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“Keith, it’s getting pretty hot over in my sector.”
He breathed out through his teeth and removed his hand from where it had been pressed against his belly, reaching for the controls.
“Roger that,” he managed to say. To him his voice sounded thin and obviously off, but none of the others on the comms said anything. “On my way.”
He piloted Black to the left, towards where Lance was facing off about a dozen fighter jets, while the battle raged around them. The Lions darted this way and that, chasing down the small mobile units that had been deployed, while at their back the Atlas traded shots with the warship opposite.
It wasn’t a smooth ride, and while normally that wouldn’t be a problem for him, today was turning out to be decidedly not normal.
The pain that now roiled in his gut had begun that morning at a far lower intensity. He had brushed it off, fully convinced it was nothing and would go away on its own, but he was wrong. It had strengthened into a deep, pervading ache just below his stomach that made him want to curl into a ball and scream.
But he couldn’t. He needed to focus and lead the team through the battle, so this stomach ache or whatever it was would just have to wait.
Keith came into the fight fast, as usual. Black shoulder checked one of the jets, crumpling it like a ball of tissue paper, then spun around and sliced through another with her jaw blade. Red roared over their head and caught a small group of the jets with her magma blast, reducing them to sludge. Lance wasn’t as quick with Red as Keith used to be, but he got the job done.
A sudden stab of pain made Keith’s left arm jerk, instinctively trying to wrap around his stomach, but he had a death grip on Black’s controls and only succeeded in jerking her to the side, right into another jet. It too was destroyed, but the move was messy and graceless enough that even oblivious Lance noticed.
“Keith? You good?”
“Fine,” he muttered through a clenched jaw. His breath hitched for a moment, wanting to let out some sort of a noise, but he swallowed it down and hoped his heavy breathing wasn’t detectable through the comms. Comms which, at that moment, crackled with a new voice.
“The ship’s on its last legs,” said Shiro, sounding confident. “Just a few more minutes.”
Keith took a deep breath and held it. It kinda felt like a giant hand was squeezing him into jelly, but he could make it a few more minutes. He had to.
Shiro was true to his word. In less than three minutes the warship was exploding into a fireball that lasted milliseconds before being consumed by the void of space. The metal tore into deadly chunks that went spiraling off into the distance, probably not to stop until they ran into some unsuspecting asteroid.
Keith could’ve cried with relief, but somehow he managed to keep his composure long enough to gather up the Paladins and fly back to the Atlas.
Black landed a bit heavily, and the jolt made Keith wince and clap a hand over his mouth. Once again he was able to keep quiet enough that none of the others noticed, and after a moment to brace himself, got to his feet.
Black rumbled in the back of his mind, concerned, but Keith brushed her off as he headed for the exit ramp, still slightly bent to keep less pressure on the painful area. He kept one hand braced against the wall; he knew he’d have to straighten up to join the others, but for now he could indulge a bit of weakness.
The door in Black’s mouth opened. At the other end of the brightly lit hangar he could see Shiro and Sam Holt waiting for them, and the other Paladins making their way down their own ramps. Shiro raised his new prosthetic hand in greeting. Time to pretend.
So Keith straightened, taking his hands away from his stomach and the wall. With a set expression he hoped would disguise his grimacing, he took a step forward.
At the same moment a spike of pain lanced through his side. All thought of saving face flew right out the window as a choked sound escaped his throat and he grasped at his torso. He felt the impact of his knees hitting the ramp, but he couldn’t think about anything but the ache twisting his guts.
“Keith?” It was Shiro’s voice, along with a babble of others that must’ve been the Paladins. “Are you alright?” A pair of hands landed on his shoulders.
“Is he hurt?”
“Did he get shot or something?”
“Do you see any blood?”
Another twist of pain made him gasp, jerking forward against whoever’s hands were holding him up, and the voices around him all pitched higher with increased panic. All except one.
“Keith, otouto, can you hear me?”
Though he kept his eyes wrenched shut against the tears that threatened to spill, he managed to nod in answer to Shiro’s question.
“Ok, good, can you tell me what’s wrong?”
“H-hurts.” He tightened his grip around his torso for emphasis, and Shiro, thankfully, understood.
“How bad? One to ten.”
“Eight.” A whine escaped his throat. “Don’t know why.”
“Alright, I’m gonna help you up, ok? We’re gonna go to the med bay.”
Keith nodded again, and instantly there were hands on all sides, trying to help him get to his feet. Normally that would’ve bothered him, but it was hard to think about anything except the pain. Or just think in general.
His gait was awkward, even with so many people helping him. Shiro was the closest, pressed against his right side, so his voice was loud in Keith’s ear when he spoke.
“Pidge, ping Krolia and tell her to meet us in the medbay. Lance, run down ahead of us and let them know we’re coming.”
Even though Shiro wasn’t the leader anymore, the others still leapt into action the moment the orders were given. Lance’s footsteps rang out as he dashed down the hall, and if he listened close he could detect the sound of Pidge’s fingers on her tablet, tapping violently at the screen.
It felt like forever, but eventually their group reached the infirmary. There was already a Garrison doctor and several nurses there waiting, their white clothes making them blend in with the blindingly bright interior of the room; untempered by the soft afternoon light of the Earth hospital, it made Keith’s eyes burn.
The nurses moved forward without having to be told, the doctor busily prepping an examination table. But when Keith caught sight of the nurses’ hands at the corners of his eyes, he instinctively flinched back.
“We need to take your armor off,” said one of them in a tense tone, but all it did was make Keith recoil more as the pain ratcheted up another few points. Logically he understood what needed to be done, but his brain felt scrambled and short-circuited, and all he could manage was a weak shake of the head. He didn’t want strangers’ hands on him.
“We’ll do it,” answered Shiro. “We know how to get it off faster, anyway.”
Keith felt fingers worm their way under one of his shoulder pads; although a strange sensation, he didn’t fight it. He recognized these hands as Shiro’s, and a moment later on the other side, Hunk’s.
In a matter of minutes they’d stripped him down to his flight suit and helped him up onto the exam table. Shiro gently pushed him down until he lay flat on his back, leaning over him with a concerned look on his face. Keith blinked up at the bright lights for a moment, then turned his head away, trying to roll onto his side to coil around the pained area. But with a wretched look, Shiro stopped him.
“Sorry,” he said softly when Keith shot him a betrayed look. “The doctor needs to check you over.”
The man in question appeared at Shiro’s side, peering over the edges of his glasses at Keith. His salt and pepper hair and square jaw made him look solemn and intimidating, but this was the same doctor who’d treated the Paladins after the battle for Earth, and Keith knew him to be gentle and soft-spoken. Which was the only reason he allowed the man to touch him.
“Where is the pain?” he asked. Keith, wincing at the depth of the ache, splayed his fingers over his belly, then removed it when the doctor tapped his hand.
“Tell me how this feels,” he said, then pressed two fingers firmly on the left side of Keith’s abdomen. “Has the pain increased?”
Keith shook his head. Without a change of expression the doctor stopped the pressure-- the sudden spike of pain took Keith by surprise, and he couldn’t resist twisting into a ball, biting his lip and trying his damn best not to make a sound. His eyes had wrenched shut again and he couldn’t see the doctor’s face, but he heard the unfazed tone in his voice when he spoke.
“Seems to be appendicitis. We’ll run a few tests to make sure, but--”
He was cut off by the sound of the infirmary door opening, two determined sets of feet making their way inside.
“What’s happening?” Something tight in Keith’s chest eased a bit at the sound of his mother’s voice. After all of those years alone, knowing she was nearby, that she cared, always helped him feel less awful. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing too serious,” answered the doctor soothingly. “His appendix has merely become infected. A quick surgery to remove it and a few days’ bed rest and he should be fine.”
“Wait.” This voice was much deeper, and Keith mentally groaned to himself. Of course Kolivan would’ve tagged along. “Show us which organ, first. He’s a hybrid, it could be different than in humans.”
“Right, of course.” The doctor sounded put-out, like he was scolding himself for only now remembering Keith’s alien ancestry. There was the sound of more footsteps and rustling paper, a few voices murmuring in the background, then he spoke again. “See, this one here. It’s rather small, and--”
“You want to take that out?”
Krolia sounded alarmed, and that alone was enough to get the hairs on the back of Keith’s neck rising. He tried to shift, maybe to sit up, but his stomach flared angrily at him and he subsided with a hiss. A few seconds later a cool hand ran through his hair-- Shiro’s prosthetic-- trying to soothe him back into stillness as his mother continued.
“You can’t take that out of him, it’s-- in Galra, it’s important. You might as well take out his heart or his lungs or--”
“Krolia,” scolded Kolivan, “that’s enough.”
“In humans, the appendix shows no discernible purpose,” explained the doctor, though now there was a hint of anxiety in his tone. “When it gets infected it can cause severe pain and even burst, so our general procedure is to simply remove it.”
“So what are we gonna do?” Lance’s voice made him jolt a bit-- he’d forgotten the Paladins were in the room. “Take it out and roll the dice on which side of the family it takes after?”
“No. For now we can give him some antibiotics and pain relievers and see if the infection can be treated internally. But,” he voice held a warning, “if it bursts, we’ll be forced to remove it.”
Someone let out a shaky breath-- he thought it was Krolia’s. Shiro’s hand moved away from him, but before he had time to miss the contact another had worked its way into one of his, pressed over his stomach. When his eyes opened, he found himself looking at the purple face of his mother, eyes shining with concern.
With a gulp to smooth his dry throat, he managed a hoarse, “Hey.”
“Hey,” she replied, though her voice trembled. “They’re going to have to move you to a proper bed, so that they can get an IV set up. Is that alright?”
Keith grunted. “Do I have a choice?”
Her frown deepened, but all the same her other hand rose to brush away the hair that had fallen over his eyes.
“Not really.” She was trying to act nonchalant, but Keith could see through her mask. To humans appendicitis really wasn’t that big a deal-- but they weren’t humans. Not entirely. And she was scared. Scared for him.
So he forced a tiny smile onto his face despite the pain and said, “It’ll be ok, Mom. I’ll be fine.”
She squeezed his hand, saying nothing.
Shiro hovered anxiously in the doorway of Keith’s hospital room. It had been well on an hour since they had brought Keith in, and now he was settled into a bed, an IV delivering antibiotics into his hand. Under the blankets he had a heat pack pressed to his abdomen, and he remained in the fetal position, head flat on the mattress with Krolia at his side, holding one of his hands and stroking his hair with the other. Kosmo lay across the foot of the bed, resting his head on his paws as he dozed.
The nursing staff of the Atlas had been keeping a close eye on him, watching for side effects or reactions to the antibiotics or the pain medication, but thus far nothing had surfaced. Gradually the grimace on Keith’s face had receded, until he’d fallen asleep, leaving the room between Shiro and Krolia quiet.
“Do you think it’ll work?” she asked suddenly, jarring Shiro out of the reverie he’d fallen into. The other Paladins had long since been sent off to bed now that they knew Keith’s life wasn’t in danger, but Shiro couldn’t help the paranoia that kept him tethered to the room. He got the feeling Krolia couldn’t, either.
“Yes,” he said. “Keith’s managed on Earth for his whole life without anyone knowing he was different. I think his body will be able to figure it out.”
For a moment she didn’t answer. Her gaze was far away, eyes locked on Keith’s face.
“He got sick,” she said after a brief silence, “while we were in the Abyss. Horrible fever, shaking, nightmares. A few times he…” her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “He didn’t recognize me. Thought I was someone else. Someone who was going to hurt him.”
Shiro was surprised to see a tear or two fall from Krolia’s eyes, but she wiped them away so quickly he couldn’t be absolutely sure he’d seen them at all. More than anything he was shocked to be hearing this at all. Krolia was like Keith-- quiet and private, not willing to spill her thoughts or emotions willingly, at least until there was no more room and they came pouring out.
Now was probably one of those times.
“And I couldn’t help.” Her voice was tight like it was about to snap. “I didn’t know how. I thought I was going to lose him.”
Shiro gnawed on the inside of his lip, trying to figure out what to say. What could he say? That he understood how she felt? It was true he’d woken Keith from many a nightmare only to be mistaken for one of the monsters in it, and he’d been at Keith’s side through so many hurts, like the time he broke his arm while racing hovers, and every time he went into a cryopod in the Castle, and the days after the battle for Earth.
But what was that compared to a mother’s love?
“If he made it through that,” he said eventually, “He’ll make it through this.”
Krolia didn’t say another word. She merely laid her head on the mattress beside Keith’s, one of her hands still holding his and rubbing slow circles onto the back with her thumb. She didn’t need to speak for Shiro to understand the message her body was sending.
I hope so.
Waking up took longer than it normally did.
Dimly, he could hear an alarm, and all around him were voices, loud and shouting over each other. All he could process were bits and pieces.
“--three warships--”
“-- can’t, he’s sick--”
“-- need Voltron--”
That was the one that kickstarted his higher brain function, pulling everything into focus. The alarm was the one that went out during battle, telling the non-combat personnel to hunker down and prepare for the worst. The voices were ones he knew, Shiro and his mother and… the last one escaped him. Allura, maybe?
After a few more seconds of struggling, Keith finally managed to get his eyes open. His room was crowded between the nurses, the doctors, Krolia, Shiro, and all five Paladins. Outside in the hall he spotted a flash of orange that might’ve been Coran’s mustache, and Kosmo was laying over his legs, ears pricked up and alert.
“He can’t pilot right now,” Krolia was saying. Her back was turned to him, but from her posture Keith could tell she was agitated. “He’s sick, he can’t go running off into a battle! Shiro, you were the Black Paladin before, why don’t you take the Lion back?”
Shiro looked distressed and disheveled, his prosthetic arm vibrating a bit where it hovered in place. “I can’t, our bond was severed when Allura pulled me out, I can’t communicate with Black anymore.”
Finally it all clicked together in his brain. The Atlas was under attack, they needed Voltron, and they needed him piloting Black to do it. Without hesitation he braced his hands under him, one aching slightly with the IV inserted into it, and levered himself upright.
Instantly pain exploded in his gut, making his arms buckle. He managed to catch himself on one elbow, but he must’ve made some sort of a noise, because now all of the people in the room were focused on him.
“Keith,” said Allura, cutting off both Shiro and Krolia in the process, “We’re under attack. We need to form Voltron-- are you able?”
Well, that wasn’t really a question, was it? He nodded, then, grinding his teeth, he forced himself up again. This time he managed to make it to sitting, but before he could go any further his mother put a hand on his shoulder, holding him in place.
“No,” she said, steel in her gaze, “you’re ill.”
“Nobody else can fly Black.” He moved again, this time getting his legs over the side of the bed before being stopped again.
“Then they’ll just have to take care of it with four Lions.”
“Not happening.”
For a moment there was a standoff, the two of them just glaring at each other, waiting to see who would break first. The others in the room quieted as well, just as invested in the result as they were.
There was a dull blast, and the ship rocked under their feet from the impact. That was enough for Krolia’s eyes to gentle, and for her to pull her hand back, grim acceptance pressed into her face.
“Fine. You win. Just be careful, alright?”
Breathing a sigh of relief, Keith nodded, then turned his attention to the Paladins, still waiting for orders.
“Get to your Lions,” he said in the strongest voice he could muster. “Kosmo will get me to Black.”
There was no more arguing. The Paladins left and the medical personnel scattered to allow them passage. Shiro followed them out, heading to the bridge, and that was all Keith waited to see before twisting a hand into Kosmo’s mane and letting him teleport them.
It felt odd, being in Black without his armor on. The pain was still there, roiling just underneath the surface of his consciousness, but as the Lion’s dashboards lit up it dimmed. It was still there, but felt like it had been draped in a heavy quilt.
Despite the circumstances a smile quirked Keith’s lips. Black was trying to help.
With a single tap of his finger he opened the comms, and with another set the hangar door to begin sliding open.
“Paladins, are you in position?”
A chorus of affirmative answers greeted his ears. He could detect the worry in their tones-- they weren’t sure about bringing him into battle either, but as with so many other things, they had no choice.
“Let’s move!”
Keith’s reflexes were still dulled from the sedative effects of the pain medication, but once Voltron had been formed the other Paladins were able to pick up his slack. The Atlas was surrounded on three sides by the warships, taking a beating from their ion cannons. Much smaller and more mobile than the other ships, Voltron danced between them, appearing on the farthest side of the leftmost ship, hovering right over the command center.
“Form sword!”
Lance did as he was bid, and with one slice powered by their thrusters, the sword severed the ion cannon from the rest of the ship. Another strike and the ship was down it’s bridge, and one more bit into the main engine. The shockwave went right into Voltron’s chest when it imploded, and the spark of pain that lit up in Keith’s side echoed through the paladin bond and into everyone, but they didn’t have time to feel it.
The next warship had seen them and was slowly turning in their direction, the ion cannon already powering up. With a white knuckled grip on the controls, Keith flew them forward at it until the last possible second, when the light from the cannon filled his entire vision like a sun. Then, and only then, did he call the next order.
“Shield!”
Pidge’s reflexes were unfaultable. The impact from the blast shook them, but they’d taken so many hits like it in the past that all the Paladins brushed it off within the next breath.
“Shoulder cannon!”
The swarm of rockets drove red hot wounds into the next warship’s side. The whole thing rocked and tipped onto its side, and Keith led them down into a dive and away-- the Atlas could finish that one off for them.
The final ship they skewered through the belly, rocketing up from beneath like a shark and driving the sword into the metal hull all the way up to the hilt. The action set off a series of explosions that Keith hadn’t anticipated, Voltron taking the brunt of the force and getting sent tumbling literally head over heels into empty space.
Normally this wouldn’t have been a problem. But this wasn’t normally.
He didn’t know whether it was the shock or the movement or the G-force that did it, but suddenly Keith’s abdomen was on fire. His vision went white and he released the Lion’s controls as he bent double, nearly sliding completely out of his chair while he tried his best not to vomit. He succeeded, but a sound over the comms said someone else hadn’t been as fortunate.
It took a minute, but once the ringing had faded from his ears Keith realized that the others had all felt the same pain he had. Their cries rang over the comms, drowning out Shiro’s frantic questions. He opened his mouth to apologize, only to have to close it again when all that came out was a high pitched keen.
“Ohhhhhh-k, ow, fuck.”
“This was such a bad idea, I knew it was a bad idea.”
Pidge’s channel was a slew of incoherent swearing.
“Keith.” That was Allura’s voice, wane and thin. “Have Kosmo take you back. We can… tow Black…”
Keith was one hundred percent certain she only said that to get Voltron disbanded and make them all stop feeling pain that wasn’t theirs, but he couldn’t blame her. It really was nothing short of excruciating-- he put up no fight when Kosmo pressed up against his leg and poofed them back to the Atlas.
He saw white tiles and a pair of legs before promptly blacking out.
“The appendix has burst,” said the doctor, confirming Krolia’s worst fears. “We’ll have to go in and remove it.”
She clenched her fists to keep her face impassive. She tried her best to think about the situation logically; if the organ had burst and Keith was still alive, clearly it hadn’t been as important to him as it would have been to a full-blooded Galra. If it was already burst, the act of going in to remove it shouldn’t kill him.
But if she turned her head at all, if she got the slightest glance of Keith’s pale, pain-lined face, the fear would surge right back up in her chest and strangle the logic in its crib.
“It won’t take long,” the doctor continued as he simultaneously punched things into a tablet. “An hour at most, and in a few days he’ll be ready to go back on active duty.”
By the stars did she hate feeling like this. So scared, so panicked, so… out of control. How many years had she spent in the Blade, beating her emotions into compliant little shapes she could throw about, or away, as she wished, all gone now that she knew what it meant to have a son. Not a small, squishable human infant, but a real son, who looked so much like her and so much like his father at the same time that it still took her breath away.
This is why having children was forbidden, she thought bitterly to herself as the tips of her claws perforated her palms. So that we wouldn’t get attached.
“Krolia.”
She looked over. At the door to the room stood the captain of the Atlas, Shiro, with such a concerned expression on his face that she almost wanted to punch it off of him.
“Do you have a minute?”
She wanted to say no. But when the doctor looked over and her and waved a hand, she understood. They were about to do the surgery (to cut open her son and pull his organs out in little pieces) and they didn’t want her there.
Her brain agreed with them.
Her heart howled.
All the same, she found herself a few doors down in a semi-comfortable lounge with the captain, the same tense silence from before woven around them. The captain poured himself a cup of coffee from the small table and moved to the sofa to sit. Krolia remained standing, only a few steps from the door, ready.
Ready for what? She didn’t know. For anything, she supposed.
For better or for worse.
“He’s going to be ok,” Shiro said at length, finally breaking the binding quiet. “If something was going to happen it would’ve happened already.”
She knew what he meant, the same thing she herself had been thinking earlier, but she couldn’t swallow down the fear. Not entirely.
After a few seconds without an answer from her, Krolia heard the clink of ceramic as Shiro set his cup down.
“Would you like to sit?”
She shook her head no. But, after a few more moments, she gave in and slunk into place on the sofa across from him. The expression on the former Black Paladin’s face was almost the same as the one she was feeling: fear and dread. But underneath was a little gleam of something golden… hope? No, something different.
Trust, she realized with a jolt. Shiro was just as scared as she was, but he was choosing to place his trust in others; in the doctor, and the rest of the staff, and even in Keith himself, trusting that he would pull through.
Could she do the same? She didn’t know, not for sure, but…
Maybe it was worth a shot.
Keith was stable.
The doctor had delivered the news in the lounge, to the crowd of people who had gathered for it. All of the Paladins, still in their armor, and Krolia, and Kolivan, and Shiro.
The Paladins beamed at each other, exchanging high fives and happy exclamations. Kolivan allowed himself a smile. Krolia sank back into the seat she’d vacated when the doctor had entered the room, trying and failing to hide the grateful tears that shone in her eyes.
Shiro, more than anything, felt like melting. The last eighteen hours had been an absolute hurricane of adrenaline and fear that was finally getting an outlet.
In a shower of blue sparks Kosmo popped into the room. He didn’t dilly or dally-- he went straight to Krolia and, taking her hands gently into his jaws, popped back out again.
Shiro smiled softly to himself.
Keith was stable, and for today, at least, everything was going to be just fine.