Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Hey, team leader, can I talk to you for a tick?”

Lance sounds uncomfortable, and it’s enough for Keith to quit watching Shiro’s ramrod straight back disappearing round a bend in the Atlas hallway. Something’s not right, he just knows it. By now, Keith is incredibly attuned to Shiro’s emotional state. It’s like a sixth sense – or eighth, or ninth, he’s stopped counting, really. That’s not the point. Something’s not right, hasn’t been right for a while now. Keith’s Shiro-sense is tingling, as Matt would say. Keith made it a rule not to listen to Matt outside of combat and science, but in this, he’s right: Keith does have a Shiro-sense, and it’s tingling like mad. Right now, though, Lance needs him, and he’s the leader of Voltron now and not just the … whatever of Shiro.

“What is it?”

Lance squirms a bit, and that’s how Keith knows it’s serious.

“Out with it, Lance.”

“Well, … I don’t know if it’s anything, really, but …” Lance blinkers at him with his clear, blue Lance-eyes and Keith tries to look leaderly and encouraging. Lance huffs.

“Look, don’t get mad, but … is Shiro the clone again?”

“What? No!” Keith bristles. “That’s not how it works, Lance!”

“I said don’t get mad, okay? It’s just … I didn’t say anything last time, and then …” Lance wrings his hands and looks so unhappy that Keith’s ire deflates. He’s helpless against Lance’s special brand of unhappiness.

“Shiro is not a clone,” he says, but much calmer. “Though … I guess I know why you’re asking.”

It’s Allura. More specifically: Shiro and Allura. They have been very polite to each other for weeks now. Excruciatingly polite. For all that they keep presenting a united front to the Atlas crew and the entire Coalition, not to mention any adversaries they encounter, the distance between them still feels immeasurable to Keith. He is kind of glad that he isn’t the only one who’s noticed; his Shiro-sense may be on point, but his social skills still aren’t.

“Do you know what happened?” Lance asks. “Did Shiro and Allura have a fight?”

Keith grabs Lance by the scruff of his neck and pulls him back into the conference room they were just leaving when Lance approached him. They are alone now, all paladins and MFE-pilots and bridge crew long gone.

“Hey, hey, be a little gentle, bossman. Don’t damage the goods!” Lance complains, but not very vehemently. He’s probably aware, too, that it’s not a great idea to air Voltron’s dirty laundry where everyone might hear. Not that they know yet if there is indeed any dirty laundry to be aired.

“Do you know when it started?” he asks Lance, because he sure doesn’t. It was just suddenly there, this distance between Shiro and Allura, and a weird tentativeness in each and every one of Shiro’s gestures. Like he was afraid of breaking glass.

“No, I don’t. I mean, Allura and Shiro have always had this mad kind of respect for each other, but now, they’re just … polite!”

“Excruciatingly polite,” Keith murmurs. It’s like Lance can read his mind and that’s just creepy. Though maybe, it’s not so much his mind that Lance can read but Allura’s discomfort.

“Why do you think it’s Shiro’s fault?” It’s a question he has to ask, precisely because he himself doesn’t believe Shiro’s to blame at all. He loves Allura like he does all the paladins, but he also knows what it’s like to get on the wrong side of her. He’s not objective in this. Neither is Lance, but maybe they can meet in the middle.

“I don’t! Not really. But the last time there was any kind of tension between them, it was because of the clone, and I didn’t think … I don’t know what to think. This isn’t good, Keith!”

Keith doesn’t need Lance and his big, sad eyes to tell him that. Shiro and Allura are their foundation, still the leaders, even if Keith is the Head of Voltron now. They may defer to him in battle, even Captain Shirogane when the occasion calls for it, but it is them who are the diplomats, the strategists, their everything. The Voltron Coalition needs them to be strong. The team needs them to be strong. And Keith? Keith needs Shiro happy, and it hurts to see him so subdued after how far he had already come.

“We need to get to the bottom of this,” Lance says, uncharacteristically serious. Well, maybe not so uncharacteristically anymore. Something clicked in place with Lance during their fight to free Earth from Sendak, and Keith knows exactly how that feels. He shifts a little bit on the soles of his feet. Kinship with Lance still makes him feel uncomfortable, like his uniform is a few sizes too small.

“I’ll talk to Shiro,” Keith says. “I was planning to anyway, but thanks for saying something. I don’t know if I would have actually done it. I wasn’t quite sure and I don’t want to hover. Shiro hates being hovered over.”

“Well, no offence, but this isn’t about what Shiro hates. It’s about what he needs.”

“That’s … actually kind of deep, Lance. I think.”

Lance puffs out his chest. “Of course it is. I’m not just a pretty face, you know.”

“Use your pretty face to talk to Allura and I won’t tell you what I really think of it.”

“Ouch, I believe that was kind of an insult, team leader.” Lance grins at him, and it looks so grown-up Keith is almost angry. He is quite a few years older than Lance at this point, even though he stopped really keeping track. Lance shouldn’t have to be that mature, is the point.

“Let me talk to Shiro first,” he amends, “and see how far I get. If he’s keeping schtum, you can try to work your charm on Allura.”

Lance snort comes unexpected. “Yeah, well, I think that ship has sailed, man. I don’t know, I kind of fear I’ve might have missed my moment there.”

“Really?” Keith thinks of the soft glances he has caught Allura giving Lance ever since he’s come back to the team, but he doesn’t really know anything about these things. It took him an embarrassingly long talk with Romelle of all people to get a clue what Ezor might have been on about when she called him Acxa’s favourite paladin. He’s still not sure he fully gets it.

“You don’t think so?” Lance sounds hopeful, even though he probably knows about Keith’s cluelessness; Romelle isn’t very good at not talking.

Keith shrugs. “I really don’t. I think she really likes you. But I have to warn you. I know nothing.”

The look Lance gives him is shockingly soft, and Keith doesn’t understand it at all. “Mullet, that is both very true and very, very wrong.”

After this cryptic remark, Lance gives him a wave and wishes him good luck talking to Shiro. He leaves without explaining himself any further, and isn’t that just fucking typical. Keith sighs and decides to ignore it. He has no time for Lance and all his little jokes he never gets. After all, he has a captain to find.

*

Shiro longs for the Castle of Lions sometimes. He loves the Atlas, heart, soul and bones, but she is utilitarian first and foremost, no matter how advanced and amazing she is. The Castle, on the other hand, was a piece of art. Shiro adored its wide, open rooms and arching hallways. It made him feel like he could breathe and he misses that. The Atlas is his companion; the Castle was his home.

He felt like he could be quiet in the bright, high-domed rooms of the Castle, could hear himself think. It’s never quiet on the Atlas, and that’s not the fault of the ship in his head. Her presence is like something soft and warm and small in the corners of his mind, and he is utterly unable to express how huge and simultaneously tiny she feels to him. He doesn’t have words for it. The Atlas is his to protect and to mind and to foster, and she would tear the universe apart for him. He has yet to tell anybody that. He knows who would understand the sentiment in a heartbeat, of course he does, but he’s afraid that even Keith will feel obligated to inform someone about how powerful and devoted Atlas really is. And Keith would be right to do so. Nobody should wield that much power; the Lions might be wiser and even greater than Atlas is, but they are also much more strong-willed and self-determined and, in the end, less eager to please. Atlas would do anything if Shiro just asked, and he is not sure what would happen if anybody knew that. Maybe it would be for the best to take the ship away from him, he has to admit that, but he can’t lose her. Not now. He doesn’t have anything left to give. He can’t give up the Atlas. He just can’t.

Nobody asked you to, he tries to remind himself, but such are Shiro’s thoughts these days, full to the brim with half-imagined and horribly exaggerated fears of loss, loss, loss and he just can’t. He thinks of Adam and Allura and the Atlas and Keith and Black and Earth and Pidge and Lance and Hunk and the Castle and his body and his mind and his heart and there is a vice around his chest and a fist around his throat and he just can’t.

He hasn’t abused his power over the Atlas yet, and he is beyond relieved that the ship wasn’t anywhere near that planet when it happened. There is no telling what Atlas would have done had she sensed his distress; maybe there wouldn’t even be a planet anymore for him to hate. Shiro doesn’t hate much, but that planet makes the list next to Haggar and Sendak. He is careful not to let Atlas know. He’s always careful now, careful around his crew not to show the true extent of his bond with his ship, careful around the paladins not to let on how left out he sometimes still feels, careful with his mind not to show Atlas the things she can’t know and wouldn’t understand, careful with Keith in order to not ever, ever lose him, careful around Allura, Allura, Allura. All of which are reasons why Shiro is sitting wedged into a corner of Colleen’s greenhouse while having a break-down because the Princess didn’t smile at him today. Atlas is anxiously brushing against the barrier he has built between her and the darker part of his mind; he can keep her out, but he can’t keep her from noticing that he is not alright. She desperately wants to help, too young and too powerful to understand that she can’t, and Shiro feels like he is failing her, too. He has already failed Allura, and it’s tearing him apart.

Who knew, right? Who knew this would be the thing that would finally break him. Not even the Galra managed that. Not even death did.

Now, Shiro is sitting curled up in a corner surrounded by green growing things and the sorrow of an omnipotent baby-ship because a girl couldn’t bring herself to smile at him. His cheeks are wet and his human hand is trembling and he feels like something is trying to crawl out of his throat. He presses his teeth together to keep it inside and clasps his human hand with his new one. The one Allura gave him. The one that holds the crystal connecting him to his ship. Which Allura gave him. The woman he … He can’t even think it.

Keith! Keiiiiiiith!, coos the Atlas in his mind. She doesn’t know many words yet and Shiro’s not quite sure she really understands what that one means either, that it’s a name for a very specific person and not for a feeling of trust and safety and love. She does, however, grasp that the feeling and the person go together, so it’s probably all the same in the end.

Shiro raises his head just in time to catch Keith peering into the conservatory and hastily wipes the tears from his face. Keith!, the Atlas states in delight.

“Shiro?” Keith asks, and God knows how he found him. Maybe the Atlas even let him know.

“Shiro!” Keith exclaims when he sees him sitting there, hastening over and falling to his knees beside him. Shiro stares at Keith, at his worried eyes, liquid and star-lit, and at his soft, gentle face, and he almost chokes. The thing that lives in his chest and his throat and behind his teeth tries to burst out, but he forces it back. It tastes like ash.

“I’m fine,” Shiro croaks, “I’m fine.”

“Shiro,” Keith says. The tenderness of his voice has little barbs in it for Shiro’s heart to get caught on, and he gasps because it hurts too much and he is much too tender. An arm encircles his shoulders and pulls him in to rest his head on a solid chest. Keith has always been stronger than he looked, even when he was short and scrawny, and now his strength is just devastating to Shiro. Keith, enthuses the Atlas, so very confident that she has done something splendid, and Shiro grits his teeth. His human hand clenches around a fistful of Keith’s uniform.

“Shiro,” Keith says again, and his hand finds its way into Shiro’s hair, cupping the back of his head like something fragile and precious. It’s not fair.

“Talk to me,” Keith says, but Shiro can’t. It’s not his to tell, not really. There is, however, one thing he can say, and Keith has every right to hear it. Every right.

“I’m not okay,” Shiro says. “I’m not okay, Keith.”

He feels Keith’s lips press against the crown of his head, and something shatters within him. The noise he makes is very much like a whimper, but Shiro is beyond caring. He has reached the end of his tether. Shiro is done.

Chapter Text

Keith is going to murder whoever did this. Or at least severely maim. He has learnt things during his time with the Blades, things the other paladins don’t know about, and he will use them when given enough incentive. Fuck patience and fuck focus. Fuck all of it. Because this? This isn’t just some spat with Allura or some residual fragility from Shiro transitioning to the clone body or anything of that sort. This is Keith holding Shiro in his arms while Shiro is trembling like a leaf and crying tears that are so utterly silent it’s breaking Keith’s heart.

He tries to weather the storm as well as he can, tries being comforting and gentle and soft and all the things he’s generally not good at. He suppresses the urge to call Hunk or Commander Holt or Iverson or, for fuck’s sake, his mom and holds Shiro together. He can do it. He has to. He’s not a volatile kid anymore who can’t bear watching his hero fall apart. Shiro is as human as they come, still, even though he’s sometimes so much more, too, and Keith has to be the one Shiro doesn’t have to be strong with. For both their sakes. Maybe for everybody’s sake.

Eventually, the tremors seem to die down and Shiro appears more settled in his arms. He still hasn’t raised his head from where it’s burrowed into Keith’s chest or said anything, but Keith doesn’t believe he’s crying anymore.

“Hey,” he says quietly, tries to mimic his mom talking to him while he lay recovering at the hospital, “you wanna get out of here? Somewhere you can rest?” He knows he could do with a change of position; his knees are starting to fall asleep, and that just feels awkward.

Shiro shrugs. “I can’t go out there like this, Keith,” he mumbles into Keith’s uniform, and Keith’s heart is doing stupid stuff in his chest. It feels like it’s trying to turn itself upside down or something. He hasn’t got time for this. Keith wishes he could tell Shiro that he’s being stupid, only he isn’t. The Atlas crew are not the paladins, and neither he nor Shiro can be sure how they would react to seeing their captain vulnerable. Most of them are Garrison personnel, after all, and the Garrison didn’t exactly foster an environment that encouraged showing a soft underbelly. The best, the strongest, the brightest. Shiro was and is all of that, but he is also the kindest person Keith knows, and he doesn’t deserve to be scrutinized by people that just might go for his throat the moment he shows weakness or what they would perceive as such. Well, they can try. Keith will gut anyone who so much as looks at Shiro funny because of it.

“Keith.”

He glances down at Shiro, who is in the process of unfolding himself from Keith’s embrace and pulling himself back together. He’s more successful with the former than the latter.

“You don’t have to go out there,” Keith says. “Just wait a tick. I’ll take care of it.”

Shiro doesn’t protest, just nods in thanks, and Keith doesn’t know how to cope with all that faith directed at him. The two of them have always trusted each other, but this is something different and it leaves Keith jittery. Just ignore it, he tells himself and sends I-wanna-get-out-of-here-vibes to his cosmic wolf. Kosmo – Keith has given up – promptly appears and pops them to Keith’s quarters.

Not quite sure what to do, Keith settles on depositing Shiro on the ugly couch he bartered for at the impromptu alien market that sprung up around the Garrison. It’s a faded apple-green and has horrendous purple and pink flowers on it, but it’s insanely comfortable and Keith secretly loves it. Not counting the stuff at the shack, and he kind of doesn’t, it’s the first piece of furniture he has ever truly owned. Shiro should look out of place sitting on it, but he doesn’t, and he immediately snatches up one of the cushions shaped like fat animals that Pidge gave Keith for his birthday and that don’t match anything in his quarters – or anything at all, really. Keith pauses for a moment to take in the picture of the Captain of the Atlas huddled amidst apple-green and purple-pink, clutching a fuzzy unicorn to his chest, and he doesn’t know whether to laugh or to cry. He opts for disappearing to his tiny kitchenette that is not really good for anything more than preparing hot beverages or a pot of soup and comes back with two cups of tea a few minutes later. He finds Shiro with his face buried in unicorn fluff and Kosmo drooling on his shoe, which Shiro either doesn’t notice or doesn’t mind.

“Lavender,” Keith says, pushing one of the cups at Shiro when he decides to stop hiding in the cushion at the sound of Keith’s voice. “My mom swears by it.”

“Because it’s purple?” Shiro mutters, but he takes the tea.

“Hush, you,” Keith says without any bite. Kosmo’s tail is thumping on the floor; the wolf probably thinks Keith was talking to him. Keith pets his back and then Shiro’s head while he’s at it. Getting rid of his shoes, he climbs on his couch so that he’s facing Shiro’s profile and wedges his toes underneath his friend’s thigh. Shiro watches him from under his lashes while pretending to study his tea.

“Don’t analyse it, drink it,” Keith orders.

Shiro’s nose wrinkles as well as it can beneath his scar. “It’s too hot.”

Keith huffs, bends forward and blows on the tea. “There,” he says and doesn’t miss the tiny smile almost hidden behind the unicorn. Cautiously, Shiro takes a nip of his lavender tea. He looks a bit better than he did in the greenhouse, but that is not saying much. Keith can’t really parse his mood. He seems almost content on Keith’s ugly couch, sipping tea he didn’t ask for.

“It’s good,” Shiro finally says with his nose in his teacup and Keith smiles.

“See? Never question the wisdom of my mom.”

“Duly noted. I’m never doubting mom wisdom ever again.”

Keith looks at Shiro with his cup of tea and the fat, fluffy unicorn clutched in his huge Altean hand. He thinks of Krolia and Colleen Holt and Hunk and Lance with their moms and something twist deep in his gut. It used to be him, the kid on the outside looking in while other children were given hot cocoa and ice-cream and kisses by their mothers, and now he’s not. How did he fail to realize that?

“Have you talked to anyone since coming back to Earth?” he asks quietly.

Shiro raises his head, his brow furrowed. “What do you mean? I talk to people all the time.”

“About stuff that matters, Shiro. About what has happened to you the last couple of years, for example.”

“I talk to you.”

Keith sighs. Exactly how he feared. “I don’t count, Shiro.”

“Don’t say that!” Shiro sets the unicorn down in the floor next to Kosmo, who immediately starts chewing on one fat, rainbow-coloured hoof, and reaches for Keith’s hand with his Altean one. It’s startling how warm and subtle it feels to the touch. “God, Keith, you don’t even know, do you? Sometimes I feel I’m only still sane because of you.”

Keith feels the heat in his cheeks and lowers his gaze. That’s not what he meant. He wasn’t fishing for compliments or anything. He just wants Shiro to have … more. He deserves more. He deserves everything.

“How can I help?” he asks Shiro who squeezes his hand very gently.

“You are already helping. Really. I just …” He shrugs, sips his tea again, coughs. “I’m … I’m scared.”

Shiro studies his tea. Kosmo looks up from trying to mangle the unicorn and whines. The lights start flickering. Keith says nothing, doesn’t even move. He knows how monumental what he just heard is.

“I’m scared that this is it,” Shiro says quietly. “I don’t know if I can go on. I’ve put myself back together so many times, you put me back together so many times, Allura …” And he stops. Oh, Keith thinks.

“So this does have something to do with Allura. You two have been … weird.” But what? It can’t be something Allura did, can it? She and Shiro love each other, Keith knows that. She would never do anything to hurt him. Would she? No, no it can’t be. Keith won’t accept this.

“Shiro. What happened?”

Shiro shrugs and reaches for the unicorn again. Kosmo licks his hand and then snuggles up to his leg. Shiro drops the unicorn onto his lap and pets Kosmo. He takes a sip from his tea. He puts the cup down on Keith’s tiny couch table. He scratches Kosmo between the ears with his now free human hand and uses the Altean one to start giving the wolf a backrub. He doesn’t look at Keith. Who lets him get away with it for quite some time. Kosmo can use the cuddles and maybe Shiro will feel obligated to break the silence sooner or later.

He doesn’t. Kosmo is getting the backrub of his life. Keith should have known he would never outstubborn Shiro. Change of plan.

“Shiro. Talk to me.”

Shiro shrugs again. Keith pulls his lower lip between his teeth. Shiro offers the unicorn to Kosmo who licks its nose. Fine.

“You said I count, Shiro.”

Shiro honest-to-god flinches, and Keith hates himself a little bit. He pulls his toes out from under Shiro’s thigh because he somehow doesn’t feel like he deserves to keep them there anymore and sits up straight on the couch. Time to be the leader. Fuck.

“Listen,” he says. “I get it. You don’t want to talk about it. But if it’s something between you and Allura, you know I can’t just let it rest. It’s going to affect the team. It already is. Allura has been acting like some kind of princess pod person, Lance is worried sick, and now I’m angry at her without even knowing why because it sure as hell appears to me like she hurt you real bad.”

That does it. Shiro looks at him with glittering eyes. “She didn’t! It’s not her fault, Keith.” Count on Shiro to always be Allura’s paladin. Keith feels miserable, but he can’t stop now.

“Okay. So it isn’t her fault. Is it yours?”

Another shrug, and Keith will thank all gods, human, Galran and Altean alike, if he never sees Shiro make that gesture again.

“I don’t think it is,” he decides.

“How can you be so sure?” Shiro whispers.

“Because I know you. Whatever this is, it’s bad. What you had … it’s almost gone, isn’t it? And you’re not capable of doing anything that would wreck a friendship like that.”

Shiro snorts quietly. “You know very well that that isn’t true.”

“That was not you, and you know it. That was Haggar.” Who Keith will hang, draw and quarter when they finally find her. Just to be clear. And anyone who has anything to do with breaking down Shiro this time can get in line. Shiro will not be broken on his watch without there being hell to pay. It's hard to keep a lid on his fury and to lead by example, he says so: “I’m furious.”

Shiro flinches again and Keith raises his hand. “Not at you. I’m furious that somebody hurt you. Again. And I can’t be there for you. Again.”

“You’re always there for me,” Shiro says roughly, but Keith shakes his head.

“Not enough. Shiro, I’m not enough.”

“Yes, you are!”

“No, I’m not. You said it yourself: That’s why there’s five of us.”

Shiro keeps silent. Both of his hands are clenching around the corners of the unicorn cushion. The lights flicker. Oh, Keith thinks again. On the outside looking in.

“But that’s not entirely right,” he continues slowly. “Because in truth, there have always been seven of us, haven’t there?”

Shiro looks at him again. There is a shimmer in his eyes that Keith could drown in and doesn’t.

“We need you, Shiro,” he says, “both of you. So please: If you can’t talk to me about it, then talk to her. Or it might just tear us all apart in the long run. It’s only a matter of time until Hunk, Pidge and Coran catch on that something is wrong, if they haven’t already. Shiro, we need Allura and you to work. I’m sorry. I wish I could just let you hide here with me, but I can’t.”

Keith can pinpoint the exact moment Shiro shoulders the responsibility Keith has just given him. The shimmering look disappears from his eyes, his back straightens and his face takes on an almost serene expression. It’s like watching him put on armour. He puts down the unicorn, squeezes Keith’s hand one more time and rises from the couch.

“You’re right, Keith,” he says, his voice decisive and devoid of any uncertainty. “I should have talked to her days ago. Thank you.”

And with that, Shiro is gone. Keith stares at the spot on his ugly couch where he sat not a minute ago, so open and scared and hurt. He fucking knew that the only way to stop Shiro from falling apart was to appeal to his sense of duty. He knows he did the right thing. He knows this. But it doesn’t feel like it. He catches the beady eyes of the fat, fluffy unicorn. He's pretty sure the little fucker is judging him.

Chapter Text

Shiro feels like somebody reached into his mind and flicked a switch. Of course he has to talk to Allura. She is his friend, and they have been through so much together. Now that he has been inside of her, soul and body, he’d better find his backbone and look his friend in the eye. Time to man up, as Pidge has taken to saying. Maybe it should be woman up, he thinks, because being a man has helped him pretty well zilch.

Thank god for Keith setting him straight. Or, you know, not. … Shiro hates how his mind works sometimes. He also hates that he gets so down, bouts of self-flagellation leading down a rabbit-hole of despair. Intellectually, he understands what this is and that it isn’t his fault: depression with a hefty dose of PTSD and survivor’s guilt. But knowing that doesn’t help one bit when he gets like this. The break-down in the greenhouse hasn’t been his only bad spell by a long shot, though it was one of the worst. It was also the only one anybody other than the Atlas or Black has witnessed.

I’m not okay, he thinks again. He should have said it out loud sooner. He should have said it to Keith sooner. It’s out in the open now, though, and he feels so relieved he has no words for it. He should do something nice for Keith; maybe he’ll ask Hunk what kinds of tea Keith would like or pester Pidge where she got those cute cuddly cushion animals from to add to Keith’s collection. Buy him a dragon-friend for his unicorn perhaps. Or maybe he’d better get something for Kosmo; Keith would probably appreciate that more. It’s just … oh god, he just loves him. It shouldn’t be down to Keith to pull him out of a slump, but he did it anyway, because that’s the kind of person Keith is. Keiiiith, rejoices the Atlas and Shiro agrees.

He finds Allura in the little alchemy lab Coran and Sam installed for her. She uses it to broaden the knowledge she brought back from Oriande, and as always, it’s awe-inspiring to watch. Shiro has never gotten the impression that being an alchemist is Allura’s true life passion, but they need her to be one if they want to take on Haggar. The princess is a true natural at Altean magic either way. Lifegivers, she called the beings inhabiting Oriande, and Shiro secretly believes that’s exactly what Allura is, even though it may be some kind of blasphemy to think so. As he stands in the doorway, watching her work with steady hands and an adorably furrowed brow, he doesn’t care.

“Allura,” he calls softly and still manages to startle her. He doesn’t know if it’s a sign of how deeply focused she’s been on her studies or if it’s because of him. Well, he’s here to find out, isn’t he?

“Shiro!” She looks at him over the empty space of her lab, and there’s a naked kind of helplessness in her eyes that doesn’t suit her. “How … What can I do for you?”

“Stop looking at me like that,” he says on impulse, and she inhales sharply.

He sighs and rubs his eyes. He’s so tired. “I’m sorry. That didn’t come out right. Can we talk, Allura? I think we should.”

She looks at him a moment longer, her hands clasped in front of her body, and then she exhales like letting go of something. “You’re right. It’s high time. And I’m sorry, too.”

He doesn’t ask her what she’s sorry for. There’s a plethora of things to choose from, and in the end, it doesn’t really matter. Of course they’re both sorry. That’s not the point.

Allura beckons him into the lab and he follows her to the little alcove the Atlas created for her, with a floor to ceiling window, a comfy seating area and little nests for the mice. Allura is one of the few people Atlas already likes on her own behalf rather than Shiro’s, and it shows. If someone asked, Shiro would translate the thought-feeling attached to Allura in the ship’s mindscape to something like “heart-and-soul-person”, while Coran is “hands” and Sam “the-one-who-builds”. Griffin is “the-one-who-gets-cold-coffee”, but he’s pretty sure that’s his fault and not the ship’s. In any case, Allura deserves a sparkly divan and a view of the stars; Shiro and the Atlas are in total agreement on that.

They sit down next to the window and the princess looks at him expectantly. Shiro feels like Krolia’s lavender tea is trying to climb back out of his mouth. Focus!

“How are you, Allura?” Well, he has to start somewhere.

She gives him a wane smile. “Tired. Frustrated. That witch has simply disappeared and left us to clean up her messes. Warlords, desolate planets, the remnants of the Galra Empire in disarray … Sometimes, I almost miss Zarkon. At least he was well organized.”

Shiro smiles back, probably just as wanly. “It’s hard to regret the fact that he’s gone, though, isn’t it?”

Allura shrugs and plays with the hem of her uniform. “Maybe. But things felt simpler back then, didn’t they? More clear-cut.”

“Maybe we were just younger.”

The princess laughs; it sounds like he has startled it out if her. “My goodness, you talk like an old man, Captain Shirogane. An old, old man.”

“I feel like it. Sometimes.”

“You’re not.” Traces of her laughter are still on her face. “At least not compared to me.”

“I’ve given up trying to understand how time works for us,” he admits. “How old are you? How old am I? I have no idea.”

Suddenly, her hand is on his, and before he can overthink it, he links his flesh-and-blood fingers with hers. Her strong grip is incredibly reassuring.

“The last thing I’ve ever wanted was to hurt you, Allura,” he says softly.

“Shiro. I know that. And you didn’t. Not … You know I would never want to hurt you either, don’t you?”

“Of course I do. Allura, that’s not even a question.”

“Then why can we barely stand to be in the same room anymore?”

Her question twist him up inside, but it’s also a relief of sorts. He rests his brow on their entwined hands. “Because we are both idiots and haven’t talked until now?”

Allura gives a very unprincess-like huff. “I hoped things would simply go back to normal. It’s very vexing that it is so difficult.”

They are both quiet for a bit, contemplating the brilliant red-and-pink nebula swirling past Allura’s window. Sad?, the Atlas enquires cautiously. Yes, sad, Shiro thinks back. People are sad sometimes. The Atlas pouts. He shoos her into a corner of his mind and tells her to stay put, hoping she will listen to him. The nebula outside is colour atop of colour and his heart burns because he used to feel this cosmic beauty to his very core and now doesn’t quite anymore. For one endless, terrible moment he yearns for the empty quiet of the astral plane.

“You know the Inturians meant it as a sign of respect,” Allura eventually says, startling him out of the emptiness. “To partake in the Night of the Sacred is seen as the highest honour. And it means something that they had the two of us spent the night together instead of, say, Romelle and Griffin or any of the other delegates, really. They saw a connection between us.”

For one single night, she was the most beautiful sight he’d ever beheld, Shiro remembers that, and having her, being had by her, was an epiphany. He can’t quite connect to the feeling anymore; he remembers the ecstasy of it, but even the clone’s memories are more vivid and more his. And yet, when he looks at Allura now, the faint echo of it is still there, vibrating somewhere deep in his bones.

“They should have asked first,” he says harshly and immediately bites his tongue. He was fibbing before. They did try to talk about it, once, but that was exactly how far they got because Allura’s insane sense of diplomacy drove him up the wall. What the Inturians did wasn’t okay.

“Yes, they should have informed us about the particulars of that night. You can’t just assume that your customs are shared or understood by everyone,” the princess now says primly. “I’m sorry if I gave you the impression I thought otherwise before.”

Shiro deflates. “I’m not sure I was ready to listen, before. I’m sorry, too. It just …” He gulps. There’s desert sand in his throat and his heartbeat is picking up. Alarmed, the Atlas burrows back into the forefront of his mind. Keith?, she ask and he closes the door on her. He can’t have her here right now. She starts wailing like a lost puppy on the other side of the mental barrier, until a soft, powerful purr drowns out her pitiful cries. It’s the mental equivalent of Black picking the Atlas up by the scruff of her neck and carrying her off to the Lion’s own vast consciousness. Shiro heaves an exhausted sigh.

“Is everything alright?” Allura is eyeing him with concern.

“Yeah, don’t worry. Black just volunteered to mind Atlas for a bit. It’s … I can’t talk about that stuff with her in my head. She wouldn’t understand and I don’t want her here for this.”

Thank you, he sends to the Lion, and Black gives a long-suffering rumble. Go talk to your princess, paladin. Leave the kitten to me. Shiro feels duly chastised and startles when Allura gently strokes his temple.

“It’s very crowded in there, isn’t it?” she muses. “I didn’t realize.”

“I don’t mind most of the time. Black and the others usually keep their distance, and I love Atlas, I truly do. She’s just new.”

“The others?” Allura’s eyes have become sharp. “Does that mean you can feel the other Lions, too?”

“Yes? I … I thought you knew that.

“Not … quite.” Allure pinches the bridge of her nose. “It seems we have a lot of catching up to do.”

“Well, like I said: We’re idiots.” He makes an unhappy face. “I’m actually only here because Keith told me to. He says we’re tearing the team apart, Allura. We have to fix this.”

The princess peers at him, suddenly mischievous. “Keith did, did he?”

“Hush,” he says, his cheeks heating up. “That’s not what this is about.”

“Maybe it is, though, a little bit. Don’t you think? I don’t want you to lose your chance with him because of this.”

“I’m not even sure if I have a chance with him.”

“Nonsense. He loves you.”

“Like a brother, Allura. Those were his exact words. Twice.”

“Hmpf.”

“I love you when you are being so dignified, Princess.”

“Only then?”

“Always, Allura. And that’s kind of the problem. I feel …” Come on, say it. Focus. “You’ve given me so much. Black, Voltron, a mission, my life, my arm, even my connection to the Atlas. Everything the Galra took, you gave back, and more. And now, I’ve been made to take something from you that I … that nobody was entitled to, not without your say-so.” He almost chokes on empty air. “I feel like my body was used to hurt you. And there was nothing I could do to stop it.” He squeezes his eyes shut. “Allura, I’m so, so sorry that there was nothing I could do.”

He hears something rustle, and then her arms enfold him. “I don’t blame you, Shiro,” she whispers. “I don’t blame you for any of that.” Relief floods him like rain after a drought. He returns her embrace desperately.

They sit like that for a very long time, until he notices her getting more and more tense. “Allura. Are you alright?”

She lets go of him and looks outside at the star-birthing nebula they’re still circling for Slav and Sam to collect the particles they need for what they’re cooking up to maybe find a trace of Romelle’s people.

“No, I’m not alright.” Allura’s admission is so quiet, he almost doesn’t catch it. Only he does.

“Please. What can I do?”

She gives him a look that is kind of harsh and it surprises him after how soft and cautious she has been with him. Sometimes he forgets she is a princess that came into her own during a war.

“Firstly, Captain, you can stop assuming that my hurt is somehow greater or weightier than yours. That is rather arrogant, I must say. You have taken nothing from me that I haven’t also taken from you. Let’s make one thing abundantly clear: If I had not, at that moment, wanted what you did, if there had been the tiniest part of me that had felt taken advantage of by you, then I would have broken you like a twig. Are we clear?”

Shiro gulps and nods hastily. He feels about the size of an Arusian. Allura hmpfs again and crosses her arms in front of her chest.

“Well, good. That being said: It happened. Neither of us would have done it if we hadn’t been given the Stardust of the Sacred Night, or whatever they call that cursed concoction. I know I insisted we avoid a diplomatic incident, but that was princess-me. Allura-Me is furious. The entire wretched thing is destroying what we had, Shiro. I loved what we had! Do you know what it’s like to be a princess?”

“Uh …”

“Well, of course you don’t. Shiro, I never had an equal. I had my father and my mother who were above me, and everyone else who was … below. Until there was you. You gave me your respect and your support, even though you didn’t have to because I wasn’t your princess or the princess of anything anymore; but at the same time, you never kowtowed to me or even just acquiesced to something you didn’t believe in just because I said so. You treated me as an equal, Shiro, absolutely and without question. The other paladins did, too, later on, but first, there was you. And I want that back. I know that you expect me to be disturbed because you put your penis in my vagina, and yes, it's intolerable how it happened. But honestly? I think I’m more upset that you now treat me like you are not worth to be in my presence. Or like something to stand guard over, I’m not quite sure which it is, but I hate it.”

Shiro blinks at her. “So … you are angry.”

“Yes. I. Am!” She jumps to her feet und buries her fist in the sparkly upholstery of her divan. “I’m furious that my father’s once closest ally murdered him and most of my people.” Smack. “I’m livid that I have to keep fighting a war I didn’t start.” Smack. “I’m fuming that the man I was about to give my heart to turned out to be a bloody delusional mass murderer. Who had the gall to truly care for me and then go and lose his mind and made me strand him in the quiznaking quintessence field!” Smack. “I’m outraged that one of the only Alteans left is responsible for a big part of this and is using what remains of my people for her own ends!” Smack. Smack. “And I’m angry that someone caused me to sleep with my best friend and made me lose him!” Smack, smack, smack!

The last smack is her fist colliding with his Altean hand. He’s stood up and caught her punch to tug her into his arms again.

“You haven’t lost me, Allura,” he says and tucks her head underneath his chin. “I’m sorry I made you feel like you had.”

“I’m sorry, too,” she mumbles into his neck. Shiro’s lost count of how often they’ve said it. He was wrong; both of them being so fucking sorry is exactly the point of this. “I’m sorry I keep making you feel bad, Shiro. I’m sorry that I’m not as revolted by what happened between us as you are. I wouldn’t have done it had I been in my right might, but I can’t help that I’m not disgusted by the mere fact of us having been intimate.”

“No, no, no, no, no.” He clasps her body to his like someone would come and rip her away. “That’s not … I’m not disgusted by you. I’m disgusted because I feel like I let myself be used again. And I don’t know how to get over that.”

She clutches him right back and her strength once more overwhelms him. “I’m so angry at you,” she confesses. “And I don’t know why. I don’t want to be.”

He has started to sway them back and forth and she goes with it. They have reached an impasse, he feels, and he is not quite sure if they’ve achieved anything. He does feel lighter, though, and maybe Allura does to. He thinks about her dainty fist pummelling her divan.

“Hey,” he whispers into her ear. “You want to spar?”

She looks up at him with glittering eyes.

*

When Keith gets to the training deck later that day, there is a crowd of people gathered there. Irritation furrows his brow; he was hoping to let off some steam in peace, and the training deck is usually pretty deserted at this time of day. What are all these people doing here? Keith squeezes past an Unilu and a gaggle of Garrison personnel to see what all the fuss is about. He spots three of his paladins at the very front of the gathering and comes to a halt next to a flabbergasted Hunk, feeling his own jaw drop. What. The. Fuck.

Shiro und Allura are sparring. Or at least that’s what he hopes they are doing. Because from where he’s standing, it looks more like they are beating the living daylights out of each other. It’s as beautiful as a thunderstorm over a churning sea, but Keith still feels chills running down his spine.

“What’s going on?” he asks weakly.

“Aha!” Lance exclaims when he notices Keith’s, pointing an accusing finger at the sight before them. “Is that your doing? That’s your idea of fixing this? Telling Shiro to beat up Allura?”

“I … I told him to talk to her,” Keith says and he can’t even muster the energy to defend himself against Lance’s accusation. Thankfully, Pidge has him covered.

“Doesn’t look like it’s Allura who’s getting beat up,” she says calmly and adjusts her glasses. “Relax, Lance. Seems to me they’re having fun.”

“Fun,” Veronica, who’s standing next to her brother, echoes. She’s watching the whole spectacle with stars in her eyes, which Keith just finds scary. However, Veronica scares him a little bit in general. He doesn’t have much to do with her, but she appears to him like a more ruthless, more organized version of Lance, and that’s a disturbing thought in and of itself.

“That’s not fun!” Lance is almost screeching and his finger-pointing becomes more agitated. Keith looks back to the training mat and he isn’t sure if he agrees with Lance or not.

Shiro and Allura are blurs of motion. She’s wielding some kind of glowy bo staff even Keith has never seen before, while he is fighting with his bare hands, though given his Altean arm, this isn’t exactly saying much. They seem pretty evenly matched. While Shiro is probably the more accomplished fighter, Allura has him beat at both strength and speed. Keith’s not quite sure who’s more agile, and they are both absolutely ferocious. No wonder everyone is staring.

On the mat, Allura swings her staff at Shiro’s crotch, and every male bystander winzes in anticipated sympathy, but a resounding clang tells Keith that Shiro managed to use his metal arm as a shield at the very last instant. Allura utilizes the staff to give herself a boost and wraps her thighs around Shiro’s neck. He kicks away her staff and both of them go down on the mat.

“Oh brilliant, and now they’re wrestling,” Lance despairs. “Keith, do something!”

Keith is not sure there is anything he can do. A murmur like wind in trees goes through the crowd when Allura manages to not only wind herself out of Shiro’s grasp but lift him up bodily and slam him back onto the mat. He rolls over one shoulder and sweeps her legs out from under her, and they are down again. Hunk whimpers.

“This is absolutely wonderful,” gushes Veronica. “Why didn’t you tell me that your princess is so badass, Lance?”

“Not my princess,” Lance grouses.

“Methinks thou dost protest too much,” grins his sister and Lance squawks. Keith closes his eyes. He opens them again when he hears Allura cackle. She is sitting on Shiro’s chest and has both his wrists pinned to the mat. Keith is pretty sure he lets her, judging by the huge grin on his face.

“I yield,” Shiro declares and the crowd twitters.

“We don’t yield on this ship,” Pidge hollers into the ring. “Get your ass free, Shiro! We fight like men here!”

“Like women!” Shiro shouts back and flips Allura, who shrieks in outrage.

“Our friends are all terrible,” Hunk says forlornly. Keith doesn’t know what to think. Both Shiro and Allura seem bright and vibrant while rolling on the floor and trying to one-up each other, a stark contrast to the pale shadows of themselves they’ve been over the last few weeks. And yet he can’t fight a sense of unease. It’s all fun and games, Matron Margaret from one of the nicer homes he misspent his youth at used to say, adding some inane conclusion like “until someone loses the match” or “until the chickens come home to roost” or, Keith’s least favourite, “until the last straw breaks the camel’s back”. And as Allura tries to get Shiro into a headlock while the Altean arm is zipping around her, Keith has to think of Matron Margaret and wonders what the last straw will be and who will end up the camel.

Chapter Text

Three days in, and Keith gets the suspicion the camel might eventually be Lance. Shiro and Allura have gone from civilly distant co-workers to being thick as thieves. It’s as if their impromptu beating-the-crap-out-of-each-other session has stripped away a veneer of politeness and maybe even a veneer of pain. Mornings and evenings find them huddled together in the Paladin Longue, silver-and-white heads bent over some problem or other, if they’re not giggling like little school girls. Pidge has started to roll her eyes at them, while Hunk watches them like a content mother hen, which basically amounts to the same level of approval. While there is still some kind of tension between them at times, it’s decidedly different from before and might even be positive; Keith can’t really tell. He has caught them sparring on two more occasions, but those bouts lacked the ferociousness of the first one, which has already gone down in Atlas history. The crew are talking about it in awe, like they saw titans clash or something, the entire thing clearly having furthered Allura’s rep with the Garrison personnel especially. Keith can’t help a feeling of sweet, dark satisfaction in face of their astonishment. He isn’t sure what they thought of Allura – and Coran and Romelle – up until then, and he doesn’t really want to know, lest he get mad at people he’s obliged to work with for the betterment of the universe. Or something.

That’s not the point anyway. The point is that Shiro and Allura were breaking apart and now they’re not. Which is good. Very good. Vital even. He’s glad. Bordering on ecstatic. Totally. Right now in particular.

It’s early evening, and the both of them are sprawled on one of the couches in the Paladin Longue. Allura is doing the nails of Shiro’s left hand, her legs draped over his thighs, and his Altean fingers are working some kind of oil into her long, gleaming tresses. They both look utterly relaxed in their little bubble, and Keith is reminded of Rizavi calling them the ultimate power couple the other day. He didn’t quite get it then. He does now. They look like two parts of a whole made of starlight and brilliance. Keith feels kind of silly that he hasn’t seen it before. It’s very likely anybody but him and Lance understood exactly what all that tension between Shiro and Allura was about, and now, he finally does, too. Good. That’s … good. He just feels a bit sad on Lance’s behalf, that’s all.

“Keith! Hey. You’re here.” Shiro’s greeting comes with a sunny smile and an eyebrow waggle, probably because he doesn’t have a free hand to wave with. Keith smiles back, even though it turns out a bit wonky. Because of Lance and Keith feeling sad for him, probably. He supposes.

“Hello, Keith.” Allura is wearing a small, lion-like smirk. “Come sit with us. As you can see, the others are not here yet. How unusual for them not to be punctual.”

“Uh … I don’t want to …”

“I can do your nails,” she says enthusiastically and waves the contraption she was applying to Shiro’s pinky at him. “What do you think, Shiro? Keith has the hands for pastel nail polish, doesn’t he? They’re so dainty!”

Keith looks at his hands in horror. Dainty?

“Black is the only colour for Keith, I’d say,” Shiro replies earnestly, but his eyes are sparkling. Keith shrugs. He kind of likes black, but he likes red, too.

“I think black looks better on you,” he says and feels awkward. Allura grins at him.

“You know what? I think you’re both right.” She’s laughing at them, he can tell. Not in a mean way, because it’s Allura, but still. Shiro sticks out his tongue at her, and she threatens to poke it back in. It’s sweet. And kind of annoying.

“Ha, ha,” Keith says, although he doesn’t get the joke. “Just leave my nails alone, Allura.”

The princess pouts and it looks adorable. Keith has to smile a little bit for real now. It’s been so long that he has seen Allura playful.

“I can add sparkles,” she offers hopefully and Keith laughs. Shiro beams at him when he sits down next to him. Fuck it. If Shiro and Allura make each other happy, Lance will have to deal with it. Only, he will probably need emotional support. Keith shudders. Maybe he can somehow bribe Veronica to take care of it. Although that would require him to talk to Veronica. And it probably wouldn’t be very leader-like. Damn.

Luckily, Lance doesn’t seem to need emotional support quite yet. Over the course of the evening, he remains his usual, moderately lovable, oblivious Lance-self. The paladins plus Coran and Romelle have come together to play some game that requires them to team up and chase little colourful spheres through the Lounge which explode in glitter when you don’t touch them right. Allura insists it’s a traditional Altean teambuilding exercise; even with Coran backing her up, though, Keith still believes that she invented the game herself. Lance, of course, loves it and manages to get more glitter on his person than all the other paladins combined. He looks like a swarm of pixies threw up on him. Pidge berates him for missing the point of the game and explodes a green sphere right over his head because he made her lose. Romelle and Hunk have somehow succeeded in squeezing under the couch table to hide from the glitter and are munching on the mystery sandwiches Hunk made, while Shiro and Allura, overachievers that they are, have hoarded an entire mound of intact spheres in their corner. Keith and Coran have enlisted Kosmo’s help to herd as many of the things together as they can without having to touch them, causing Lance and Pidge to chase them around the room for cheating. Keith hasn’t laughed this hard in weeks. And when his mom peers into the Longue, regarding them with an indulgent smile before skewering a purple-coloured sphere with her knife to ruin Shiro and Allura’s clean sweep and glitter-free uniforms, Keith is flooded with a fuzzy, warm feeling he’s starting to associate with family and begins to hope that, maybe, nobody will have to be the camel at all.

–

Keith brings the issue up with his mom the following evening anyway. He thought it through last night. While he trusts Shiro and Allura to be professional and knows Lance is anything but selfish, he still prefers being prepared to going la-la-la and pretending the potential for drama doesn’t exist. It’s his duty as Head of Voltron to guarantee that his paladins remain functional. So he asks Krolia during their biweekly mother-and-son-dinner in his quarters what she thinks of romantic relationships within a team and how the Blades usually handle things in that regard. To his surprise, there’s a glint of humour in her eyes, while she’s sinking her fangs into a bread roll.

“Hn,” she says and chews with a grin. “Well, as you can probably guess, romance is not really encouraged among the Blades. Kolivan once gave me a very stern and earnest talk about it.”

Keith snorts at the thought and Krolia’s grin widens. “That being said, it is very hard to work as a close-knit unit in constant life-and-death situations and avoid romantic entanglement completely. It happens. And in my experience, preventing people from being together to maintain team cohesion is a pointless exercise. The feelings are there either way. If you’re dealing with somebody who will put their loved one before a mission, they will do it, whether they were allowed to act on their romantic feelings or not.”

She regards him with a soft expression, probably thinking about his dad. However, Keith is pretty sure neither Shiro nor Allura would put anything before a mission, so that’s not what he’s worried about.

“But what if two people being together changes the entire dynamic of a group? I’m not saying that’s a reason to not let it happen at all, but how would you handle it?”

“Be open about it,” Krolia says immediately. “Listen, Voltron is a special case anyway, isn’t it? You’re structured very non-hierarchically. You’re the leader, but so is Shiro and sometimes Allura, and Lance, Pidge and Hunk can take over at any given time too, am I right?”

He nods. “Our connection through the Lions makes it easy. We can take many shortcuts and don’t have to talk everything through in minute detail.”

“Yes, that goes for battle situations. But even outside of it, Team Voltron has a very flat hierarchy and is rather communicative.”

“That’s because of Shiro. He set that tone from the beginning.”

She gives him a look Keith would interpret as “Duh” from everyone but Kolivan and possibly Iverson. He returns it.

“So what? You’re saying I don’t have to worry about it at all and should just let Shiro do his thing?”

One corner of her mouth curls up. “Well, I wouldn’t go that far. Maybe you could … I don’t know, what is the expression … have his backside?”

“Have his back, mom. It’s have his … you know what, never mind. How should I do that?”

Her look is indescribably fond for another moment, before her expression turns more serious. “As I said: communication is incredibly important, especially with a team as tightly knit as yours. Don’t try to keep it secret from the others in order to make it easier for everybody or to not inconvenience them with your emotions. You’re all practically in each other’s heads anyway. So bring it out in the open and talk about how everybody’s feeling.”

He makes a disgusted moue, and Krolia laughs, covering his hand with hers. “Believe me, shining star of mine, I know you don’t like it, but it’ll prove better in the long run.”

She goes back to grinning around her bread-and-stew and leaves Keith to consider her words. He already knows she’s right, but he doesn’t have to be glad about it.

“Okay,” he finally says after a few doboshes of silent eating. “So, do you think we should all just … I don’t know, sit down in a circle and talk about what it means for us that Shiro and Allura are together?”

Krolia’s spoon stops halfway to her mouth. She blinks at him. Blinks some more. Her stew drips back onto her plate.

“Excuse me, what?” she finally says, and Keith has never seen his mom this flummoxed. Her bafflement makes him ill at ease, too.

“Well, I’m kind of worried that Lance might feel a bit jilted. He wouldn’t take it out on them on purpose, but you never …”

“Shiro and Allura.”

“Yes.”

“Shiro and Allura.”

“Uh … Yes?”

“Does anybody else know?”

“What? I … I’m not sure.”

“Do they know?”

“Mom! Yes, I’m pretty sure they know.”

“How sure?”

“I … oh.” He stops to contemplate her question in spite of how strangely she put it. Could it be that he over-interpreted things? Shiro and Allura may still be in the early stages of their relationship or not even, um, have sealed the deal. Who knows how these things work? It must be difficult to decide when you stop being friends and start becoming something else. Or can you be both simultaneously? Shiro and Allura might not be ready to tell the team yet.

“Maybe I should talk to Shiro first,” he thinks out loud.

“Yes,” his mom says emphatically. “Please do. Talk to Shiro. At length and in detail. Maybe take Black and fly away for a few days. I hear Giltaret has beautiful beaches.”

“What? Mom, please, I’m trying to be serious here.”

Krolia sighs and finally puts her spoon down. “I know, Keith. I’m sorry. I just ...” She shakes her head. “You’ll see, I promise. Just talk to Shiro. And remember: be open. No secrets, no hiding.”

“Okay,” he nods, still a bit baffled. He takes a bite of his stew, but it tastes kind of bland, in his opinion, and he lost his appetite. He keeps eating anyway, too used to not waste food.

“Thanks, mom,” he adds belatedly. She’s being weird, but she’s helped him anyway, and he knows she’ll always be there for him. All of a sudden, the fumes of the lukewarm stew sting in his eyes. He has to think of Shiro on his ugly couch clutching a fluffy unicorn and clears his throat.

“Speaking of Shiro, mom … Could you maybe … Would you mind mothering him a bit?”

Krolia smirks again, just a little. “You want me to mother the Captain of the Atlas. Seriously?”

“He’s not just that. And he doesn’t really have … anybody.”

“He has you. He has Allura, whether you’re right or wrong. And the other paladins.”

“But he doesn’t have a mom.”

“Oh Keith,” she says, and her eyes are soft with love. “Don’t worry, my son. You go talk to your Captain, and after, I will mother him all you want. I suspect I won’t even have a choice.”

“You’re being really cryptic tonight, mom,” he mutters but lets her peck him on the cheek anyway. Apropos of nothing, he catches himself fearing that the camel might somehow turn out to be himself.

–

An opportunity to talk to Shiro in private comes up on the horizon sooner than Keith would have thought, as he is cornered by his friend the next morning right after breakfast. Well, “cornered” might not be the right word, but Shiro radiates some kind of nervous energy Keith can’t read, and it has him immediately on edge. It goes like this:

“Keith! Hi,” says Shiro.

“Hi?” Keith answers; it comes out more like a question because they’ve just had breakfast together with the rest of Team Voltron.

“Hi,” Shiro says again and rubs his neck with his left hand. “Hey. Do you want dinner?”

“Dinner?” Keith parrots in bewilderment. “We’ve just had breakfast.”

Shiro closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. His cheeks are kind of rosy and Keith can relate. He feels sort of embarrassed, too. Shiro clears his throat.

“I didn’t mean now. Obviously. Sorry. I meant to say, are you free for dinner the next couple of days? I’d like to talk with you.”

“Oh!” Seems Shiro’s had the same thought as him, or rather as his mom. Figures. “Yes, of course. Whenever you want, really. I’m free.”

“How do you feel about the day after tomorrow, then? I fear I’ll be beat after the big Atlas-Voltron drill today and Mitch wants to go through some Garrison legalese tomorrow, so that’s out, too.”

It still gives Keith major creeps to hear Shiro call Iverson by his first name; he prefers to pretend that Iverson doesn’t have a first name, but that is neither here nor there. His friend seems out of sorts, is the point, and it gets his Shiro-sense going.

“I’m fine with whatever,” he shrugs. A quick look over his shoulder tells him that the corridor is deserted, but he takes a step closer to Shiro nevertheless. “Are you alright?”

Shiro’s gaze grows impossibly gentle, and his right hand finds its way onto Keith’s shoulder. “We both know I’m not. But thanks to you, I might be getting there.”

Keith opens his mouth to protest on principle, but is stopped by Shiro’s flesh-and-blood finger against his lips. “I mean it, Keith. Thank you. For being there for me. Always, but especially the other day in the greenhouse. I was … It was bad, Keith.”

“I know,” he whispers, and he also knows that making up and possibly making out with Allura will not have magically cured Shiro from … well, everything. Keith is not stupid. He never assumed he found his best friend wedged into a corner crying his eyes out because he had suddenly realized that he was in love with their fabulous princess.

“I’ll tell you,” Shiro promises. “What brought it on. That’s why the dinner, partly. I have to tell you.”

“You don’t have to do anything, Shiro. I’m just glad everything’s worked out between you and Allura.”

Shiro smiles and it’s a sad smile and that baffles Keith. “Well, I wouldn’t go that far.”

“No? You two seem … good.”

“We’re working on it, let’s put it that way, yeah? It’s …” Shiro huffs a laugh and rubs his eyes. “It’s sort of like therapy, to be honest.”

“That sounds … nice?” Weird, is what he means. Kind of unromantic, too. But he can’t very well say that to Shiro’s face.

“Don’t mind me,” Shiro says with his goofiest grin. “It’s complicated, but it’s not bad, I don’t think. I’ll tell you everything. I promise, alright? Dinner. In two days, okay?

“Okay,” Keith says weakly and is rather worried about Shiro. Maybe he is the camel after all.

–

Only they don’t get the time to talk. After weeks of no combat, of aiding refugees, conducting diplomatic visits and scouring the far reaches of space for Haggar and the Alteans, the Atlas gets attacked by an entire Galra fleet. Keith almost isn’t surprised.

The warlord calls himself Norrn, Master of Galaxies, a fanatic who, according to Acxa, rivals Sendak in his zeal for Galran purity. Fortunately, he’s not Sendak’s equal as a strategist, but he’s taken hold of several former Empire strongholds and has had three years to amass resources and soldiers. His face on Atlas’ viewscreen looks haughty and cruel when he demands of Shiro to hand over all Galran traitors and half-breeds on board or face the wrath of the Pure Galra. The Captain’s eyes flicker to where Keith is standing at his usual spot on the bridge and he gives Shiro a nod. Norrn’s fleet is impressive, but nothing the Atlas, MFEs and Voltron combined can’t handle. So the drill will turn into a battle; it’s not something they aim for, but they also won’t run from it.

Shiro tells Norrn exactly that, with a few choice words about how he will never give up one single person under his command. It sends shivers down Keith’s spine. Norrn shows his pointy fangs and cuts communication with a tried and trusted “Victory or death!” All crew rush to battle stations, including Keith and his paladins, and everything runs so smoothly, it almost feels like routine. Until Blue refuses to let in Allura. And Keith realizes he should have known that, in the end, the camel would be Voltron.

Chapter Text

They have four willing Lions, the MFEs and Atlas to fight Norrn’s fleet, and Shiro has to keep track of too many moving parts to muster the concentration necessary for finding out what exactly has Blue so bothered. He generally has a good rapport with her; she is rather fond of him, as she is of all the paladins, while Green and Yellow are amused and disconcerted by him respectively, and Red, Shiro feels, only tolerates him for the sake of Black and Keith. Now though, all he gets from the Blue Lion is No, Shield and Kitten, which Black usually calls the Atlas, but that isn’t much help to Shiro in this context. The Head Lion, for her part, gently shoves him away when he asks her. Fly now, my paladin, is all she says, fight, chase, slay! So Shiro tells Allura to sit this one out and sends her Coran to try and figure out what is going on with Blue. Then he transforms the Atlas to help the remaining Lions hunt.

In ship-mode, the Atlas is an incredibly powerful, incredibly young being made of science and magic with the temper of an over-eager pup, and Shiro is both her minder and her charge. When they transform, however, Shiro and Atlas are one. They are a titan, a warrior made from the bones of the earth and the heart of the sky, and their purpose is to keep the universe whole. They have Atlas’s power and Shiro’s experience and all the energy of an interdimensional explosion solidified. They know how to fly; they know how to fight; they know what they can do. Their moves are quick and fluid despite their size as long as they don’t think about it, and while they’re still a little unsure about their place in the pride, they’ll always follow where the Black Lion leads.

“MFEs, keep those fighters busy,” Keith-in-Black commands; he knows to take over when Atlas transforms. “Pidge, Lance, Hunk, do your thing with those attack-cruisers. Don’t let them use their ion cannons. Atlas, on me; let’s go after the head of the snake.”

YES, YES, YES, cries Atlas, and Black roars. Together, they fight their way through Norrn’s line of defence, Black vaporizing two cruisers in an instant, while the titan slaps a few smaller ships around like flies. There are a lot of enemy vessels, however, and his talk of victory or death notwithstanding, the Master of Galaxies takes great care to keep his own butt covered. They don’t quite make it to his huge flagship, even when Pidge and Lance join them in their effort. If they had Voltron, the battle would already be over, the Shiro-part of the titan muses. No matter, though, because now, now, now, now Atlas has Norrn’s flagship in their sight, has spotted a gap in his defences where Hunk-in-Yellow has drawn the fire of a cruiser. Atlas delivers a jump kick, giant fist extended and weapons at the ready. Norrn’s ship evades their shot at the last tick. But it was enough to throw part of the enemy fleet into disarray.

“Shiro's broken through! Attack!” Keith-in-Black orders. It goes downhill from there for the Master of Galaxies. His forces break apart bit by bit; if Norrn is smart, he will count his losses and scam. And it seems at first like that's exactly what he’s about to do. However, they must have pissed him off, because he decides to go all B-movie villain and indulge in one last verbal parting shot. He hails the Atlas, his snarling face appearing on the viewscreen of the bridge.

“This is not over yet, Voltron! I will return. And when I do, I will destroy all of you abominations, starting with your mongrel of a Black Paladin!”

Atlas bitch-slaps Norrn’s flagship. The gigantic cruiser cants and goes into a tailspin. Its lights flicker and then die.

There is a moment of silence on the bridge and on the comms, and then everybody cheers. Most crew are clapping, Lance is laughing like a maniac, Pidge is whooping and Hunk hollers an uncharacteristic, “Vrepit Sa, you asswipe!”

“Well,” Keith says drily. “That’s one way to do it. Stand down, Atlas. We’ve got it from here.”

Slowly, Shiro detaches himself from the titan he and the Atlas become, while the latter is turning back into a ship. He breathes in deeply to get his metaphorical feet back on the ground and catches Veronica’s eye.

“That was nicely done, o Captain, my Captain,” she says with a small grin, and he suddenly realizes how much he appreciates her. She has been by his side ever since this entire thing with the Atlas started, and she is smart and efficient and stout-hearted, and he maybe loves her a little bit.

“Let’s just hope we never happen upon an ally with a potty mouth,” Mitch gripes, but Shiro is used to stuff like that from him, just as Mitch is used to Shiro ignoring everything he says, especially when it comes to Keith.

“You have the bridge, Commander Iverson. I have to check on the Blue Lion,” Shiro says calmly. “Call me should someone start running his mouth again.”

Mitch barks out a laugh, and Shiro struts from the bridge to where Krolia is waiting for him. Shiro nods at her and keeps walking, knowing that she, like him, will not want to waste time standing around.

“He’s trouble, that one,” Krolia says as soon as they are out of earshot of the bridge.

“Iverson? Don’t worry, he’s harmless.”

Krolia’s lips are twitching, which makes Shiro smile, too. She is one of the few people who appreciate his sense of humour.

“I won’t forget what you did on behalf of my son today,” she declares. Shiro gives her a sidelong glance.

“I can’t really take credit for that. It was pure instinct, I’m afraid.”

“That’s exactly why I won’t forget it.” She sounds pleased and Shiro is such a sucker for her approval, it’s not even funny.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” he asks instead of lingering on her statement and the warm feeling it causes in the vicinity of his chest. He’s a bit surprised she isn’t with the other Blades and Special Forces, readying them to detain Norrn and his troops. They’ll send most of them off to different allied planets to be hopefully convinced to choose a less violent career path, but that’s not a solution that will work for Norrn and his senior staff. Krolia seems to be thinking along the same lines: “I want to suggest keeping this self-proclaimed Master of Galaxies on the Atlas for the time being. And maybe a handful of his highest-ranking cronies.”

“Why is that?” Shiro asks, curious to hear Krolia’s reasoning.

“These parts used to be one of the major Galran territories; I’m not sure if you’re aware. I want to know how Norrn managed to unite them under his lead and how loyal they are to him. We captured one fleet today, along with himself, of course, but that can’t be his entire arsenal. Maybe there are another two or three armadas out there waiting for us, not to mention the handful of planets under his rule, full of resources and people.”

“That’s very likely. Do you suspect he might have anything up his sleeve right now?”

“I don’t know. But something about him makes my ears twitch. Why this hatred directed at us specifically?”

“Well, Galra who aren’t already our friends tend to hate us on principle. It isn’t hard to guess why he would, too.”

Krolia shrugs. “Maybe. But Acxa says he was one of those higher-ups in the former Empire who weren’t all that happy with Zarkon’s rule. And he despised Lotor for obvious reasons. Seems to me he should be glad Voltron shattered the Empire and gave him the chance to build up his very own stronghold of Galran purity.” She says the last words with quite a bit of bitterness. This whole thing is personal to her.

“And the Galra on our side are often anything but pure,” Shiro finishes her thought. “With Lotor gone, the Blades and Voltron are the most obvious targets for his hatred.”

Krolia looks grim. “This whole purity craze is utter nonsense anyway. There used to be four species on Daibazaal alone, and anyone who claims the other three simply disappeared when the original Galra defeated them is just repeating lies and propaganda. And after that, we mingled with so many other peoples I would be surprised if something like a true pure Galra even exists anymore. I certainly am not. Norrn probably isn’t either.”

“Never underestimate a fanatic’s aptitude for hypocrisy.”

“He can bite my mixed purple ass,” Krolia mutters and Shiro has to suppress a smile; she sounds so Earth-y sometimes. “Anyway, I want to find out more about what makes him and his followers tick. I fear we haven’t seen the last of them. Also, don’t you think he knew too much?”

“About Keith, you mean? We don’t exactly keep him a secret.”

Krolia shrugs again. “Something just doesn’t sit right with me. Don’t you feel it, too?”

He sure as hell does, but his head has been stuffed with too many thoughts and his heart with too many emotions the last few weeks, or years, if he’s being honest. Which he seldom is, at least in that regard. It may be time to start. So Shiro does: “Honestly, Krolia? I don’t think I have any energy left for Norrn and his bullshit.”

“Just leave him to Acxa and me.” Krolia says sounds positively gleeful. “You have an uncooperative Lion to deal with, after all.”

“Don’t damage him, though. Too much.”

“Hn. As you say, Captain.”

“It would look bad,” he says wryly. “Very, very bad.”

“Undoubtedly. We wouldn’t want that.”

“After all, we have a reputation to uphold.”

“I’ll only slap him around a little bit then.”

“No.”

“Spoilsport. By the way, my son hasn't talked to you yet by any chance?”

The sudden change of topic almost gives him whiplash. “Uh … about anything specific, you mean?”

Krolia makes a wavy gesture with her hand that seems out of character for how controlled she usually is. “He wouldn’t really have had the opportunity yet, and I don’t want to break his confidence. It’s his talk to have with you. However, I have some experience how human men work.”

“Is that so?” Shiro teases and earns himself a raised Krolia-eyebrow, which is a truly terrifying thing to behold.

“So do you, I hear.”

Shiro is beet red from one moment to the next. Was that … a sex joke? Oh my god. That’s … no. Just no. Krolia regards him a moment longer and then grins a delighted, evil grin.

“Garrison people like to talk,” she informs him. “A lot. You should look into that.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” he says automatically. “Uh ... what did you want to tell me?”

“I’m no longer sure I should tell you anything, disrespectful youngling that you are,” Krolia grouses, but she is still smiling. Shiro decides to take her ribbing like he would a paw-shove from Black and merely ducks his head. Krolia hns again.

“I really like you, Shiro,” she says, startling him. “Perhaps I already like you too much, given the circumstances. But I don’t care. I want what’s best for my son. And that’s why I will tell you exactly what I told him. When he comes to you with his talk, and you’ll know it when the time’s come, then, please, Shiro: be open. No secrets, no hiding.”

Shiro comes to a halt. Whatever he expected, that wasn’t it. He meets Krolia's calm gaze. “I’m not sure if I can do that.”

“Try. I don’t mean tell him everything you hold close to your chest. I mean tell him what’s important. Shiro, I love my son.”

“So do I,” he says to match her earnestness.

“Exactly,” she says and smiles again. Oh, Shiro thinks, and his heartbeat picks up. Keith?, the Atlas asks hopefully. Yes, Shiro replies fervently. Keith.

–

He finds Allura in the Lions’ hangar, sitting on the floor with her back to the wall and looking taut and tired. Coran is whizzing around Blue, who has her particle barrier up, and seems to be reciting a poem for the Lion. Or maybe it’s Altean scientific data, Shiro can never quite tell the difference. He himself is too exhausted after his battle as the titan; the Lions’ presence is always muted in his mind after an Atlas transformation. All he gets is a vague sense of accomplishment from them. So he simply sits down next to Allura and offers her his shoulder to rests her head on. She does so, and he can feel the small tremors running through her.

“I’m so scared,” she whispers. “I don’t want to lose Blue.”

“I get that, I do, Allura.” Shiro has vague memories of her sitting in the Black Lion, full of a pure longing to be allowed to do good, to be allowed in. His heart aches for her; he knows what it means to not be a part of Voltron, both as the clone and as himself. While he is privy to the Lions’ shared consciousness now thanks to month and month cradled in the vastness of Black’s mind, it still isn’t the same, and he doesn’t wish that loss on anybody.

“Why won’t she let me in?” Allura sounds devastated. “The bond is still there; I can feel it. What is going on?”

“Let’s wait for the others. Together, we’ll find the answer. Allura, I don’t … neither Black nor Blue felt upset or concerned to me during the battle. I think they simply deemed it best that you not fly.”

“Aargh!” Allura’s shout of frustration echoes through the hangar, causing Coran to give them an anxious look. Shiro goes for a reassuring wave, and Coran turns back to the Lion after a moment that lasts too long. Shiro shifts uneasily. Coran is much more perceptive than people give him credit for, and he has been watching Allura and him like a hawk. The princess is Coran’s everything, and he knows something is up; this entire thing with Blue will do nothing to quell his suspicions. Shiro feels Allura’s body along his side like a flame.

One by one, the other Lions come back to the hangar. Red is first. When Lance exits from her jaws, he clearly notices them against the wall, but he doesn’t come closer, just busies himself with his Lion. Not so long ago, nothing would have kept him from Allura’s side while she was upset. Shiro sighs and rubs his eyes.

Yellow and Green arrive, and Pidge and Hunk join Coran immediately, the three of them huddled around a data pad. Black is last, predictably, Keith having conferred with Special Forces on how to proceed with the captured Galra. Watching him stride down Black’s walkway, Shiro is struck yet again by Keith’s power and grace. What if Krolia is right? She wouldn’t have said anything, if she wasn’t sure, would she? Shiro lets himself stare, his love for Keith a heartbeat under his skin.

“I’m so jealous of you sometimes.” Allura’s quiet words tear his eyes away from Keith. He looks down, meeting her opalescent gaze.

“Why?”

She shakes her head and gets up. “Forget it. Let’s find out why Blue hates me now.”

“She doesn’t hate you,” he says, jumping to his feet. “I don’t know much, but that, I do know. She adores you.”

“Yes, yes, alright.” The princess cuffs his upper left arm, and it almost hurts. “I didn’t mean it, you big softie.”

“You’re spending too much time with Pidge,” Shiro declares. The Green Paladin in question turns her head in his direction.

“What about me?”

“Nothing. I love you, is all,” Shiro tells her.

“You’d better,” Pidge grumbles, while Hunk is petting her head and making aww-noises.

“Why have I never noticed before that you’re a master of distraction?” Allura asks Shiro and he grins.

“Because I’m a master of distraction, naturally.” His cheek earns him a tiny smile that Shiro is counting as a victory.

When they join the others, Keith has everybody sit down in a circle, Shiro included. Coran leaves his findings, which basically amount to “the Blue Lion is being difficult”, in Pidge’s capable hands, and scampers off to chase down Romelle and, in his words, enlist her in his endeavour to ensure that the paladins are not disturbed in their vital quest. That just leaves the six of them, the Lions and, of course, a sleepy Atlas curled up in Shiro’s mind.

“Ready, everyone?” Keith asks. He’s sitting cross-legged between Shiro and Hunk, with Lance on Hunk’s other side; then comes Pidge, and finally Allura next to Shiro. Lance raises his hand.

“Um, I have a question. Not that I don’t love you, Shiro, and I’m all for group activities, but didn’t Black, like, throw you out?”

“Uh, no?” Keith says, before Shiro can even open his mouth, and looks around the circle, where everyone but Allura seems rather startled. “Wait a tick. Don’t tell me you all can’t feel him when we form Voltron?”

“Uh, no?” Hunk echoes Keith, turning to Shiro with round eyes. “Should we? Shiro, have you been there all along? Have we been ignoring you?”

“Well, it kind of makes sense,” Pidge says, adjusting her glasses. “The bond between Zarkon and the Black Lion remained intact for millennia, and Shiro becoming Black Paladin didn’t break it. Neither did the clone piloting Black hurt Keith’s connection with her.”

“It’s more than that, though,” Shiro says quietly. “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything. I simply assumed you all knew. Yes, I’m still connected to Black and I can feel her the clearest. Maybe that’s why Keith can sense me, too. But I also feel the others, when they let me. Which they don’t always do. Red, for example, doesn’t actually like me being there all that much, I think. She doesn’t appreciate me sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong.”

“She’s just finicky,” Keith says.

“Wait, wait, wait.” Pidge peers at Shiro with narrowed eyes, and he suddenly feels like a particularly fascinating piece of alien technology. “You’re telling me you have five Lions and the Altas in your head? How does your mind not just fold in on itself?”

“Woah, getting a little dark there, Pidge!” Hunk eyes Shiro with worry. “Will it, though?”

Shiro lowers his gaze. He knows they mean well, but he doesn’t like how they're looking at him. “It hasn’t yet,” he says.

“Nor will it,” Allura declares, certainty personified. “Shiro and I have been working over the last few days on exploring his connection with the Atlas and the Lions, and while I can’t claim to understand it completely, I can assure you that it isn’t harmful, neither to Shiro nor to Voltron.”

“Wait, you’ve known about this, too? Guys, you need to tell us these things!” Lance sounds exasperated, and Shiro can’t say he blames him. No secrets, no hiding. Maybe he should take Krolia’s advice in regards to more than just Keith.

“I’m sorry,” he says again. “I didn’t mean to keep all of it secret. It’s … Adjusting to being alive, to having the clone’s memories, the Atlas …”

“You have the clone’s memories, too?!” Lance interrupts him, and Shiro has to take a deep breath.

“Don’t worry, guys. I’m not going to go homicidal again.”

“Oh, great job, Lance,” Keith gripes, but Pidge has already scrambled over Allura’s legs and thrown her arms around Shiro, squeezing him with all her considerable might.

“Shiro, we know! You’ll never do anything to hurt us.”

He hugs her tiny self cautiously. “You already have four contingency plans in place should it happen, don’t you?” he says gently, and Pidge sniffles.

“Five; two of them accounting for the Atlas going rogue along with you.”

“Pidge!” Keith shouts, scandalised, but funnily enough, Shiro doesn’t mind. He is actually kind of relieved that he can always count on Pidge’s vigilance.

“You’ll have to adjust them to account for the Lions in my head,” he tells her, causing Keith and Lance to make almost identical sounds of aggravation.

“Shouldn’t we focus on Allura and her Lion problem first before plotting how to take out Shiro?” Hunk asks.

“Nobody’s taking out Shiro!” Keith snaps. “Guys, seriously, could you just stop?”

“Yes, let’s all calm down and concentrate,” Allura agrees in her stern princess-voice she doesn’t use on them often anymore. It still works like it always has, however. Everyone goes back to their place in the circle and tries to calm down. Honestly, Shiro doesn’t know how much help he’ll really be, still burnt out from the battle as he is, but it wouldn’t feel right to let the paladins do this all by themselves either. Taking a deep breath, he feels for the threads connecting them all to the Lions and to each other. Keith on his right is there immediately, a jump over a cliff personified, and Allura is a shining star to Shiro’s left. He feels Black’s presence arching over them like a dome, sheltering all of them, sheltering the Atlas and her crew, too, and Shiro loves her so fiercely it brings tears to his eyes. The others are still muted, though, Paladins and Lions alike. All he gets is a sort of joyful contentment from Black, and he doesn’t get it. Shiro tries harder and comes back with a feeling of Pride and Kitten. Frustrated, he changes tactics and attempts to form a closer connection with Allura in order to give her a boost with Blue. He feels Keith push, too, and Pidge, Hunk and Lance might be there as well, colourful flickers in the corners of his mind’s eye.

“I don’t understand,” Allura whispers finally. “Joy, joy, joy, there is nothing but joy! What does it mean?”

“I feel it, too,” Pidge says. “Green is almost giddy.”

“Yellow seems a bit concerned,” Hunk chimes in. “But not in a bad way. She wants us to take care.”

“Red, too", Lance agrees. "She’s in full-on protector mode. And she likes Shiro quite a bit, actually. Likes how strong he is. Dedicated. Good hunter. Good defender. Good … genes? Oh god, I think Red has a crush on Shiro!”

That’s not what Shiro gets from Red usually, but he doesn’t dwell on it now, just pushes harder towards Allura, towards Blue. And yes, now he feels it too, the joy, joy, joy, radiating from her. Black, too. All of them.

“Family,” Keith says then.

“Pride,” Shiro says automatically.

“Same thing,” Keith says.

“Yes,” Allura whispers. “Pride. Joy. Growth. Shield. Family. Care. New. Life. New. Joy, joy, joy.”

And all of a sudden, Shiro gets it. Maybe his connection to the Lions clicks into place, or maybe he just stops being obtuse. Adrenalin floods him from head to toe.

“Kitten,” he says. Oh my god.

“Kitten,” Allura repeats. It’s an affirmation. Her eyes lock with his. “Kitten!”

Chapter Text

Keith has a feeling he’s figured out what’s going on. Shiro is all keyed up and battle-ready beside him, although there is no battle to be fought; he’s looking at Allura, who’s looking at him. Her hands flutter to her mouth, then towards her belly, then to her mouth again.

Pride. Family. Kitten. Allura is pregnant.

That is ... that was ... how ... Keith is kind of overwhelmed. Fuck, he’s overwhelmed? He looks at Shiro and Allura and doesn’t know what to do.

“Allura …” Shiro says, reaching for her. She jumps to her feet. Her face, normally so expressive, is blank. Hands still caught in their fluttering dance, she takes a few steps back from the group.

“Allura, what’s the matter?” Lance asks, deeply troubled.

“Have you found the answer?” Hunk adds. “What’s wrong?”

“I need to go to the sick bay,” the princess says. “I want Coran to meet me there. And Romelle.”

“I’ll come, too,” Shiro says, getting up. Allura gives him a look, and Keith knows that look, knows it because it skewered him for days on end after the Trials of Marmora, and it takes his breath away to see her look at Shiro like that, like she doesn’t even know him and doesn’t care.

“You most certainly will not,” Allura says in her coldest voice, and Shiro grows pale like a ghost. He steps back from her, raising the palms of his hands as if showing her that he’s unarmed, as if he thinks she’s scared of him. Allura stares at him, and the crack between them tears open; Keith can feel it, but he doesn’t get it. It’s a surprise, certainly, but … he doesn’t know what comes after but.

“I will report to you when I know more,” Allura says stiffly, maybe to Shiro, maybe to Keith.

“Report,” Shiro echoes, his voice breaking on the word. Allura looks at him again, not cold or harsh this time but helpless, and that may be the one thing that’s worse.

“I need to do this on my own,” she whispers. “Please, Shiro. I need … I need to be sure first.”

Shiro’s throat works as he swallows. “Of course. Yes, yes, of course. Whatever you need.”

Allura nods, reaches out her hand to him as if she wants to touch him, but she doesn’t. Then she turns around and hastens out of the hangar. Shiro looks after her like he’s bleeding, and Keith can’t take it. He finally manages to get to his feet to lay a hand on Shiro’s left shoulder and makes the call to Coran and Romelle. Coran keeps fretting on the comms and Keith tries his best to reassure him without spelling out what's going on. He doesn’t think the others have caught on yet, not judging by how they are looking at Shiro and him with varying degrees of annoyance and worry, and Keith can’t be the one to tell them. It has to come from Shiro and Allura, together, for all of their sakes. Shiro is trembling under Keith’s hand from barely suppressed tension, and Keith squeezes his shoulder, trying to exude calm he doesn’t feel.

When Coran finally gets off the comms, the other paladins have planted themselves in front of Keith and Shiro. Pidge and Lance are frowning, and Hunk is wringing his hands.

“Is Allura sick? Is that what this is?” he asks anxiously.

“Yeah, can someone please fill us in?” Lance has reached the end of his patience; Keith can hear it vibrating in his voice. He gives Shiro’s shoulder another squeeze, for reassurance, but also a warning: say something.

Shiro draws in a shuddering breath and rubs his human hand over his face. “Guys, please, I know you want answers, but would you please bear with us a little longer? I promise …” He breaks off, like he doesn’t know what he can possibly promise them. “Allura is not sick,” is what he eventually settles on.

“Then what? That’s really all you’re gonna give us?”

“That’s all I can give you without Allura’s say-so, Lance.”

“Oh, so it’s Allura’s fault now?”

“It’s Allura’s call,” Shiro corrects, and there’s a little bite to his voice.

“Only she’s not here,” Pidge says quietly. She’s standing next to Lance with her arms crossed in front of her chest and her fighting face on. “I’m sorry, Shiro, but this has been going on for weeks. Something’s been not right between you and Allura. First you were too distant, then you were too close, and now this? You had all the time in the universe to say something, the two of you, anything. And now that whatever this is about is affecting Voltron, you tell us to wait?”

“Pidge, I think that’s enough,” Keith says, for as much as he kind of agrees with her just a little bit, confronting Shiro now is hardly helpful.

“Yeah, I don’t think so. See, I’m not really sure you get a voice in this,” she says to him. Keith feels his own jaw drop.

“Excuse me, what?!”

“Because you’ll take his side!” Pidge explodes. “You’ll always take his side. So excuse me, Keith, if I feel that you should not really get to order us to shut up when we have a bone to pick with Shiro!”

“A legitimate bone,” Lance adds. He looks mutinous. “I’m sick and tired of this! I didn’t say or do anything last time, with the clone, and I swore I would never make that mistake again. Then I say something, to you, team leader, and you said you’d handle it, and all that happens is Shiro and Allura beating the snot out of each other and now this! So I will certainly not shut up just because you tell us to.”

“Guys, stop,” Shiro says, and it’s a good thing he does, because Keith is so angry he can barely see straight. “Nobody’s ordering you to shut up, but please understand that I simply can’t tell you now without Allura. I’m sorry we’ve let you down by not talking about it sooner. But we didn’t and now I can’t. Not right now.”

There’s a long, awful moment of silence, Pidge and Lance bristling on the one side and a fuming Keith with a pleading Shiro on the other, while Hunk’s eyes swivel back and forth between the two pairs. It’s Pidge who breaks the silence, because she’s snivelling.

“Why didn’t you?” she asks. “Don’t you trust us anymore?”

Keith’s anger drains out of him as fast as it rose. Pidge looks tiny and sad and lost, Hunk seems like he is about to start to cry any second, too, and Lance has withdrawn into himself completely. Guilt radiates off Shiro in waves, and it’s just wrong. All of it is wrong. Keith looks at his paladins and wants to build a nest for all of them to keep them safe.

“Why?” Pidge asks again, and Keith feels Shiro straighten.

“Because it’s private, Pidge,” Shiro says softly. “You probably all deserved to know anyway, at least some of it, but, guys …” Shiro looks at the three of them, Pidge and Hunk and Lance, and Keith has a feeling that it’s the first time Shiro truly sees them as adults. He doesn’t know how he knows. But he does, and he also knows what Shiro is going to give them now, and he knows that they will wish that they hadn’t asked.

“Over the last few years,” Shiro says, “I’ve had everything taken from me. All that I was, all that they made me – they saw it all. The Galra, the druids, Haggar. They saw me kill. Thousands of them saw me kill for nothing more than survival. There is not an inch of my body that they do not know. The old one, they scarred and probed and experimented on, and the new one, they just made. They know it better than I do. And Haggar … when she was in his mind? She also saw mine. She saw everything. She knows … everything. How I think, how I feel, what I fear, what I hate. What I want. How I love you guys.” He looks at Keith then, and Keith will take the raw pain he’s seeing in Shiro’s eyes into himself, and he will unleash it on Haggar someday and on anyone who dares to lay a finger on his paladins in the future. He doesn’t care what that makes him.

“There is so little left of me that nobody owns,” Shiro says. “And that is something I have to learn to live with. But until I do … Or maybe I will always have a hard time just talking now. Giving away something of myself that’s … private.” There are tears running from Shiro’s eyes, quick and quiet. “I’m sorry for that.”

Silence falls over the hangar once more, and it is so much deeper than before. Lance is staring at the floor, his fists clenched at his side and his lips pressed together. The bond he and Keith share through Red is not as strong as Keith’s with Shiro, but the same kind of anger is running through their veins right now, and Keith knows, when the time comes, he can count on Lance to be his right hand, always. Hunk is openly crying, his big, soft heart in his eyes as he looks at Shiro, and Keith’s own heart goes out to him, because he knows Hunk would heal the entire universe if he could, but he will take it on, too, if he has to. Pidge looks like a shard of stone where she stands, small and sharp and deadly, and Keith knows, if he needs a weapon, Pidge will give him her mind, and if he needs a shield, Pidge will be that, too. But right now, war is not what they need.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, come here, all of you,” he says, holding out his left arm, while using the right to draw Shiro’s head down to the crook of his neck. Keith doesn’t often swear outside of his head, and that he does now gets him their attention. Pidge is first, colliding with him and Shiro and hugging them both to her. Lance and Hunk are only a split of a tick behind her. Shiro’s Altean arm is huge enough to embrace then both, while his left comes to rest on Keith’s waist. The five of them entwine into one big paladin bundle, and Keith is pretty sure there are more tears and even some snot involved, but he loves them all, and he will end anyone who threatens his family.

Pride, Black growls in his head. Keith takes it as approval.

*

The test itself takes only six doboshes. Allura makes Coran redo it three times, the third with the equipment from the pod they took from the Castle because she doesn’t trust Earth technology enough for this. The results are the same each time.

Coran has been valiantly struggling to keep his tears at bay since the second test; Allura presumes the cause to be a mixture of worry, elation and sorrow. He’s probably thinking about her father, and her mother, too. Coran must miss them so very terribly. She remembers a childhood with the three of them watching over her, caring for her, loving her. And then, after her mother’s death, there remained her father and Coran, always lifting each other up, always at each other’s side, until Alfor decided to save what he loved the most but not himself. Allura is still not sure she has entirely forgiven her father for that, even so she would never say so out loud. She loved her father more than anything in the universe, does still love him, but something deep inside of her that she never lets out is very angry at him, too. Coran, though? His love for her father remains unscathed, and sometimes Allura envies him that. She can’t even imagine what this child must mean to him.

What does it mean to her, though? Well, that would be the crux of the matter, wouldn’t it?

Allura stares at the data in front of her, at the double helix that belongs to the new life growing inside her. It’s twirling around its own axis, and it is beautiful. But is that the point? She’s a soldier, sometimes-general, sometimes-diplomat in a war. Her most powerful enemy is lying in wait somewhere out there, keeping what’s left of her people hostage. The fate of the universe might very well still be at stake. She has never even thought about having a baby. The few dalliances she had before she went to sleep for millennia were fun and harmless and of no great importance in the grand scheme of things. After, there had only been Lotor, and that had still been very much at the cusp of becoming something, before it withered into nothing at all. And then, maybe Lance … but that has always been a huge, massive maybe, and now, it might never become anything else. Allura is so sick of maybes and loss.

She reaches out a tentative finger to touch the helix hologram with its many shiny colours. Romelle is sitting beside her, squeezing her other hand and resting her head on Allura’s shoulder to watch the helix twirl with her. Allura is not quite sure why she asked for Romelle, other than the fact that she has barely anyone else to ask. She didn’t want the paladins here, needed distance from all of them for this; and while she likes Veronica, Rizavi and Leifsdottir well enough, she doesn’t really know them. That only left Krolia, but that would have meant going through Keith and thus a slew of further complications. Romelle, at least, knows and understands much of what Allura has been through, and at the end of the day, she is an Altean. Allura knows that shouldn’t count for as much as it does for her, but she can’t really help it.

“Are you alright?” Romelle asks with a tiny voice that doesn’t suit her, and Allura takes a deep breath.

“I don’t know,” she says, still staring that the double helix. Coran’s eyes are flickering towards her and back to the data pad in his hands that he probably isn’t even reading. He hasn’t asked who the father is yet. That may be because he can guess or because he dreads the answer. Possibly both. Should she just come out and say it? Would divulging the who also involve explaining the how? She can’t just keep sitting here saying nothing. That is no longer an option. There are people in here and people out there waiting for an answer, and it is not right for her to resent them because of it. They are her friends. They are her family, a family they’ve built together against all odds. A tiny genius with a brain like the universe. A gentle giant with a heart of gold and a backbone of steel. A cheeky swashbuckler with seemingly endless potential for growth. A fierce half-Galra with enough love to give to fill the infinite void. A leader so kind and constant he made them great by just letting them be. And two bereft Alteans who started out with nothing but each other.

Why does she still fell so alone?

“I’m a princess of nothing,” she says. Romelle lifts her head from Allura’s shoulder to look at her with her wide violet eyes.

“Why do you say that? You’re our princess, aren’t you?”

Is she, though? It was absurd to call herself a princess with only one attendant, one castle and five Lions, but now? The Alteans that are left don’t even know her, what remains of her castle is powering a ship she doesn’t understand, and her Lions she has to share with the entire universe. All that she has left from her world are a few trinkets, four mice and one heart-broken Altean who carries on and on with a smile underneath his moustache because there is no other worthy option. She doesn’t even own the clothes that she wears nowadays.

Allura caresses the helix again, and a wave of protectiveness surges up from very deep inside of her. This baby is hers. No matter how it came to be, not matter how inconvenient it is, this much at least, she knows. She has no idea what to do; she isn’t even sure how she feels about it yet. But she suddenly understands why the Lions are so joyful. This new life is of the pride, and it is hers. Hers and Shiro’s. And she wants it.

“Oh, quiznak,” she says. “What am I going to do?”

Romelle squeezes her hand again. “If it helps: I think Keith is going to be ecstatic. He’s big on family, our Keith.”

Allura stares at her. “Romelle, have you fallen out of bed and hit your head again?”

“What? No! Why?”

“I mean, I understand that you care for Keith, and this is going to affect him, too, of course, but is that really the most pressing issue right now?” She doesn’t understand that girl sometimes, honestly.

Romelle pouts a little bit. “I just figured knowing that he is gaga about family might make it easier to tell him.”

“What does that mean?”

“Gaga? Lance taught me that. I think it means ...”

“I know what that means. Why are we talking about Keith?”

Romelle’s eyes grow very big. “Oh. Isn’t he the father?”

“Keith?!” The pitch of Coran’s scream pretty much matches the sound in Allura’s head. “Why in the name of King Groggery the Infirm would you think that?”

Romelle’s cheeks have turned very pink. Her grip on Allura’s hand is almost painful as she’s jerking it up and down in apology. “I’m sorry, Allura! I shouldn’t have assumed. Oh my. I just ... What other human-Galra do you even know?”

“None! Romelle, what are you talking about? The father is completely human.”

Romelle lets go of her hand; looks at Allura; looks at the double helix in front of her. Then she points at the collection of data underneath it that Allura has so far ignored, captivated by the image itself.

“If the father is human, then where do these little bits of Galra come from?”

Allura stares at the data and where Romelle’s finger is pointing to. Although she’s no healer and no natural scientist, she can see that Romelle is not wrong but not exactly right either. The amount of Galra DNA relative to Altean and Terran is much too small to come from someone like Keith. Which, of course, it didn’t anyway.

“Ah,” Coran says, folding his hands behind his back. “Well. That would explain quite a bit about our dear Captain, wouldn’t it?”

“What?” Romelle boggles. “Shiro is the father? And he’s Galra?”

Allura heaves a deep sigh and rubs her brow. “I need a drink.”

Coran pats her back. “I’m very sorry, princess, but you shouldn't.”

“Right,” she says and looks at the double helix again. “I really should not.”

Chapter Text

After their impromptu family hug-fest, there is nothing much left to say. Pidge, Lance and Hunk are pretty shaken after that glimpse into Shiro’s soul, and Shiro is drained from letting them look. As well as everything else, of course. Keith … well, Keith is just glad that everybody has calmed down, because they damn well have other problems right now than teenage temper tantrums. And no, that he hugged and cuddled them and is also ready to kill for them doesn’t mean he’s not still a little pissed off by their tenaciousness. It will probably do them and the entire team good that they heard what Shiro said to them, but Keith still resents them for making him say it. He’s allowed. Apparently he’s always taking Shiro’s side anyway, so what the fuck does it matter. Someone has to.

The paladins go their separate ways after Shiro has promised to call them as soon as he hears from Allura, though Keith and Shiro end up in Black’s cockpit together anyway. The Lion welcomes them with a resonant mental purr, like a blanket wrapping itself around their minds. As there is only one pilot chair, they both sit down on the floor with their backs against the cockpit wall, a mere hand’s width of space between them. Keith can feel Shiro’s presence beside him like desert sand and moonlight, and he allows himself to bask in it.

“So,” he says after a long stretch of silence. “Allura is pregnant.”

Shiro, who has been sitting with his eyes closed and his head tilted back against the wall, peers at him through his lashes. Keith is distracted for a moment by how thick and long they are. He kind of wants to touch them, which is probably weird.

“I suspect so,” Shiro says. Even his voice sounds tired, the rough sound of it running down Keith’s spine. He hums in response, hesitant to say something, but it’s been bugging him, and his mom counselled him to be open. So here goes nothing.

“I … well, I thought you guys have only been together for a handful of days.”

Shiro’s eyes fly open, staring at Keith like he has suddenly grown a pair of full-on Galran ears. His mouth falls open, too. He closes it again, opens it, closes it.

“Keith,” he finally says, “I’m gay.”

“Oh.” So, his mom was right and he was very wrong. “Uh … I … I wasn’t … I mean, of course there was Adam, but … I guess I’ve never thought about it all that much?”

Shiro was always just Shiro to him. What did it matter? That’s what he’s always thought. Only, obviously it does matter now, somehow. Shiro likes men and only men. He doesn’t like Allura that way at all. Keith is so confused.

Shiro gives him a gentle smile. Always, always so gentle with Keith when Keith is being obtuse. “No, you’re right, Keith. Why should you make assumptions based on one relationship? We’ve never really talked about it. I mean, I thought you knew. There was enough talk at the Garrison.” Shiro gives him a fond look, and it makes Keith’s heart hurt. “But you never paid attention to gossip, did you? I should have known. Let’s just say I was a very out and very proud cadet back in the day and leave it at that, okay?” His smile turns somewhat mischievous. “I suspect you could ask your mom if you decided you absolutely needed to know.”

“What?”

Shiro smile broadens. “Just something she said to me today. Your mom’s a spy, Keith. We should get used to her knowing everything.”

“That’s probably true. She seemed to think I was way off track when I mentioned you and Allura being together. Which, as it turns out, I was.” Keith lets out a sigh and bangs the back of his head against the wall. Shiro winces on his behalf, and Keith wants to laugh at himself.

“Oh man, I’m so bad at this sort of stuff, Shiro,” he says. “I just thought … the way you two’ve been with each other over the past few days, and besides, you are such good friends. Why wouldn’t you become attracted to each other? It made sense to me!”

“Yeah?” Shiro asks with another smile. “Which of your close friends are you attracted to, then?”

Keith feels the colour drain from his face. He can tell Shiro’s teasing, but that’s just it. Oh fuck. He thought it was normal. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Welcome to Keith’s life. It’s always the same, not matter how old and settled he gets. Apparently, he’s never not weird. So, it seems that it’s strange to think Shiro would be attracted to Allura at all, even so she’s one of the people closest to his heart, and it is not strange for Acxa to be attracted to Keith, even so she doesn’t know him all that well. So, it is probably normal what Lance used to do, flirting with everything that moved and looked vaguely girl-like. And it is most likely not normal to look at your best friend’s slate-grey eyes and his silver hair and his shoulders and his jaw and his pecs and his legs and his everything, and suddenly think to yourself: yes, that. I’d like that.

“I’m sorry, Keith,” Shiro says. The look in his eyes has grown very sharp while Keith has been freaking out internally, and Keith feels like he’s being scrutinized. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. It’s none of my business.”

“Hunk,” Keith says, and Shiro raises an eyebrow. Keith gulps. “I mean, he, he has the kindest eyes. And really nice strong arms.” Which is true, and yeah, Keith has looked a few times over the last couple of months and thought hm. Besides, Hunk gives excellent hugs.

“Hunk, huh?” Shiro says and his smile turns soft. “His arms are pretty nice. And he’s ridiculously strong for how much he hates training. Plus, he’s a sweetheart. That’s quite the combination.”

Keith blushes and bumps his shoulder against Shiro’s human one. “So it’s okay to feel a bit attracted to your friends every so often?”

“Keith,” Shiro says and entwines his hand with his. Keith stares at their interlaced fingers in surprise.

“Are you listening to me?”

Keith nods.

“Look at me.”

Keith does.

“Keith, just because others do or feel things differently than you doesn’t make what you do or feel less valid or somehow wrong, okay?” Shiro’s Altean hand cups the back of his head and part of his neck, too. It makes him feel safe. “I thought we went over this long ago. Didn’t we?”

Keith tugs his head under Shiro’s chin like he used to when he was a stupid kid, Shiro’s arms enclosing him carefully. “I just wish I was normal at something,” he whispers into Shiro’s chest.

“Normal doesn’t exist,” Shiro says. “Normal is people silently agreeing that this is probably the way things are or ought to be done. There is nothing wrong with being different.”

“Tell that to normal people,” Keith says, because at the moment he feels fifteen again and has just been transferred to his fifth home in six years.

“Screw them,” Shiro whispers and presses a kiss on the crown of Keith’s head. “Who needs them? Do you honestly think Team Voltron isn’t entirely made up of weirdos?”

Keith snorts with unexpected laughter. Shiro is still cradling his head, and Keith has the absurd urge to purr. It’s alright. He might be strange, but maybe that really doesn’t matter anymore. They have more important things to deal with.

“So, whose baby is it? Do you know?” he asks Shiro’s chest.

“Oh, it’s mine alright,” Shiro says, and he sounds tired again. Okay – what the fuck?

Keith sits up and Shiro lets his arms fall to his side. The Altean one does so with a clang.

“Did we … did I just dream up the conversation we’ve just had?” Keith asks. He knows Shiro would never make fun of him or the situation, so that’s as good an explanation as any.

Sighing, Shiro shakes his head. “No. But despite that, I still slept with Allura.”

“Huh,” Keith says. It’s the most intelligent thing he can come up with.

“I was planning to tell you,” Shiro says and rubs his eyes. “I even got Allura’s okay for it and everything. It’s just … Obviously I’ve waited too long. I was building up the courage to do it, I guess.” He meets Keith eyes. “I was, I am afraid it will make you think less of me.”

“It won’t,” Keith says immediately. He’s sure of that. What little that could Shiro is not capable of doing, so it’s a moot point.

“I’m listening,” he says.

*

Krolia twirls her Marmoran blade in her hand while scrutinizing Norrn, who’s sitting secured to a chair and trying to radiate aloofness. He has that lean, sleek look about him she’s never cared for in Galran men. Now, give her a wiry, sharp-faced woman any day of the week, but she likes a bit more meat on her men as well as a certain roughness to their features. Norrn just looks like an overgrown weasel.

“What kind of warlord calls himself the Master of Galaxies, do you figure?” she says to Acxa, without taking her eyes off Norrn.

“One who has something to prove,” the erstwhile general answers. She’s propped against the table, watching Norrn like a huntress stalking prey. He threw a few unsurprising insults at her when he first saw her, but hasn’t said a word since she punched him for calling her an underbred bitch.

“Still,” Krolia muses, “he’s only managed to bring a few measly planets under his rule. Earthlings would call that delusions of grandeur. What do you think he’s compensating for?” Her blade stops, trained pointedly at Norrn’s crotch.

“I don’t care what your feeble Earthlings say, you traitorous trull,” Norrn predictably snarls.

“That is very rude of you. And very stupid, given that you’ve only just got defeated by those feeble Earthlings,” Acxa says without any inflection. She has that whole stone-faced thing down cold, though Krolia suspects it to be more of a character trait than by design. It seems to grate on Norrn’s nerves either way.

“Apparently, there is enough Galra in your paladin mutts to put up a decent fight,” he declares, his eyes glinting. His irises, small and narrow though they are, clearly hint at something other than Galra in his genetic make-up. As Shiro said: hypocrisy and fanatism, all wrapped up on one disgusting, weasely bundle. Krolia starts to circle the little shit, knowing the hairs on the back of his neck must rise up on instinct when he doesn’t have her in his line of sight.

“Do you know what the most dangerous thing in the universe is, Master of None?” she asks casually. “You should. Nothing compares to a Galra mother who sees her offspring threatened. Now, I assume you’ve had one. So you must know that.” She comes to a halt right in front of him and stares down at his snooty face, blade in hand. “So why do you insist on pissing me off?”

He glares at her with unflinching hatred. Seems he’s not a coward, at least. Shame.

“How do you know about my son?” she asks softly, allowing every protective instinct she has to colour her voice. “Why did you come after us with a fleet it didn’t even take Voltron to defeat?”

“He probably didn’t expect the Atlas,” Acxa takes up the thread. “He didn’t know we had something else that would transform and take him apart. I’d call that bad reconnaissance. Lotor would have thrown him into the pits for such a display of incompetence.”

Norrn sneers, but still remains silent. Things aren’t adding up.

“You’re telling me,” Krolia says, getting into Norrn’s face, “that a decorated Commander of the Galra Empire would act on bad intel, lose a fight and then, instead of either going down with his fleet or retreating, he hails the enemy to insult them a little bit more. For shits and giggles, I presume.” She grabs Norrn by the throat, her claws just shy of breaking his skin. “I think, Master of None, you are exactly where you want to be. The question is: Why.”

Norrn grins like he’s just won. Krolia growls, squeezing his throat for one threatening moment, and then lets go, pacing up and down in front of him. She’s not frustrated yet, but she wants him to believe that she is. Let him make his move.

“We are going to make you talk,” Acxa says to Norrn, but he ignores her, watching Krolia prowl.

“If you want me to talk,” he suddenly says, “then get me your Black Paladin. I’ll talk to him.” He smirks at Krolia. “I want to look that monstrosity in the eye.”

Krolia punches him hard.

*

BabyBabyBabyBabyBabyBabyBaby. It’s like a constant pulse at the back of Shiro’s mind. It’s not real yet. He can’t let himself believe it’s real. He needs confirmation first. Or, no, not that. While he’s sitting in Black’s cockpit, her consciousness surrounds him like an endless cave, and she knows. So he doesn’t need confirmation. But he needs to hear Allura say it, needs to know what she wants. Until then, he can’t allow himself to feel anything.

He never, ever thought he could have something like that. A baby. He never had a future before, so how could he have thought about trying to give one to a child? A baby. A baby. A baby.

“Shiro?” Keith says next to him, anchoring him, keeping him there. His very own paladin. Sometimes, Shiro remembers what it was like to be part of Black and choose Keith. They claimed him together, Black and Shiro, and Shiro carries that with him, one more thread binding him to Keith, part of an interwoven pattern that makes up so much of what Shiro is now.

Shiro takes a deep, deep breath. Keith, his wonderful Keith. And now, a baby. No, don’t think about that now. Wait for Allura. You have to wait. Heart and soul, the Atlas agrees and Black shoves her away gently. Poor Atlas. He’ll have to pay special attention to her, once everything has settled down. That is, if it ever will. A baby.

“Shiro,” Keith says again, like his name is an incantation. He needs to talk. He wants to.

“Do you remember that delegation to Intur?” Shiro starts.

“Um …  That was the big one, yeah? You and Allura went, together with a whole bunch of other people. Because the Inturians are so big on ceremony or something. That’s why we all stayed on the Atlas. The rest of the paladins, I mean. We don’t do so well with ceremonies after all.” Keith grins wryly. He’s right; that had been their reasoning back then in the assumption that Intur would require much more formality than the younger paladins were used to. They weren’t particularly adept at it either, though both Hunk and Keith were learning pretty fast. However, they weren’t especially needed on Intur, and so Shiro and Allura took some Garrison people and a few distinguished allies with them instead.

“Shiro, what happened there?” Keith asks, straight to the point, as always. Shiro stares at his hands, one human, one not, both resting on his bent knees. Keith is sitting so close to him now that his arm is pressing against Shiro’s left bicep.

“The Inturians do love their ceremonies, that’s true, but not as we first thought. They are not much for formality. It’s more like … they love their spectacle, the whole glitz and glamour of it. A bit like Lance, if you will, but a lot less innocent.”

“What do you mean?”

Shiro shrugs. “Maybe I’m being unfair. They didn’t know, and we didn’t know either. The Inturians just like to celebrate – anything and everything, it appears. They are very social beings, and personal … connections are enormously important to them. So they party a lot.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad? I mean, I’d probably hate it, but …”

“It isn’t bad. If you know what you’re getting into. Which we didn’t, Allura and I. They … they threw this huge party for all of us, and it was actually really fun. Everyone was so friendly and welcoming. The Inturians are very outgoing and also rather sensual. I suspect some members of our delegation didn’t mind at all and, well, seized the occasion. And that’s okay, of course. But Allura and I … They had singled us out from the beginning. We didn’t think anything of it, because why wouldn’t they? We were the leaders of the delegation, after all. And then they started gushing about how special and wonderful our bond was and invited us to take part in a ceremony they call the Night of the Sacred. Maybe that name should have tipped us off, but it just didn’t. What they described sounded like the two of us would meditate together the rest of the night to celebrate and strengthen our bond.”

“But that’s not what they meant,” Keith says when Shiro falls quiet. His voice has turned very mild and very strong. Shiro doesn’t look at him, just shakes his head. He remembers the room at the temple they were brought to, how lovely and homey it was, all round shapes, gentle colours and soft fabrics, and he asks himself how they could have been so blind.

“Turns out that, to Inturians, sex is like having a conversation. It can be a casual talk and it can be a prayer, but it has very little to do with romance for them. Or at least that’s how I understood it afterwards. I don’t really know; I wasn’t exactly in the mood for an ethnology lesson. Maybe it doesn’t even matter. Anyway, there were some ceremonial proceedings that involved a lot of drinking out of sacred cups and eating from sacred bowls for preparation, and then they left us alone in that room at their temple to … pray, I guess, in their view.” Shiro sighs and feels Keith shift even closer, offering silent comfort. He doesn’t deserve him.

“It started out normal,” Shiro rasps, clears his throat. “We talked a bit and tried to meditate, and then … I just … I remember looking at Allura and suddenly thinking how special and breath-taking she was and how much she meant to me. And she looked back at me, and I just knew she was thinking the same thing about me. It was the most natural thing in the world to kiss and … you know.”

“Have sex.”

“Yes. It didn’t even occur to me to not do it, I remember that. It was … it was truly beautiful, it was. But Keith …” Shiro turns his head then and catches Keith’s velvet-soft eyes. “I remember feeling it, but I can’t comprehend it anymore. Not that Allura isn’t a stunning, amazing person, but … I never wanted her that way and I don’t now. I’ve never noticed any woman like that. Well, maybe a few glances here and there, but certainly nothing of that intensity. There’s only ever been … I’ve always been much more drawn to men. And that’s how I know …” He has to swallow because his throat is so dry, and he feels himself starting to shake again. “Whatever that was, during that night, I don’t think it came from me. It was whatever they gave us to prepare us for their ceremony. Maybe it only worked because of what was already there between Allura and me, but it took it and changed it.” He gasps as if the words are choking him, can’t really help it. He’s so fucking weak. Keith's hand is at the back of his neck, carding through his hair, and Shiro closes his eyes, shuddering.

“How does Allura feel about it?” Keith asks, still with this quiet, gentle tone of voice.

“Angry,” Shiro croaks out. “Not at me, not for that, but yeah, she’s pissed. But I guess it’s more because it changed things between us and because the Inturians were so bad at explaining and because it happened at all.” He takes another deep breath and opens his eyes. “We’ve talked a lot about it since you made me go to her the other day. She … She’s not happy about it either, but in her eyes, it’s more like we got really, really drunk together and had a horrible morning after because we didn’t know what we were doing anymore.”

“Except that someone else gave you the drinks, so to speak, and they knew quite well what they were doing.” Keith sounds very calm and reasonable, and it grounds Shiro a bit.

“I guess. I think so, too. But there was no ill intent. That is true as well. The Inturians thought we understood what was happening. They made a mistake, but they didn’t mean any harm. I just wish I could accept that. Maybe Allura’s just more understanding or worldly-wise than I am. I think, to her, it’s more awkward than anything else. She’s probably right.”

“I don’t know if there is a right or a wrong way to look at it,” Keith says. It sounds like he is weighing every word. “You feel what you feel. And that’s valid. Isn’t that what you’ve said to me, roundabout?”

Shiro rests his brow against Keith’s shoulder. The second hand finds its way into his hair, too.

“Shiro,” Keith says. “How do you feel?”

He knows the answer to that one. He just has no idea what to do about it.

“Used,” he says. “Like someone poured me out of my body and poured something else in. And now I have to live with it.”

Keith’s fingers keep carding through his hair, but he is silent for quite some time.

“Are you even talking about what happened with the Inturians anymore?” he finally says. The question drives the air out of Shiro’s lungs like a punch, and suddenly, he’s back on that platform, countless copies of himself dying around him and Keith lying beneath his sword, and he’s back in Black, watching Keith fight and watching Keith fall and screaming NO without a voice, and he’s back on Haggar’s table, her mechanical blades cutting into him and her magic filling him up, up, up, and he’s back in that round, soft, pastel room moving inside Allura and it is beautiful and right but not his, and he’s back in the arena where he kills although he doesn’t want to, and he is back back back where he never chose to be, and he clings to Keith next to him, and he clings to Black in his mind, and he clings to the pulse of BabyBabyBaby in the back of his head, and he clings to the threads connecting him to the paladins and to Atlas, because he knows he can’t let go, he can’t lose himself, not ever again, he has to stay where people need him and love him and depend on him, has to stay for his baby and for Keith and for Allura and PidgeLanceHunkAtlasCoranKrolia, he needs to stay, HE NEEDS TO.

And Shiro pulls himself up, and he meets Keith’s steadying gaze, and he says: “I’m back.”

Chapter Text

“Keith? Are you free? I need to talk to you.”

For the first time since he’s met his mom, Keith is not immediately elated to hear her voice. Somehow she’s intruding, although he and Shiro have done nothing but quietly look at each other for a while now. It’s been oddly peaceful and tension-filled at the same time, and he doesn’t want it to end. If wishes were fishes, like Matron Margaret used to say.

“Can’t it wait?” he asks, but Shiro is already putting some distance between himself and Keith. It stirs something wild and primal up in Keith he can neither name nor really describe. All he knows is that he would love to take Black right to Intur to put a fear of Lions and Blades into those meddling, careless people, but he has a feeling that would do more harm than good at this point. All he can do is to be supportive and offer a shoulder for Shiro and Allura to lean on. So, things he’s fucking brilliant at anyway, right?

“I need you to talk to Norrn,” Krolia says, and Keith clenches his teeth. Why is that important right now?

“I’m with Shiro,” he replies, hoping that, somehow, his mom will understand.

“It’s alright.” That comes from Shiro, of course. “He’ll be there in a tick, Krolia.”

That ends the call, and Keith is glowering at Shiro, if only a bit. He can never truly glower at Shiro.

“Will I?” he says anyway, and he can admit to himself that it sounds rather petulant.

“I’m okay, Keith,” Shiro says, straight to the heart of the matter. “It’s all a huge complicated mess, myself especially, but I’m not going to fall apart if left to my own devices for a while.” He even smiles a little, and if Keith is being honest, he does look much calmer. Keith has the ridiculous feeling that he’s missed something. Shiro almost slipped away again when Keith asked his thoughtless question, he felt it, and it was only by the skin of his teeth that he pulled himself back. Now, he seems alright, in control even, and Keith doesn’t know what’s happened.

“I don’t wanna leave you alone,” he admits. It’s the bare, simple truth. He couldn’t care less about Norrn or anything else right now. He needs to be with Shiro and watch him breathe.

The point is rendered moot by Coran’s voice ringing out over the Lion’s comms: “Shiro, the princess wishes to speak with you.”

“I’m on my way,” Shiro says, and that is that. He looks at Keith, pale but whole, and Keith knows he can’t go with him. It’s not his place. Shiro gives him a soft, deep smile.

“Thank you, Keith.”

“Of course,” Keith says. It’s not enough. Shiro seems to think so, too, or something similar at least. He’s hesitating, studying Keith’s face like it’s a cliff to jump over. Something hangs suspended in the air between them.

“Keith,” Shiro says. “One way or another, things are going to change. And before they do, I need you to know something.” He sighs. “This might just be the most selfish thing I’ll ever do.”

“You’re never selfish,” Keith declares immediately, because the mere thought is ludicrous. Shiro’s smile turns wry.

“I am very selfish on a regular basis, Keith. It’s sweet of you to not notice.”

Suddenly, Shiro’s hands are framing his face und Shiro’s brow is touching his forehead.

“Keith,” Shiro says. “I’m so in love with you.”

Every thought screeches to a halt and Keith’s breath catches in his lungs. No! … What?

Shiro’s human thumb strokes over the bone of his cheek, once.

“Whatever happens next,” he says, “I just needed you to know that.”

Shiro kisses Keith’s brow.

“That doesn’t mean I expect anything from you,” he whispers. “But I’ll always love you.”

And then he is gone, and Keith feels like the sun went down and up again in the space of a second. Black is vibrating around him, and his heart is trying to beat its way out of his chest.

“What?” he says to the empty cockpit.

Paladins, Black grumbles. She sounds a lot like his mom.

*

While she’s sitting in the sick bay, waiting for Shiro all on her own, nervousness crawls up Allura’s spine with clammy fingers. She shouldn’t have been so dismissive of him earlier. That she had to come to terms with the fact of her pregnancy without him there is an explanation, but no excuse. She could have told him in a different manner. Thinking back, she can see Keith in her mind’s eye glowering at her, and maybe she deserved it. Being cruel to Shiro is about the same level of vile as pulling new-born ginndors by their ears.

Keith. Shiro. Her hands are resting on her abdomen, and she takes a deep, shuddering breath. What are they going to think? What are the other paladins going to say? The Coalition? She has responsibilities to them she may no longer be able to fulfil. Allura looks down at her hands, at her interlaced fingers. If worst comes to worst, she will leave. It will hurt like ripping a piece of flesh out of her body, she’s sure, but she won’t let anybody take this away from her. She will be fine, Voltron will be fine. Blue will choose a new paladin, and the fight can go on without her. The team will find a way to defeat Haggar, and Coran and Romelle will take care of the remaining Alteans. Nobody needs her here, not really, but her baby does.

She won’t be talked out of this. Enough is enough. If she has learnt anything in the past how many deca-phoebs, it’s that you fight for what you hold dear. You don’t give up on it just because it’s inconvenient or dangerous or unusual. She’s learnt that from Keith and Krolia, and from Shiro, too. They simply will have to live with what they have taught her. If they try to stop her, she will fight. If anybody tries to stop her …

The door opens, before her thoughts turn even darker. All notions of having to fight her way off the Atlas wither away into nothing when she sees Shiro standing there, his eyes wide like an open meadow. Something quivers in the air between them, and it doesn’t even take a thought for Allura to open her arms, inviting him to step into them. His arms close around her, his Altean one encompassing her entire back, it seems, and his human hand cupping the back of her head like a shield. She burrows her face against his neck, a resting place she’s becoming familiar with, and just holds him. They’re in this together. She should have known. Nothing much matters besides that, not right now.

“Is it healthy?” Shiro rasps into her ear.

Except for that, and it makes her gasp. Oh, Shiro!

She starts stroking his back. “Shiro, it’s a tiny, itsy-bitsy cluster of cells. But yes. So far, it seems that our child is entirely healthy.”

A shudder runs through him, and he clasps her tighter. She has to tell him about the Galra-DNA soon, but now is not the time.

“It seems humans are just as compatible with other species as Alteans,” she says instead and suddenly has to smile. “Just imagine it, Shiro. We have made the first Terran-Altean. Our baby is going to be so beautiful.”

His shoulders are shaking underneath her hands, and she is unsure if he is laughing or crying. Maybe he doesn’t know himself. She has a feeling it’s good either way, and with a final rub over his frankly ridiculous shoulders she releases him. It is very strange, but Allura has never quite felt so sure about anything in her life, with the possible exception of Voltron.

Shiro lets go of her as well. His face is a bit red, but his eyes are dry and his smile is soft. “God, Allura. How are you so strong?”

“It’s easy. I have you holding me up,” she says, catching his eye very deliberately. “Haven’t I?”

“Yes,” he says immediately. “Yes, of course. Always.”

A wave of affection surges up from deep within her, affection for this impossible, gentle man, and she reaches for his hand. “I’m glad. Shiro, I want you by my side for this. I want this baby, and I want it with you. I don’t … I won’t put any expectations on you. This is my decision. But if you choose to be in our lives, you will always be welcome.”

His eyes grow even wider, and he’s looking at her like he is not quite able to comprehend what she is telling him. She squeezes his hand.

“You are my friend, Shiro. We know and we trust and respect each other, don’t we? And I know you would be the best father, the best. If you want this, too, I know we can make it work.”

“I told Keith I’m in love with him,” he says. It seems to come rather out of the blue, but Allura has to smile anyway.

“About time, too. Didn’t I advise you to take your chance? What did he have to say?”

Shiro starts to fidget, and seeing that big, self-possessed man hem and haw will never not be amusing to her, no matter the situation.

“Well?”, she gently probes. He’s the father of her child. She has every right to be well-informed about his love life, Allura feels.

“I … I kind of … didn’t give him the chance to say anything.”

Her eyes narrow of their own accord. “What?”

He keeps fidgeting and avoids her gaze.

“Shiro, what did you do?”

*

Keith is still sort of stunned when he arrives at the secured section where they keep Norrn and his most senior staff. Atlas has been very accommodating in creating cells for them, as his mom let him know before he joined the other paladins to find out what was wrong with Blue. It seems like a month ago. He just … No. He must have heard wrong. He must have. I’m so in love with you. There’s no way. No. That’s not what Shiro meant. But something is singing in his veins, and he is ready to vibrate out of his skin. Fuck.

His mom is waiting for him in front of the newly formed cellblock, leaning against a wall and staring down at her folded arms. She seems agitated, as much as Krolia ever is, and Keith wonders if Norrn is getting to her. The glorious memory of Atlas slapping Norrn’s flagship upside down springs to his mind and makes his steps falter. I’m so in love with you. Everybody seemed so enraged by the Master of Galaxies and his bigotry, with Lance cursing up a storm while they were fighting the creep’s fleet, Hunk being uncharacteristically silent and violent and Pidge her usually fierce self, only more. And all on his behalf, or mostly at least. Keith hasn’t had the time to feel touched about it, and he isn’t sure that he does now. It is kind of nice that the team would get so riled up in his defence, but it made them lose focus, including Shiro. I’m so in love with you.

Quiet now, Keith tells himself and greets his mom with a nod. “You alright?”

Krolia raises her head, looking grim. “He knows too much,” she says. “And he wants to talk to you; otherwise he won’t cooperate. Why, I wonder. Why is he so fixated on you? How does he even know about you specifically?”

“News travels fast,” Keith shrugs. He doesn’t see what the big deal is. So Norrn wants to talk to the leader of Voltron. That doesn’t seem too outlandish to him. Obviously he somehow got word of Keith’s mixed heritage, too, and that has to be enough to piss off a fanatic like Norrn.

“I’ve flown Black for quite some time now, mom,” he adds. “Granted, I’ve never been in the public eye like Shiro or Allura, or even any of the other paladins, but why is it such a stretch to think that he has heard of me? I’m the perfect target for him to hate: Half-Galra, a Paladin, a Blade. Who knows, maybe he blames me for the fall of the Empire or something. Not every maniac has to make sense, have they?”

“That’s just it. He’s too composed to be a mere maniac. There’s method to his thinking. And I feel that it’s important for us to find out what that is.”

“Alright,” Keith says easily. “If you think so, then that’s what we’ll do. I’ll talk to him and see what he wants, other than hurl insults at me, that is.”

Krolia nods, still scowling. Seeing her like this, Keith can kind of understand where the other paladins are coming from when they tell him to lighten up every now and then. She’s probably merely in deep thought, but outwardly Krolia looks like she is ready to murder someone.

“Be careful.” She gives him such an intense once-over that Keith is almost tempted to take a step back. “Do you think you’re up to this?”

“What? Of course! Why wouldn’t I be?“

“Something’s happened,” she observes, and Keith wonders if all moms are that scary or just his.

“A lot has happened, mom. A lot is always happening. Don’t worry. I can handle myself.”

She keeps scrutinizing him for a few more ticks, but then gives a satisfied nod. “Of course you can. Have you found out what is going on with the Blue Lion yet?”

“Shiro and Allura are taking care of it.” It's a cagey reply but no lie. Keith does hope the both of them are in the process of working things out, whatever that may mean for the lot of them. I’m so … Shut up.

Krolia leads him to the room where she and Acxa have been interrogating Norrn and fills him in on what little the Master of Galaxies has said and what his mom wants him to find out. How many planets are under his rule? How did he manage to conquer them? Why did he decide to take on the Voltron Coalition? Why was his plan of attack so harebrained? And, ideally, what are his plans? Keith won’t admit it to his mom, but he is nervous. He's never really interrogated anybody before, not even during his time with the Blades. There were much more qualified people back then to take care of things like that. Quite suddenly, Keith misses his fellow Blades with an intensity that feels like a punch to the gut. So many of them are dead now. He … Most of the time, he prefers to just not think about it. A pile of knives is easier to repress than a pile of corpses.

He enters Norrn's room by himself, but his mom, Acxa and two members of the Atlas Special Forces are watching on the camera feed. Norrn is sitting slouched on his chair like he has not a care in the universe. He looks sharp and predatory, and Keith can understand why his mom is wary of him. He doesn’t give off a defeated air at all, his narrow-pupiled eyes watching Keith enter with disdain.

“Now, now,” Norrn drawls, before Keith can even open his mouth. “Who are you supposed to be?”

Keith furrows his brow. He doesn’t really have time for that kind of bullshit. But that’s how the game is played, apparently.

“You asked for me,” he says and tries to appear unbothered. His current indifference towards Norrn or anything other than Shiro and those freaking words that won’t go out of his head actually helps with that. “You claimed you wanted to look me in the eye or something of that sort.”

Norrn lets his gaze wander over him from head to toe and back up again. It’s almost lewd, in a certain way. Keith doesn’t twitch, but it’s a struggle.

“You don’t look like a Black Paladin,” Norrn finally declares with a grin that shows all his teeth. Keith adjusts is stance, arms akimbo and back straight. Though he’s anything but tall for a Galra, he has learnt that body language works nevertheless. He doesn’t know if Norrn is referring to his size, his human heritage or merely his red armour, but it won’t hurt to show him that he isn’t intimidated.

“I am the pilot of the Black Lion and the leader of Voltron,” he states calmly. “And that’s who you wanted to talk to.”

Norrn sneers. “I want nothing from you. I want him. Zarkon’s Champion. Sendak’s favourite. Lotor's tool. The witch’s botched-up abomination.”

Keith sees red. The faces of the ones Norrn has just named superimpose themselves over his sneering visage, and suddenly, Keith’s mouth is full of fangs, and he throws Norrn to the floor, kneeling over him and squeezing his scrawny furred neck with clawed fingers.

“You touch him,” he snarls, “you touch him, and I’ll tear you apart.”

Norrn’s eyes are wide and everything has gone sharp, so sharp, and Keith knows exactly how to twist his hand just so to snap Norrn’s neck. He’s stronger than he looks, so much stronger.

“You … filthy half-breed,” Norrn gasps out beneath his claw. “You won’t … save him.”

Keith growls, and it is a sound he has never heard himself make, and he doesn’t care, and he is inches from ripping into Norrn’s jugular with his fangs, when Krolia and Acxa pull him off his prey. He snarls at them, too, because he needs to finish this, and he struggles against their grip to get back to the piece of garbage that dared to, dared to …

“Quick, fetch Shiro!” someone calls. It’s his mother, his mother who’s trying to keep him from his prey, and she must know that he has to do this, she must know that he has to put an end to those monsters for what they did, and he fights because he has to.

“There is no time,” someone else shouts. He’s gotten his arms free and lunges for the heap of Galra on the floor and he gets his claws back around his throat, leaving bloody streaks when he is pulled off again. His mother tackles him to the ground, and he feels a weight on his legs keeping him down, and still he’s struggling, until he feels his mother’s hand grab him by the scruff of his neck, shaking him once, twice. His entire body goes limp and pliant like a new-born kitten, and he snarls, because he hates it. He presses himself flat against the floor, ready to strike the moment she lets go.

“Keith, my star, my light,” she says. “Come back to me.”

But he doesn’t.

Chapter Text

‘So, you told him you loved him, and then you left?’

Allura is trying very hard not to judge him; Shiro can hear it in her voice. It’s almost funny from a certain angle that probably only appeals to him. Confessing to Keith the way he did is admittedly one of the less smooth or kind things he’s done in his life. He had painted himself into a corner, though.

‘I know that I left it until the last possible moment. But I needed to let him know before coming to talk to you, you see? All of this changes things, Allura. He had to know beforehand, or it wouldn’t have been the same. Maybe it wouldn’t even have meant the same, not to him.’

‘You needed him to know that you have already chosen him, no matter what.’

‘Not … quite. I don’t know, that sounds too harsh. Like I thought you would make me choose. It’s not like that, Allura. We are a team, a family, all of us. I know that.’

‘I didn’t,’ she confesses, and it startles him. She is their centre; of course she would know, or so he’d thought. Allura makes an awkward motion with her shoulders that’s very different from her usual poise; Shiro is still getting used to this other Allura he’s allowed to see more and more of.

‘I mean, I do,’ she amends. ‘But part of me was ready to choose between this child and … all of you. All of this.’ She pulls her lip through her teeth. It’s precious, and he adores her completely. Heart and soul, heart and soul! It feels like the Atlas is bounding around in his head out of sheer enthusiasm for Allura and what Shiro feels for her. Her and the baby.

The baby. All the destruction he’s wrought and all the death he’s dealt, and now this. Something as simple and as wondrous as a new life.

‘I won’t let them make you,’ he says softly. ‘No one will make you choose, Allura. Just this once, we’re going to have it all. No either-or, no impossible choices, no sacrifices for the greater good, no nothing. We’re going to take it all, and we’re going to make it work. Because it’s going to be you and me, Allura, and I know the people we love will stand right beside us.’

It has been a long time since Shiro has last felt such deep conviction, but he doesn’t question it now. This is right. This is what they deserve. Nobody is taking anything from any of them anymore. Enough is enough. Fight, the Atlas agrees, and it sounds strong and wild. Shiro smiles. What do they have to fear? They have five omniscient mother-lions and a fierce little titan on their side.

Allura squeezes his hand, placing it on her belly. It’s flat with only the slightest curve like it’s always been. There is nothing there to feel yet, and still it’s as if a tiny flame blazes to life in his mind. He’s probably imagining it. The Atlas’s curiosity is real, however; she understands something exciting is happening, though she doesn’t really grasp yet what it is. Shiro wonders if Black would be willing to try and explain babies to the Atlas, and the thought makes him smile. Allura beams at him.

‘Thank you, Shiro.’

‘Thank you, Allura. Thank you for choosing this. And me, in a way.’

They’re grinning at each other like a couple of sentimental fools for a while. Shiro’s heart feels all gooey in his chest, kind of like melted chocolate.

‘Shiro, do Terrans have something like a parentbond?’ Allura asks eventually. Shiro furrows his brow.

‘A bond that forms between parents and their children, you mean?’

Allura shakes her head. ‘No. On Altea, people who wished to raise a child together would have the possibility to enter a formal relationship in order to share guardianship of the child and all responsibilities.’

‘Like marriage?’

Again, her head-shake indicates no. ‘On occasion, lovers would choose a parentbond, especially if there were more than two people involved in the relationship. However, a parentbond was much more common between relatives or friends. It made everyone a legal parent to the child or children in question, no matter their biological or marital status. I think my mother and father would have loved to establish a parentbond with Coran to raise me if we hadn’t been royalty. Everything was always more complicated for royalty.’

‘So …’ Shiro starts, his heart beating like crazy. ‘You would suggest such a parentbond for us?’

‘Well, in principle. With Altea gone for so long, it wouldn’t have any legal bearing anymore. But I do hope it would have some meaning for you and me. And Keith, of course.’

‘What?’ His voice must sound as weak as he suddenly feels because Allura smiles at him tenderly.

‘Shiro, let’s be honest: there is no you without Keith, is there? That is and always will be true, whether his feelings for you will prove to be romantic as well or not. He is already part of our child’s life due to the mere fact that it is yours. So, if you agree and if Keith agrees, I would be very willing to talk it through.’ Her smile becomes smaller and a bit sad as well. ‘I think, this child will need all the parents they can get, don’t you think? We’re still fighting a war. We need to make sure that our child will never be alone.’

Shiro has been fighting tears ever since Allura’s began talking, and those last words have them spill over. He swore he would stop bursting into tears all the time, but he can’t help it now. A child with three parents at least, a child so much less likely to end up like him and Keith, a child that will always be loved. Not only due to what Allura is suggesting, but it'll still make a big difference. He gives her a very brief hug, laughing through his tears.

‘So, if I’ve understood this correctly, Coran would be the honoured grandfather in your scenario?’ he asks because he has to make light of the entire thing for the time being or he’ll never make it through with his heart in one piece. Allura seems to get it and giggles.

‘Don’t forget Krolia,’ she says. Shiro has to laugh once more, and it’s pure joy. His child will be the most fiercely protected person in the entire universe. For one perfect moment, everything is bright and clear and right.

‘Captain Shirogane.’

Of course that’s when the call comes. Shiro and Allura share a look. Of fucking course.

‘Yes?’

‘Sir, you’re needed at the new cellblock, quickly. It’s Commander Kogane, sir. He’s … attacked the prisoner. He’s gone berserk, sir! We removed the prisoner, but Agent Krolia said to call you immediately.’

Shiro’s grin dies a foreseeable death. Keith? What …? He meets Allura’s concerned gaze.

‘Go!’ she urges him. ‘Be quick!’

‘Are you going to be alright?’

‘Yes, yes. Go!’

‘I promised answers to the rest of the paladins,’ he says, already starting to run.

‘I’ll take care of that,’ Allura calls after him. ‘You take care of Keith!’

A final ‘Go!’ is echoing after him while Shiro races down the corridors, nudged into the right direction by his wonderful ship who knows where he needs to go the instant he thinks Keith at her. There, there, there, she’s spurring him on, right to the room where Keith is. Shiro barely registers the two crew members standing guard in front of it, although later, he will remember how spooked they looked, like they had seen a ghost or a monster they weren’t prepared for. Now, however, he pushes past them while they’re saluting him and storms into the room that is empty save for Acxa and Krolia holding Keith down on the floor with what seems to be all of their combined strength. The former general is kneeling on Keith’s legs, while Krolia is leaning over his upper body, clutching the back of his neck with a quiet sort of desperation. Her gleaming eyes meet Shiro’s.

‘Oh, thank fuck you’re here,’ she grunts. ‘I don’t know how much longer I can hold him.’

Shiro can barely make out Keith under the combined bulk of the two Galra women, graceful and slender as they are by the standards of their species, but the low, dangerous rumble he hears isn’t coming from either of them. Dread is trying to climb up from deep within his gut, but Shiro refuses to let it. He knows this. The clone lived through it, so Shiro did as well, no matter how loath he is to admit it. He knows what caused it last time and he knows what stopped it, too, wrapped in violence and cruelty and untruths. He drops to his knees next to Krolia.

‘What happened?’ he asks her calmly, his human hand coming to rest on top of Keith’s head. The rumbling drops in volume, but Keith is still ready to attack, Shiro can feel it through the tips of his fingers.

Krolia’s jaw works before she lets out a small snarl that sounds only marginally less dangerous than the noise Keith is making. ‘Norrn threatened you.’

‘He transformed,’ Acxa adds, and Shiro has never heard her this unsettled. ‘It was like …. like his Galra suddenly broke forth. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

‘I have,’ Shiro says and nods at the two women. ‘Let him go.’

‘Captain, are you sure?’ Acxa asks, but Krolia has already relinquished her hold on her son. Keith explodes into motion, throwing Acxa off and lunging at Shiro.

‘Captain!’ Axca cries out, but Shiro is ready. He lets his entire body go pliant and goes down underneath the force of Keith’s onslaught. His back meets the floor, and he lets it happen, lets Keith crawl all over him and drape himself over Shiro like a mantle, like a shield. Were they under attack, any foe would have to go through Keith’s armoured body now to get to Shiro’s most vital parts, his face, his chest, his belly. Shiro stares up into Galra-gold eyes.

‘It’s alright, Keith,’ he whispers. ‘You saved me. You saved me.’

Because, in the end, that, above all, is what Keith has always wanted. And Shiro feels that he is finally ready to accept that.

‘I love you,’ he adds for good measure, offering a truth where there were only taunts and falsehoods the last time. Wrought by the desire to push Keith into making it stop, that is true, but words twisted and sharpened to hurt nonetheless. Even the clone knew that Keith would go to any length in order to protect what he holds dear.

Keith blinks at him, his eyes still purple, tinged with gold. ‘He said I wouldn’t save you,’ he growls out around his fangs. Shiro reaches up with his human hand to cradle the back of Keith's neck.

‘You will, love,’ he tells him. ‘You always will because you always have.’

Keith shudders and bends his head towards Shiro, breathing hard, like he’s in pain. Shiro starts kneading the tiny muscles at the back of Keith’s neck.

‘You can let go, Keith,’ he says. ‘I’m here. I’ll catch you.’

Keith lets out a tiny sound and curls up around him, his arms on either side of Shiro’s head. His eyes are slowly losing their golden hue, and his fangs are starting to retreat.

‘We’ll go,’ Shiro hears Krolia from the other side of the room and then the swishing of the doors, but he barely registers it, all his attention focused on Keith. Keith, who is looking at him like something worth saving and worth loving, has always looked at him like that, even when he didn’t deserve it.

‘I found you,’ Keith says with a bit of growl in his voice, and Shiro strokes over his cheek with his thumb.

‘You did, love,’ he agrees. ‘And you know what they say: Finders, keepers.’

When Keith kisses him, there is still a hint of fang to it, and it is perfect.

*

Atlas is as giddy as the day she was born. The Captain and the Keith-one are all tangled up together, and the Captain is glowing from the inside from all the happiness. She has to tell the moms. ‘Moms’ is the right thing to call them, Atlas is sure, for that’s what the little builders call their taking-care-and-knowing-things person, as does the Keith-one with his. Moms, moms, moms, she shouts, because she is so full of delight. The Captain and the Keith, the Captain and the Keith! She doesn’t quite know what the both of them are doing, except that it is happy-making, and what makes her Captain happy is good. The Keith-one is good, Atlas has always known that. He makes the Captain feel the Keith-feelings, and the Keith-feelings are bright and warm.

Be still, kitten, Sky-Mom says. Leave them be.

But it’s glowy! Does Sky-Mom not feel it? It’s the best! Atlas wants it for her Captain, always. What is it?

It’s loyalty, Fire-Mom growls. Fire-Mom is fierce and grumpy, and Atlas loves her.

It’s pride, Earth-Mom declares.

It’s life, Tree-Mom rejoices.

It’s adventure, Water-Mom laughs.

It’s everything, Sky-Mom thunders, and Sky-Mom is always right.

I love it!, Atlas exclaims, I love it always!

And somewhere in the infinite vastness of space, the IGF Atlas starts to glow.

Chapter Text

He can’t stop. Not that he wants to, but maybe he should, just for a moment. Stop and think about what he’s doing. What they are doing. But does it really matter? It’s Shiro, and going with his gut has always been his first choice as far as Shiro is concerned. No, Keith doesn’t want to stop. Maybe not ever. Shiro has started kneading the muscles of his neck, and his tongue has found its way into Keith’s mouth. Keith is vaguely aware that he’s making tiny noises, but only Shiro is there to hear them, so he doesn’t mind. More than that, he wants to, needs to let them out, feeding them into Shiro’s mouth like it’s important. It is. It’s important and so, so good.

Keith didn’t know. It’s not the first time he’s kissed someone, but it has been years. There was this girl at his last group home he was not-antagonistic with and two boys at the Garrison who weren’t intimidated by either his flying or his reputation. Keith shared a few kisses with the three of them at one time or another, for the sole purpose of finding out what all the fuss was about, and came away with the conclusion that it was wet and uncomfortable at worst and wet and kind of nice at best. It was never like this.

This is it. It’s like flying and the desert and sunsets, it’s like space and fighting for the sheer joy of it, and it’s like being held, too, and not only because Shiro’s arms are enfolding him now. Keith wants to sink into him and stay there.

The thought is weird enough that Keith slows down his kisses to bury his face against the place where Shiro’s neck meets his human shoulder. He does, however, not move away from Shiro, although he’s basically straddling him and is half-hard from all the adrenalin. And the kisses. Those, too. Keith not sure if he should feel embarrassed about it. Shiro’s hands start carding through his hair again, and Keith shudders. It’s a good kind of shudder.

“Hey,” Shiro says quietly against his ear. Not a whisper, but something more intimate. “You okay?”

Keith just nods against his neck. He is okay. He’s just a bit overwhelmed.

Shiro hums. “You know, it’s fine if that just now was simply a spur of the moment kind of thing.”

Keith flinches, his heart all fluttery against his ribs. “I love you,” he mutters into Shiro’s neck. “So much.”

“I know that, Keith.” His voice becomes deep and soothing. “It doesn’t mean that this has to be part of that. Or not yet. This can be whatever you want.”

Keith sits up, staring down at Shiro who looks flushed and unspeakably beautiful. His thighs are very firm underneath Keith’s ass.

“Shouldn’t that be kind of mutual?” he asks with a frown. “I mean, what do you want, Shiro?”

“I just want to be in your life. The rest is up to you.”

“What about Allura and the baby?”

Shiro smiles, and Keith finally understands what ‘beatifically’ means. “We’re going to make that work. I don’t know how yet, but she has some ideas about how we could raise this child together.”

“Your child.”

“Yes.”

“You’re going to be a dad.”

Shiro’s smile becomes blinding. “Yes.”

Keith blinks down at him. His heart feels too big for his chest. Shiro will be the greatest dad. And Allura is going to be a fierce mom; Keith has some experience with those by now.

“Congratulations. Truly,” he says and hesitates, wetting his lips. “Only … I don’t mean to come across as selfish, but … How do I figure into this?”

“Oh, Keith.” Shiro uses his floating arm to cup the back of Keith’s neck again, and it is weird how not-weird that feels. “You figure into this in any way that you want. Allura has ideas about that, too.”

“Oh?” Keith says and blushes. That … well … that is kind of … uh …

“Nonsexual ideas,” Shiro says and starts to giggle, of all things. Keith glares at him, and Shiro giggles harder. “Oh god, your face!”

Keith slaps his chest. “How was I supposed to know,” he grouses, his cheeks burning by now.

“You’re so cute,” Shiro says, and that’s it. Keith hides his face against Shiro’s neck again.

“Can I be non-nonsexual with you?” he mumbles, and Shiro wheezes. Good. Keith turns his head to kiss Shiro on the cheek. Before he can retreat very far, Shiro pulls him back down to meet his lips which are still smiling a bit. Keith licks that smile because he feels like it, and Shiro laughs.

“Always knew you had to be part cat,” he says, and Keith leans back an inch to study his face.

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“What? You being Galra?” Shiro huffs. “Of course not. Where is this even coming from?”

Keith shrugs the best he can in his position. “You saw what happened to me earlier.”

Shiro looks at him like he would at baby kittens trying to lick milk off their whiskers or something. “You’d never hurt me. Or anyone else you care about, for that matter. And I’m sure you’ll learn to control it anyway.”

“Hm,” says Keith. Shiro didn’t see him when he attacked Norrn, or maybe he would sing a different tune. Not majorly different probably; Shiro means what he’s saying. But he might be less inclined to believe that Keith is utterly harmless. Keith doesn’t give voice to his thoughts, though. In the end, they both can be very dangerous if driven to it, and that might not be entirely a bad thing.

He’s startled out of his musings by Shiro’s human index finger stroking down the slope of his nose. Shiro’s smiling again.

“So,” he says, “you wanna be my boyfriend?”

Keith has to laugh. “Smooth, Shirogane, real smooth.”

“Is that a yes?”

“That is a yes,” Keith says and gives Shiro a lingering kiss. When he pulls back, the entire room is glowing. A bright shine radiates from the walls, the ceiling, even the floor. Keith rises to his knees in confusion.

“What’s happening?” He looks to Shiro who’s still lying on the glowing floor. The light surrounds him like a halo, and Keith has to blink. Shiro grins.

“Don’t worry. It’s just the Atlas.”

“What is she doing?”

“She’s glowing,” Shiro replies unhelpfully.

“Why?”

“Because I’m happy.”

Keith stares at him. Shiro’s grin broadens. Keith promptly bursts into tears.

*

After the paladins dispersed, Hunk found Kinkade and recruited him for some stress-baking. It’s just … it’s all too much, and Hunk needs something to do, preferably with his hands. He kind of wants to unhear what Shiro said to them and feels like an awful person because of it. Shiro had to live through it, so the least Hunk and the rest of them can do is live with the knowledge. And act accordingly, damn it!

He never stopped to ask. There is so little of me nobody owns. Why did he never ask? Hunk pilots the Yellow Lion, and isn’t that supposed to say something about his heart and his ability to hold the team up? Shouldn’t that mean everyone, including the Head of Voltron? Why has he never even tried and thought about what Shiro might be going through after everything? He did okay with Keith, Hunk thinks. They’re doing okay with each other, Keith and him, even. But Shiro? Hunk buries his hands in cookie-dough, kneading furiously. He’s failed at his job, hasn’t he? He’s pretty sure he’s failed. God, the fragile pain in Shiro’s face will haunt him, and he deserves that.

“Hey, Hunk. Did you want to bake those cookies or murder them?” Kinkade asks and Hunk stops mangling the dough. Two batches of cookies are already cooling on the counter while a third bakes in the oven, but this one is probably a lost cause. They’ll fall apart as soon as they’re baked, he’s pretty sure. He stares at the crumbly dough mournfully and wonders if it’s a metaphor. He hopes not.

“Everything okay, man? Is this about the Blue Lion?” Kinkade’s voice is cool, calming and non-judgemental. He’s offering to listen, but he doesn’t expect an answer. At least not to that last question, Hunk can tell. He heaves a huge sigh, wishing he could just spill the beans to Kinkade; to get everything of his chest, yes, but also because he feels it would be the right thing to do. The others wouldn’t agree, however. Shiro, Keith and Allura have all been very adamant that, though the Garrison are their allies and the Atlas is manned mostly by its personnel, they are not part of Team Voltron and thus not automatically entitled to every piece of information regarding the Lions or the Paladins, especially not to sensitive ones. Pidge agrees whole-heartedly, having lost nothing of her distrust in the institution, never mind that her father is part of it again, and Lance has chosen not to voice his opinion on the matter. Hunk hates it. They’re all on the same side, aren’t they? Shouldn’t they just trust each other and get on with the important stuff? But he also understands why most of his fellow paladins just can’t do that, and in the end, they are his priority.

“We’re still working on the nuts and bolts,” he finally settles for, and Kinkade nods, patience personified. Hunk bites his lips. “Shiro told us some stuff. You know, about how he feels. About what happened to him with the Galra and stuff.”

“Hm.” Kinkade steals a blob of the ruined cookie-dough and chews thoughtfully. “He never talks about that.”

“Uh … how do you know?”

Kinkade shrugs. “Just a guess. You guys are pretty close-lipped in general. Even Lance is a master of saying nothing while talking a mile a minute.”

“I’m not! I mean … I’m basically an open book with foot-in-mouth-disease.”

Kinkade gives him half a smile. “If you say so.”

“I am! Have you met me? Case in point, Shiro is probably going to kill me if he finds out I said anything to you at all. Well, Keith is going to kill me. Shiro’ll just look at me with disappointment.” And sadness probably. Hunk shudders. Bits of dough are squished between his fingers when he balls them into fists. “Quiznak, what a mess! What am I going to do?”

“You could always rework it into ice-cream,” Kinkade says. Hunk stares first at him, than at the heap of cookie-dough in front of him.

“Ice-cream?”

Kinkade shrug-smiles again. “Ice-cream makes everything better.”

That’s how, half an hour later, Hunk finds himself in front of Lance’s door with a basket of cookies in one hand and a pitcher of ice-cream in the other. As expected, Lance and Pidge are inside, sitting on Lance’s cushy couch amidst a mountain of fluffy cushions and decimating an army of virtual orcs via controller. It appears to be a downright massacre. They all have their own coping-mechanisms, after all.

“Ice-cream!” Lance screams and commandeers the pitcher immediately. Pidges jumps from the bed to kick his shins and try to get him into a headlock.

“Share, you skunk!” she hollers. Hunk sighs and separates them. He makes them snuggle down on the couch, Pidge on his right and Lance on his left, and finally thrusts a spoon at each of them. The pitcher he keeps in his lap and the basket of cookies on the table in front of them. Lance and Pidge blow raspberries at him for that, and Hunk wonders for the gazillionth time how the both of them are not related.

For some time, it is quiet save for the sounds of munching and the clinks of spoons when Pidge and Lance wordlessly fight for dominance over the pitcher. Hunk contents himself with filching a spoonful of ice-cream every now and then to spread over a cookie. Cookie-dough ice-cream on cookies. It’s like cookies squared.

“Can we all agree that we need to pulverize Haggar?” Pidge says suddenly. Hunk almost chokes on his mouthful.

“Seconded,” Lance says. He sounds absolutely ruthless and not at all Lance-like. At least to people who don’t know him, he wouldn’t. Hunk forces down the cookie bits in his mouth instead of spitting them out.

“But shouldn’t we like … be all forgiving and stuff?” he asks. “Isn’t that what being a paladin is all about?”

“It’s about helping the helpless, and Haggar is anything but.” Pidge furrows her brow, looking savage. “It’s also about preserving life irrespectively of whose, I guess. But …” She stares at the spoon in her hand. “Have you ever wondered how Shiro got his scars?”

“Uh …” Hunk squirms. Another thing he’s deliberately not thought about.

“Can you imagine how Shiro must have hated the arena?” Lance sounds utterly indignant. “I mean, he’s a brilliant fighter, but he despises being put on display. And to be made to kill for spectacle …”

“Yes,” Pidge says grimly. “But I meant the second time.” She looks up at Hunk and Lance, her eyes glittering. “Shiro got his scars fighting in the arena originally. But where do the ones on the clone body come from?”

“Oh god,” Hunk says. The last cookie is coming back up, and he feels his eyes well up. Fucking quiznak.

“Let’s kill her.” Lance’s voice sounds like gravel. “I don’t care if that means we’re horrible people. We can’t let Keith do it alone. And he will do it.”

“Agreed,” Pidge says. “We have to.”

They both look at Hunk, and he gulps down the bile in his throat. He knows he’s killed people, he’s not stupid. They’ve been fighting a war for years. This is different, though. This has intent. This is … No. This isn’t about him.

“Agreed,” he echoes. Pidge and Lance smile at him darkly, and he finds himself mirroring that as well. He knows they’ve just lost something. But maybe they’ve gained something, too. Around them, the room begins to glow.

“Oh, what the cheese now?” Lance exclaims. Before anyone can answer, there is a knock on the door.

*

He’s sitting in the interrogation room with an inconsolable Keith on his lap, whose wet face is pressed against his shoulder, and he doesn’t know what to do. Shiro was calm and collected when faced with pointy fangs and gleaming eyes, but this? Keith has sobbed himself hoarse by now, and still the tears won’t stop, while Shiro is rocking him helplessly in his arms.

“Shhhh, it’s alright, baby, I’ve got you,” he says for the n-th time to the crown of Keith’s head, but it still seems to do nothing to soothe his distress. "Please, tell me what’s wrong. Please sweetheart, you’re scaring me to death."

That earns him a fist to the chest and a scream that is barely muffled by his shoulder.

“YOU DIED!”

It’s a noise of pure agony, and Shiro hugs Keith closer to him. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, baby. I didn’t mean to.”

Keith shakes his head frantically. “Everybody told me. But … but I said no. I said you were still alive out there. I insisted! And I was WRONG!” The last word is that noise again that Shiro could do without for the rest of his life. He almost understands why the assertion of his own happiness has triggered this, but he still has no clue what to do about it besides not letting go of Keith.

“You were right, too,” he tries. “I was out there.”

“You were DEAD!”

“I know. I’m so sorry. Keith, Keith, what can I do? Please.”

Keith shakes his head and just clings to Shiro while crying his heart out and screaming into his shoulder. It’s wordless now, the scream, and all the more gut-wrenching for it. It hurts Shiro to the core that the mere fact of him causes Keith so much grief. It’s not a pain he can stop either. It cannot be counteracted by him giving Keith up and walking away to let him find peace because Keith simply won’t. And he can’t prevent it by not dying; in the end, Shiro is still as human as the day he took off for Kerberos.

The Atlas has long since stopped glowing, her curious worry burrowing into his mind. Where is the happy-thing?, she asks. Where has it gone? Shiro can feel her devastation, and for lack of any other ideas he starts humming an old song his grandfather used to croon to him when he was very little, hoping it will calm down both her and Keith. After some time, Keith’s sobs finally, finally become quieter. Maybe he has just cried himself into exhaustion. He’s limp in Shiro’s arms, but still sniffling, so Shiro doubts he’s fallen asleep.

“Keith?” he dares to ask.

“I’m here,” Keith answers in a small voice, and Shiro can feel him rubbing his nose against his uniform collar. It’s probably snotty.

“I’m sorry,” Keith says, and Shiro heaves a sigh of relief.

“It’s alright. Seems to me you had to let that out.”

Keith shrugs and finally lifts his head. His face is red and tear-streaked, and he looks dishevelled, but seems relatively calm now. Shiro gives him a quick kiss on the lips, and Keith wrinkles his nose.

“I’m gross. Which must mean you’re gross, too, for doing that.”

“We can be gross together,” Shiro says and smiles tentatively. Keith returns the gesture. The storm really seems to have passed. Maybe, Shiro muses, Keith simply never had time to truly grieve his death. He hopes that is all this was, but he doesn’t want to ask. Keith will come to him when he needs him, that’s all that matters. He kisses Keith again, because he can. And again and again.

The sound of a throat being cleared pulls them apart. Krolia is leaning against the frame of the door.

“You kids look a fright,” she says, a wry smile on her face. Shiro stares at her, almost drowning in the slew of emotions whirling up. His face is heating up, but it’s from joy, and that is one of the weirdest feelings he’s ever experienced. And Shiro knows weird.

“Mom!” Keith exclaims and ducks his head. He sounds years younger than he is, but there is joy in there, too, mixed with embarrassment, bashfulness and love. Or maybe Shiro’s just projecting. Krolia laughs at them.

“I wish I could leave you in peace. But there’s still work to do.”

“You’re right,” Shiro replies. He lifts his boyfriend off his lap with his Atlean hand under said boyfriend’s butt, stands up and deposits him on the floor. Keith lands on his feet and blinks at him. It may be in bewilderment or something else. Something very interesting. Shiro grins a little bit.

“We need to take care of this Norrn-character and of the Blue Lion. Also, I've left it to Allura to deal with the rest of the paladins.”

“Lovely,” Keith comments. “That should be first on our list, then. Rescue Allura from three little gremlins.”

“They’re not so bad,” Shiro smiles.

“They’re horrid,” Keith dead-pans.

“Maybe you should clean up a little first,” Krolia says. She’s much too professional to ask what they are talking about. Shiro wants to tell her, though, desperately. But first things first.

“Are you going to be okay handling things down here?”

She nods. “We were going to let the Master of Galaxies stew for a bit anyway. Let him fear the half-breed is going to come and finish the job.” She grins evilly. “I’ll try to soften up some of his underlings in the meantime. Maybe I’ll show them the video-feed.”

“Mom!” Keith has turned beet-red. “I … I don’t want anybody to see that!”

“Keith.” She comes over to them and encloses her son’s face in her hands. “There is nothing to be ashamed of. You were trying to protect what you love.” She grins again. “You were magnificent, star of mine.”

“I would have killed him.”

“You don’t know that. You wanted to, but there is no telling if you really would have. Besides, it’s not your fault that your Galran heritage manifests in such an unusual way or that you haven’t learnt to keep it in check yet. That last one is on me, I’d say.”

“No, it’s not,” Keith says immediately, and Shiro will never stop being in awe of Keith’s unshakeable belief in the people he treasures.

“It’s nobody’s fault,” he says before things can escalate into Keith and Krolia reassuring each other and blaming themselves for another hour. “We’ll deal with it. Together.”

Krolia looks at him, and suddenly her hands are framing his face instead of Keith’s. “Welcome, my son,” she says to him and places a kiss on his brow. Shiro shuts his eyes for a moment. How can a day with so much emotional upheaval also be the best day of his life? He feels drained and elated, content and so very much loved. It’s wild.