Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first thing that Keith noticed as his awareness trickled back in was that the artificial gravity inside Red’s cockpit wasn’t working. Or at least, that’s what he assumed, since one side of his body felt curiously heavy, like he was dangling in midair.

The second thing was the silence, broken only by a consistent drip, drip, drip.

The third thing was pain.

He couldn’t really pinpoint it to one particular spot, it just hurt, all over. He also couldn’t remember anything that had happened in between the battle that they had been fighting against a Galra fleet, and waking up. Something must have happened. Probably something bad, considering the amount of pain he was in.

Prying open his eyes - well, one of his eyes, anyway, the other seemed to be stuck shut - he found himself looking at a darkened windscreen. The whole cockpit was dark, in fact. Nothing lit up on the dash, no warm red overhead light, no alarms…

Alarms. Suddenly a memory stabbed through him, of alarms wailing and sensors flashing frantically, of himself pushing multiple buttons, hoping for some kind of miracle, while simultaneously pulling back on the controls as hard as he could and watching an unknown planet come spiraling toward him at full speed…

He gasped as the dark, still cockpit came back into focus, causing a wave of pain through his torso. Right. No idea still what had happened to make him and Red lose control, but they had definitely crashed. First things first, then, he needed to check on her and see if she was responding at all.

“Red.” His voice sounded awful. Some kind of liquid had pooled in the back of his throat, and he was forced to cough it out before he could continue. Fire spread through his body as it was jolted. “Red, you there? Can you hear me at all?”

Holding still and closing his eye, he waited for her familiar warmth to brush up against his mind, reassuring him that she would be alright after a little bit of rest. But it didn’t come. Instead, he thought he might have felt the tiniest little nudge, much more like a sickly kitten than a proud lion. Just enough to say, “I’m still here,” but also enough to tell him that she was in really bad shape.

Keith opened his eye again, lifting a stiff, sore arm to wipe at the sticky substance that was still keeping the other one glued shut. It burned when he tried to blink it open, and after hissing in a breath, he ended up just keeping it closed.

Now that he was a bit more awake, he could take in just how bad Red’s state really was. The whole front of the cockpit was crumpled. He didn’t even know it was possible for the Lions to take that kind of damage.

“Oh, Red,” he breathed. “I’m sorry, girl. I’m sorry.”

There was no response that time.

Gathering his courage, Keith started the process of assessing his own situation. First of all, he was still seated in the pilot’s chair, hanging sideways like he had surmised at the beginning, which meant that Red had landed on her side - probably after initially crashing headfirst, based on the way she was crushed. The position was far from comfortable, putting strain on his neck and back.

Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do to remedy that, because the completely obliterated dashboard was sitting on his lap, pinning him in place. The simultaneous good news and bad news was that he couldn’t feel anything from that point down. 

The stuff he had scrubbed off his eye was blood. It was also what was making that dripping noise, as it rolled down from some unknown point on his head, across his eye, down to his temple, then dropped to the wall that was now the floor with a wet plop. He wasn’t sure he really wanted to attempt to see how big the puddle down there was. As for the wound itself, his best guess was that a piece of shrapnel had managed to fly up under his partial faceplate and leave a cut. With his whole head throbbing, it was hard to tell anything for sure.

His left arm was broken. Or at least, that was the diagnosis he was going with after he attempted to move it and ended up screaming. All he could really tell from looking at it was that it was not the shape it should be, and he decided right away that he was just going to keep it right where it was, dangling awkwardly off the side of the chair or not.

He didn’t want to look at his stomach. It had been gradually establishing itself as the most intense of all the pains, and he knew it was going to be bad way before he looked at it. But he had to. He needed to know what he was dealing with, if any of this was going to be survivable or not. Steeling himself, he looked down.

It was bad. Like, even worse than he thought it was going to be bad. There was a huge piece of metal, coated in his blood, sticking out of his stomach. For an eternally long moment, Keith just stared at it, trying to wrap his brain around it. 

Okay. Right. So, he’d been impaled. That was a lot of blood. A whole lot more than was coming out of his head, that was for sure. He was pretty sure that it was going all the way through his body and pinning him to the chair, like those butterfly specimens that one of his teachers used to keep on display. He was also pretty sure that it had missed his spine, though that could definitely change if he moved around any.

It had not, however, missed vital organs. There was no way it hadn’t cut through at least a couple. That bitter tasting liquid from before bubbled up in the back of his throat again, as if to confirm it, as if to say, “Yep, Keith, you’re definitely dying!” Coughing it out jiggled the metal inside of him and made him whine.

So, yeah. He was dying. That was a thing. Even if the other Paladins could find him and get to him, they probably wouldn’t be quick enough, not with the way he was losing blood.

It didn’t really surprise him. Death had followed Keith around for most of his life, hiding in the shadows, waiting for it to be his turn to go like so many others had. Besides, now he was in the middle of a ten thousand year old war. Death happened all around him, every day. He knew it would be his turn sooner or later. And the sooner part wasn’t surprising, either, given how reckless he knew he could be. 

Like you know, jumping out in front of a zaiforge cannon to keep it from hitting Lance. He was pretty sure now that that’s what had happened.

He also had always figured that he would die alone, and that’s pretty much how he was. Though...maybe there was a chance that he didn’t have to be.

“Red. If you’re...if you’re running any kind of systems right now...any repairs you’re trying to make, or anything...divert that power to comms. I know...I know you need help. I promise, you’ll get it. The team’ll find you, and Pidge and Hunk will be able to fix you right up. I promise. You...you’ll be okay. They’ll make sure you go on to fly another day. But...for now...I really, really need this. If you can.”

He still didn’t feel anything from her, but a moment later static began crackling in his ears. Keith gave a tired smile. “Good kitty.”

It took a few seconds for the static to clear up, but he could soon hear the familiar shouts of a battle. At first he just shut his eyes and listened, letting his teammates' voices wash over him. When there was a lull, he cleared his throat. “Guys? Can you hear me?”

“Keith?”

“Keith!”

“Keith, is that you?”

“Holy quiznak, you’re alive!”

“You idiota quiznaking estúpido -!”

He winced at the volume that pierced through his aching head, but was quick to jump back into the conversation. “Hey, yeah, I’m here. It’s me.”

“Oh, thank the Ancestors, Keith, we were so afraid of what had happened to you when we saw the Red Lion go down and you failed to respond!”

“ Por qué ? Why did you flippin’ jump out in front of me, idiota ? What were you trying to prove, huh?”

“Nothing! I wasn’t...wasn’t trying to prove anything, I just...I saw the cannon, I saw you...I didn’t really think, I just...acted.”

“Yeah, that...seems to be a thing with you,” Pidge quipped. “Hunk, on your six!”

“Keith. What happened? Where are you?”

Leave it to Shiro to finally cut to the chase. “Red and I crashed. Not sure where. She’s gone dark, I can’t see anything outside.”

“Number Four, when you say the Red Lion has ‘gone dark’...what extent of damage are we talking about here?”

Keith grimaced. “It’s bad. I can barely feel her. The only reason my comm is working is because I asked her to divert whatever power she had left to it.” Yikes, he maybe shouldn’t have admitted that part. “Her front’s all busted up. No telling what kind of hits she took everywhere else.”

“So, you can’t like, get out and look at where you are?” Lance asked.

“Pidge, you’ve got two fighters coming your way. Keith, he’s right, if we could get a location on you we can come pick you up whenever we get the chance.”

“Uh, yeah. About that, it’s, uh…” To tell the truth, or not? Now was the time to decide. “I’m kinda...pinned. When I said Red’s front was busted up, I...the dash is...yeah.”

The silence only lasted a few ticks. “That sounds bad, that’s like, really bad, isn’t it? What does that mean, anyway, you’re pinned ?”

“Hunk, less worrying, more shooting!”

“How bad is it, Keith? What are your other injuries?”

Because of course Shiro would automatically assume there are other injuries. Another chance to choose whether to tell the truth.. “Well, um...it’s not...great, um…” 

“Not great? What...what does that mean?” Hunk was still apparently doing just as much worrying as shooting, the poor guy. And Keith would have attempted to answer him, but he was a little busy trying to breathe through a sudden rush of pain through his middle that made all the noises sound more like high-pitched whines for a minute.

When his hearing returned to normal and he could kind of breathe again, he was being bombarded with frantic voices all trying to get him to respond. “I’m here,” he croaked. “Sorry. I was...just…”

“Pidge, there’s absolutely no way you can get a location?”

“Not while she’s powered down. If he could get her to divert power from the comms to her tracker for a minute -”

“No!” That came out far too forcefully, and it hurt like heck, but he couldn’t lose his connection to the team, he couldn’t . If he cut the comms he might never get them back, and...and he’d die alone, in silence. “No, it’s...you don’t need to do that. I’m okay. You’re already down one Lion, you can’t afford to lose any more for a rescue right now. Just focus on your battle.”

No one spoke for a minute, other than calling out the occasional warning or fight maneuver. Keith knew they were realizing that what he said was true, and he was glad. He was already starting to get lightheaded and have a hard time breathing. If they sent someone after him, it would be for nothing, and they might lose the fight, or worse, lose another paladin.

“Talk to me, Keith. You still haven’t told me what your other injuries are.”

Closing his eyes, he drew in a stuttering breath. “Yeah, well...don’t wanna make Hunk queasy while he’s fighting.”

“Keith…”

“It’ll be okay, Shiro. Don’t worry about me. I just…” Wanted some company. “..didn’t want…” To be lonely. “...to miss out when you beat these guys.” The last victory he’d be a part of, even if he had let them down for the majority of the battle.

“Well, then maybe you shouldn’t have jumped out in front of a zaiforge cannon ! Which I have now destroyed, by the way, de nada. ”

Keith grunted a laugh, wincing when it pulled at his stomach wound. “Well if I hadn’t, then it’d be you down here.” And he could handle the thought of himself dying a lot better than any of them. “So de nada, yourself.”

Lance was shooting something back, as usual, always ready with a retort, but Keith’s hearing was fading in and out with his vision. A wave of dizziness came over him, and he let out a quiet groan.

“-ith?”

“Still here.” Even he could tell that his voice was much weaker than before.

“Stay with us, buddy. Try not to fall asleep.”

“M’kay. Gonna try. Kinda...losin’ some blood here, so…”

Someone who he was pretty sure was Pidge swore loudly. “We need to find him.”

“Nope. Don’t...don’t need to find me. Need to fight. Stop worrying about me.”

“You’re gonna have to get over it, we’re going to worry about you!” Pidge practically shouted. “You call us and tell us you’ve crashed your Lion and are pinned in your seat and bleeding and you keep randomly switching from talking to moaning and you think we’re not gonna worry about you?”

Guilt threaded its way into his chest. He shouldn’t have called. He was distracting them, he could get them killed. Besides the fact that he was making this way harder on them than it needed to be, making them listen to him as he struggled through his last moments.

“‘m sorry. I shouldn’t have...I’ll just go. You guys need...to focus.”

“Keith, no!”

“No! No no no, don’t go, you’re good, okay? We’re focused. You don’t worry about us, okay? You just concentrate on staying awake, and we’ll concentrate on fighting, and we’ll talk at the same time. Okay?”

Keith’s eyes slipped shut with a combination of relief and exhaustion. “Yeah. Okay. Just...just don’t lose focus. Don’t want any of you...getting hurt.”

“We’re good. I promise.” There was a pause before Shiro continued. “Can you promise me the same? That you’re gonna be okay?”

He didn’t know what to say to that. He hated lying to Shiro. Besides, his head was spinning so much now from blood loss that any words he came up with almost immediately got lost again.

“Hey, Sh’ro?” he finally managed. 

“Yeah, bud?”

“R’member when...I stole your...car?”

It seemed like it was taking Shiro a really long time to respond, but that could have just been because he was drifting in and out of consciousness. “Yeah, bud. That’s kinda hard to forget. You sure knew how to make a first impression.”

A smile played at the corners of Keith’s lips. “But you...you were my friend. Anyway. E’en though...I did that. And I was...a jerk.”

“You weren’t a jerk. Well, okay, maybe a little. But I could tell it was all a front.”

“You were...were the only one who...ever tried. I don’t know if I...ever...said thank you.”

Shiro’s voice sounded strange when he spoke again. “You don’t have to, buddy. Being your friend is my pleasure.”

The other Paladins had fallen strangely silent, not even calling out maneuvers anymore. He hoped they were still listening. He wasn’t sure what he was going to say to them, but he knew it needed to be something.

“Thank...all ‘f you. For...bein’ friends. Good...good friends. Like fam’ly.”

“Keith.” Hunk’s voice had that unmistakable wobble to it that meant he was crying or about to. “You’re killing me here, bud. You’re our family, too.”

“No, shut up, don’t encourage him!” Pidge growled. “This is stupid! You sound like you’re saying goodbye and you need to shut up, because we are coming to get you , do you hear me?”

Leave it to Pidge to think she could threaten him into living. “You...you can’t.”

“Excuse you, what the heck do you mean we can’t? ”

The end of Lance’s demand was drowned out by Keith falling into a coughing fit, worse than the last two combined. He could feel the metal ripping further into him. Eventually the fit dwindled into a long whimper, one that he didn’t really want the team to hear but couldn’t help.

“...Keith?”

“You’ll be too late,” he whispered, too tired to keep up the lie any longer. “I’m...bleeding out.”

“I’m going down there right now. I don’t care if I have to search the entire planet, I am not staying up here while he’s down there dy-” She cut off abruptly.

“I’m coming, too. Lance, Hunk, you’ve got this handled.”

“Yes, they’ll be fine, and will have backup from the Castle. Go find Keith.”

They were such good people. Better people than he had deserved to have in his life. He was pretty sure he was slipping away, and pretty sure that he wouldn’t wake back up. But he was doing it with a fond smile on his face. “Love you guys,” he breathed.

.

.

“Keith?”

.

.

“KEITH!”

Chapter Text

“Quiznak. Oh, holy quiznak, Keith?”

.

“He’s not breathing. I’ve got no pulse.”

.

“Hold him steady, I’m cutting the back of this chair off so we can get to the shrapnel.”

.

“Come on, Keith. Breathe. Breathe!”

.

“Look, I found this in Red’s first aid kit. I’m a universal donor.”

“Get it hooked up, he needs everything we can give him.”

.

“Please, Keith. Please.”

.

“Shiro, his ribs…”

“I know. They’ll heal.”

.

“Wait! Look!”

“Oh my g-...okay. Okay. Hurry, let’s get him to the Black Lion. I’ll need you to ride with him so you can keep up the transfusion.”

“Right behind you.”

.

.

Consciousness came in spurts. The first time, he surfaced from the never-ending blackness to nothing but cold and pain , and the feeling that his insides were twisted into a big knot and trying their best to exit his body. As he retched, body automatically jerking to try to sit up or roll over and sending even more pain shooting through him, frantic voices surrounded him.

“...reaction...blood…!”

“But...O neg...shouldn’t…”

Somebody scooped him up like a baby and ran, jarring his screaming abdomen with every step, before depositing him onto a semi-soft surface.

“...Galra…”

“...sample...synthesize more…”

The words meant nothing to him. All he knew was pain and nausea, and a blur of lights and movement above him.

Just before he passed out again, there was a sharp prick in his forearm that momentarily drew his attention away from the rest of the pain. He couldn’t find the energy to protest it.

.

.

The second time, voices were the first to filter in, hushed tones that sounded as if they were speaking a foreign language. His eyes fluttered open, but the bright lights overhead made him wince and squeeze them back shut. 

“You’re okay,” someone soothed, the only words he could actually pick out from among the rest. “You’ll be just fine. Go back to sleep, now.”

There was a prick on the back of his hand, and he whimpered involuntarily. But a moment later the nothingness was taking back over, and he gladly slipped underneath.

.

.

The next time he woke, he had no recollection of the first two times, or of anything that happened before, but for some reason he was surprised to be waking up. Somehow, he didn’t think he was going to do so. But here he was, awake. Only, he had no idea where here was.

“Keith? Bud? You with us?”

He knew that voice. Turning his head toward it, he willed his eyes to open, and after a moment, they obeyed. A blur of yellow and brown met him. 

“Hey, bud! It’s good to see those eyes open. Can you hear me?”

Keith blinked, trying to bring the person into focus. Once their features had solidified enough that he could make out dark brown eyes and a smile, he licked his chapped lips and attempted to speak. 

“Hunk.” For some reason the N dragged on for much longer than he had intended, but it was a word, regardless.

“Yeah! That’s me! Oh my gosh, you have no idea how happy I am that you’re awake and okay.”

How long had he been asleep? It must have been a while for Hunk to be worried. And he was pretty sure he felt okay, though maybe a bit numb overall. Maybe he really had been asleep for a long time. It kinda felt like he was waking up after one of those naps you take while you’re sick and your fever breaks in the middle of it.

He licked his lips again, to no avail. “‘hirsty.”

“Yep, yep, I’m sure you are.” Hunk turned and snatched something up off a nearby table, bringing it toward Keith’s face. “Here ya go. Small sips.”

The water was the most wonderful thing he had ever tasted in his life. He wanted to gulp it all down, ignoring what he had been told, but Hunk pulled it away after only a couple of seconds. 

“Okay, I’m gonna go get Shiro and Fallenta and let them know you’re awake, alright? I’ll be right back.”

Keith struggled to process that sentence. He didn’t think he recognized one of those names, and he still couldn’t figure out why him being awake was such a big deal. Unless...he had gotten hurt in one of their fights. But then why wouldn’t he be waking up from the pod, not in whatever bed this was?

“Wha...happened?” His words continued to come out strangely, despite his best efforts. Maybe he had been sleeping on his face, because it was one of those numb parts of him that didn’t seem to want to move properly.

Hunk froze at the doorway, turning slowly to face him. “Um...what do you remember?”

It was a good question. Wrinkling his brow, he searched his still half-dazed mind, trying and failing to grasp at the snippets of memories that danced by. It didn’t take long for his head to start hurting, and he shut his eyes, giving up for the moment. “Don’t know. A fight?” He had a vague recollection of being in Red recently. “In the Lions?”

“Um, yeah, well, that’s...one thing that happened.” Hunk seemed nervous, fidgeting with his hands. “I’m gonna go, um, get the others, and they can tell you everything, ‘kay?” Without giving Keith a chance to protest, he disappeared through the door.

Keith sighed, and tested out various parts of his body. Other than most of his right side being curiously numb, and an almost unnoticeable ache in a couple more places, everything seemed to be working properly. He had been in Red right before waking up there...right? Maybe she could tell him what was going on.

Only when he closed his eyes and reached for their connection, he came up empty. There was nothing there. No hum, no purr, nothing. His heart leapt into his throat. Red! Red, where are you? What if something had happened to her? What if she was gone? What if he had done something to make her reject him, and he wasn’t even a paladin anymore, what if that’s what Hunk didn’t want to tell him? If he wasn’t a paladin anymore, then he’d...he’d be nothing. Useless. There would be absolutely no reason for him to be in the Castle anymore, in space at all. The other paladins would take him back to Earth and dump him off, and he’d have no one and nothing yet again.

The door opened, and Keith shot upright, ignoring the way it made his head swim and that ache in his ribs twinge. “I can’t feel Red! I can’t...what happened? Where’s Red?”

“Hey! Hey, shh, Keith, it’s okay!” Shiro was across the room in an instant, sitting down on the side of the bed and grasping Keith’s shoulders in both his hands. “I need you to calm down for me, okay? I’ll explain, but I need you to take deep breaths.”

Drawing in one such breath to appease the man, Keith glanced around the room, taking in Hunk’s worried expression and the alien stranger that stood on the other side of his bed. “Somebody please just tell me what's going on.” The words were still slurred, which was getting more frustrating by the second. “Why’m I here?”

He hated the look that Shiro shot up at the alien before catching his eyes again. They were treating him like a fragile child. Even when he was a child, he had gotten more bad news in his few years than most adults did in their whole lives, so it wasn’t like he didn’t always expect more. 

“You were in an accident,” Shiro finally explained, still speaking far too slowly and softly. “You and Red got hit with a zaiforge cannon and crashed into a nearby planet. Do you remember?”

Keith already knew he didn’t, so he wasn’t going to waste time searching his memory when he still wanted answers. “Where’s Red? Is she okay?”

Offering a sympathetic smile, Shiro squeezed his shoulder with his flesh hand. “She’s in rough shape. All her systems are shut down right now. But Pidge and Coran and Hunk have been working on her, and they’re optimistic that everything can be fixed. With time.”

Letting all his breath out with a whoosh , Keith slumped over forward. It was simultaneous good news and bad news. Red hadn’t rejected him, or at least he didn’t think so. But he hated that she was so badly hurt. “I wanna see her.”

Shiro’s smile twitched up a little higher. “I know. But first, we need to check on you. You’ve been unconscious for quite a while. Everything seems to have healed up alright, but there were some things that couldn’t be tested while you were out.”

As if this was their cue, the alien - an objectively pretty, willowy creature with mauve fur, four long, thin arms, and a myriad of long, thin fingers on each hand - stepped forward. Their voice was light and feminine, and had a lilting accent that reminded him of Lance when he fell into his native tongue.

“I am going to give you some simple instructions to follow, okay?”

Keith frowned. “Who ‘re you?”

“Oh, yes, right.” Shiro indicated the newcomer with one hand. “This is Fallenta. She’s a Tellimite. They’re one of the most medically advanced species in the universe. We wanted to make sure you had the best care possible, so Allura brought us to Tellima as soon as we had you in the pod. Fallenta has been...indispensable.”

His explanation only caused Keith more confusion. If he had been in a pod, then why did he need a doctor? And again, why was he in some bed now? 

Seeming to sense his questions, Fallenta smiled and settled down opposite Shiro. “There were some...complications from your injuries. Coran and Shiro made the right call by placing you into a healing pod right away, knowing that it was the only way to save your life, but that meant that your bones that were broken could not be reset before healing. One of my jobs was to correct this once your abdomen wound was no longer life threatening.”

“Yes, you actually had two different stints in the pod,” Shiro nodded. His brow furrowed. “Well, three, if you count the time that your body rejected the blood Pidge had given you and started trying to shut down. Thankfully, Coran had those samples he took from all of us at the beginning, and was able to synthesize some more of yours.”

Keith couldn’t stand the troubled expression on Shiro’s face, especially since he had been the one to put it there. Lifting his left arm, he gently squeezed his brother’s elbow. “I’m okay now.”

Shiro smiled, but there was a sheen to his eyes. “You have no idea how relieved I am about that.”

“Your cognition seems to be just fine,” Fallenta said, “and losing memory of the traumatic event is not uncommon. There are a few other things I need to check, though.”

She spent the next few minutes shining a flashlight into his eyes, asking him some questions about things that happened prior to the accident, getting him to remember a short list of objects, and observing his reactions to various movements and sounds. All of it led Keith to believe that it was his brain being tested, and it made him nervous. No one would tell him anything else, though, simply repeating that they would explain everything shortly.

It seemed to be going well, though, and everyone was smiling and calm, so he tried not to let it get to him. Until Fallenta moved on to testing sensations. She started on his left arm, lightly touching it with her finger, then poking her claw into his skin, then digging in her knuckle. Everything felt like it should.

“Alright, the right arm, now.” She smiled at him and held his gaze, but after a moment of nothing further happening, her smile faded into a neutral expression. Another moment, and he was wondering why she hadn’t done the test yet. 

“Do you feel any of this, Keith?”

“What?” He looked down, and her finger was on his forearm. As he watched, she moved it up and down his arm, tapping lightly. He swallowed hard. “It's...it's been really numb e’er since I woke up. My face an’ leg, too.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw Shiro stiffen. “What does that mean?”

Fallenta smiled again, and as nice of a smile as it was, he was beginning to hate it. “Let’s complete the tests, and I will be able to tell you more. Can you feel this?” 

This time he watched as she pricked him with her claw, and to his relief, there was a faint jolt of pain. “A little. It's muted, though.”

“That’s good. And this?” She used her knuckle that time, and again, the pressure was faint.

“Same. What's wrong with my arm?” he demanded, glaring first at her, then Shiro. “Why can’t I talk right?”

“Have patience -”

“No!” Keith yanked his arm away from her with far more effort than should have been required. “I'm out of patience! Tell me what's wrong!”

Shiro put a hand on Fallenta’s shoulder, nodded at her, then reached forward and took Keith’s hand. “When we found you…” He paused, his jaw clenching and eyes flicking away for a split second before he seemed to steel himself to continue. “Your heart had stopped. It’s impossible to say how long you had been like that. I was able to get it started again, but it took a few minutes. So your brain…” Drawing in a deep breath, he let it out in a sigh. “It was without oxygen for several minutes, at the least. Brain damage has been a concern from the very start. When I said you have no idea how relieved I am that you’re okay...it was possible that you wouldn’t ever wake up. Or if you did, that you wouldn’t be able to function at all.” An errant tear slipped out, and he dashed it away with his metal hand. “But you’re here. You’re awake, and you can speak and think and...and it’s gonna be okay. I promise, it’s gonna be okay.”

Brain damage? The words hit him like a blow to the chest. That meant his arm...his face...they weren’t just numb, they were...they were…

He ripped his hand from Shiro’s grip. “How can you say it's gonna be okay? Do you hear me? I soun’ stupid! An’ my arm...how’m I supposed to fight an’ fly if I can barely move my arm?”

“But you still have some movement and sensation,” Fallenta broke in. “That is very good news. It means that, with physical therapy, you can regain even more use. You can even have speech therapy to help you build up your facial muscles.”

“ Speech therapy?” He almost laughed at that. “We’re in the middle of a war, we don’ have time for speech therapy!”

Shiro’s hand landed on his leg. “We’ll make it work, Keith.”

“No. No.” He shook his head harshly. “Get off. Get off me, I need...” Flailing his one good hand toward Shiro and Fallenta, he gritted his teeth against the tears that wanted to fall. The weight on either side of the bed moved as the two of them stood. “I need some air. I need...” Red, that’s what he needed. He reached for the corner of the blanket that covered his legs. “I’m gonna -”

“Keith, wait!”

Shiro and Hunk both lunged, but it was too late. He had already flipped the blanket to the side, revealing what lay underneath.

Or rather, what didn’t lay underneath.

He was gonna be sick.

His leg. It was…it was missing from the knee down.

Keith screamed.

The next minutes or hours were a blur of tears and pain in his chest and breaths that wouldn’t come. He vaguely recalled Shiro being in front of him, his lips moving but no sound coming out. He vaguely recalled thrashing and slamming his head into the wall behind him. 

After that, though, the nothingness took back over.

Chapter Text

When he woke again, he was lying back down on the pillow, staring up at the blank white ceiling. For one, blissful moment, he didn’t remember the events leading up to him passing out again. But it all came crashing down on him an instant later, taking his breath away.

My leg.

My leg, my leg.

My arm, my face, my leg.

“Keith?” Shiro’s voice was quiet, tentative. Not like him. “Are you awake?”

He wanted to roll over on his side and ignore him. Close his eyes, maybe go back to sleep, pretend that the world and this nightmare didn’t exist for a little while longer. The only reason he refrained was because he wasn’t sure if his stupid, wrecked body could actually manage it.

“What did you do to me?” It was only a whisper, and as slurred as it was, he wouldn’t have been surprised if it was impossible to understand.

Shiro’s breath hitched audibly. If Keith had been looking at his face, he was sure he wouldn’t like the anguished expression that he would see there. But at that moment, he didn’t have the capacity to care.

“Do you want me to...explain...how it...happened?”

No. Yes. He didn’t know. He needed to know why him losing a leg had been the best option, but at the same time he wasn’t sure if he could handle hearing about it. In the end, he just lifted one shoulder - the one that actually listened and responded right away - in a shrug. 

Shiro shifted in his seat, leaning forward so just the tip of his white bangs were in Keith’s periphery. “I already told you that you...died. On that planet. So when we got back to the Castle, you dying again was a distinct possibility. We...it’s like Fallenta said. We had to get you into a pod, even though your...your left arm was broken, and your knees, especially, were a mess from where the console landed on them.”

He paused, rubbing his palms together. “We didn’t know what would happen. I was scared to death that some of those breaks wouldn’t be able to be fixed after the pod. I mean, we were headed to Tellima, but…” His head dropped. “We had no choice. That hole in your stomach...you were dying. ”

Keith could almost imagine it - the frantic atmosphere in the infirmary, the blood everywhere, the desperate conversations escalating into shouts as they debated on what to do. He had no doubt that he really had been dying, that they had made the choice they thought was best. He just wasn’t sure if he agreed with that choice. 

“When you came out of the pod, once the stomach wound was healed enough for you to be stable, Fallenta started working on re-breaking the bones so that they could be set correctly. It was... awful. ” The shudder was obvious in his voice. “I’m glad she was able to do it, of course, but I’m also glad that you were unconscious the whole time. Your arm was relatively easy. Your left knee...it took her hours. It was in so many tiny little pieces. And your right…”

Automatically Keith flinched at the reminder of what was no longer there. Of the scarred, chopped off stump that lay just underneath the blanket, and the way his leg just... ended . He could see the void where the rest of it should have been even now, if he were to look down. He was purposely avoiding it.

Shiro heaved a huge sigh. “Unfortunately, your right knee was shattered in a way that had been blocking the circulation in your lower leg the whole time. The tissue down there was...dead.” He paused again. “Keith, I’ve...trust me, I’ve gone ‘round and ‘round in my head ever since we...trying to figure out if there was something I could have done differently. And...I don’t think there was. We did what we had to do to save your life. I’m just...I’m sorry that we couldn’t save your leg, too.”

His leg was gone. 

Would he ever be able to walk again? Could they find a prosthetic for him like Shiro had, that worked as well as the real thing? Even if they did, how long would it take him to get used to walking on it? Just walking, not even counting anything like running, jumping, fighting. 

Fighting was what he did. It was the one and only thing besides flying that he was good at. He was crap with a gun, he couldn’t sit up in a sniper’s nest like Lance. He needed to be able to move . If he couldn’t, even just for the time that it took to learn how with a new leg and an arm that only half worked...

They’d replace him. What good was a paladin who was crippled? Who couldn’t pull his weight? As soon as Red woke up and found out what happened to him she would realize that he was useless now. And the Princess, the rest of the team...they already knew it. They were probably already looking for a new Red Paladin. How long would it be until they dropped him off on Earth, or on some Coalition planet? Probably as soon as he was healed enough. They didn’t have time to keep taking care of an invalid, they had a universe to save.

They did. Not him. Not anymore.

“Should’ve left me there.”

There was dead silence for a moment.

“ What? ”

Keith tipped his head back further into the pillow, eyes roving over the featureless ceiling as if he’d see something new. “I tol’ you not to come. I tol’ you to leave me there. You didn’t listen.”

“And now you’re alive. ”

“Yeah, but why? ”

“Keith…”

His hands fisted in the blanket, jaw clenched in sudden fury. “Don’t ‘Keith’ me. Why, Shiro? Why am I alive? What is the point? You know what all this means.”

It meant he’d be alone. And he couldn’t...he couldn’t do alone. Not again. Not when he found a group of people that he actually cared about for the first time in so long. Not when he was just finally getting used to always having people around, always having someone to talk to or distract him from the thoughts that tried to consume him. Not when he barely survived it the first time. 

He’d rather be dead than alone.

Shiro sucked in a deep breath through his nose. “That life is gonna be hard for a while? That you’re gonna have to work harder than ever to get back to where you were? Yeah, Keith, I do know. I know more than anyone else.”

Oh.

Shiro must think he was so incredibly self-centered.

He was self-centered.

He should have thought about how acting like losing a leg was worse than dying would seem to the man who had lost an arm and kept going. But instead he was all caught up in how he was going to lose everything he had grown to love and rely on. Acting like the self-absorbed brat that everyone at the Garrison except Shiro had accused him of being.

“That means I also know how hard it is to accept,” Shiro was saying. “It’s going to take time to adjust. But you will, I promise, and I’ll be here to help you every step of the way.”

Yeah, right. Keith didn’t know if he was lying to make him feel better, or if he just hadn’t yet realized or accepted that Allura and the rest of the team wouldn’t want to keep him around.

“Just...please, Keith. Please don’t say that we should have let you die. You don’t know…” His voice caught. “I’ve spent these last weeks hoping, praying that you would live. Scared out of my mind every moment of every day that you wouldn’t.”

Keith finally forced himself to turn his head toward his brother and saw him brush the back of his wrist across his eyes. Just that movement was enough to make his heart drop to his stomach. Shiro didn’t cry. At least not where anyone could see him. 

Slowly, he slid his hand out across the bed, palm up. A peace offering. It took only a moment for Shiro to take it, squeezing it so hard he thought a few more bones might break.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. And he was. Not for thinking it, but for saying it. He didn’t want to cause any more pain for any of his friends. 

That’s why when it was time for him to go, he’d do it quietly. No fuss. Don’t let them see your fear or your pain - he had learned that long, long ago. He was good at it. 

Shiro gave him a shaky smile. “It’ll be alright, Keith. I promise.”

Swallowing down the words that sprang to his tongue, he gave a nod. “Okay.”

.

.

The next morning Keith woke up to an empty room. In a way, it was a relief. They obviously didn’t see the need to watch over him and baby him twenty-four-seven anymore. But he was, for all intents and purposes, stuck. With no leg, he couldn’t just get up and leave the room whenever he wanted, head to the training room like he normally would in the morning. There’d be no training for him for a long time. 

Of course there was breakfast to think about, too, and he wasn’t sure whether to expect someone to bring it to him, or to bring him to it. Either way, he hated it. He had always hated being treated like he was helpless, and now it was even worse because he actually was helpless. 

He went ahead and made up his mind, though. No matter what their plan was, he had no desire to be carried through the Castle to the dining room where everyone would give him those looks of pity. Poor Keith. Can’t even walk by himself. It’s just too bad he can’t stay.

He was in the midst of pushing himself up off the pillows, trying to get his right side to cooperate long enough to get in an upright position he could balance in and trying to ignore the strange lightness of his leg, when the door opened and Pidge slipped in.

“Hey,” she said softly. Padding over, she perched carefully on the edge of the chair that first Hunk, then Shiro had occupied. 

Tucking his left leg up close to him - the knee creaking in protest at being used for the first time since healing - Keith cleared his throat. “Hi.” 

Silence fell, but it had never been awkward between the two. The introverted arms of Voltron. Pidge just gazed at him for a long moment, her eyes saying all the things he knew she would never actually be able to say with words. “It’s good to see you awake. I was really worried about you.” 

On the outside, she merely shoved her glasses back up into the bridge of her nose and sniffed. “You better not quiznakin’ ever do that again.”

Keith’s lips turned up at the corners for the first time since waking the day before. “Alright.” 

Besides Shiro, he thought he would miss Pidge the most of all. They got each other more than anyone else.

“So.” Straightening up, she whipped a tablet out of her hoodie pocket. “We’ve been working on a leg for you. The Tellimites have crazy good medical technology, so obviously we’re using their notes, but I’ve also been talking back and forth with the Olkari, because they’re, of course, crazy good with biological connections, and we’ve come up with a design that should communicate really well with your body and, essentially, work like the real thing.”

She launched into a detailed scientific explanation of how every inch of it worked, tapping and flicking through various diagrams that just looked like a plain prosthetic leg to him. He didn’t understand but a few words here and there, but he let her talk. This was one of her passions, and it was nice to let her be able to ramble about it for once without having to worry about being rushed. The way her face lit up was worth every second.

“So...what do you think?” Suddenly she sounded uncertain as she blinked up at him. “We definitely want your input on it. I mean, I suggested putting in a rocket booster, but Hunk pointed out that it would be difficult to control with only one. Lance wanted to add lasers that shot out anytime you stomped your foot, but that seemed pretty dangerous for like, running and stuff, so…”

It almost sounded like they expected him to still be fighting with this thing. Well, maybe he would. Eventually. After all, he wouldn’t feel right about just ignoring the existence of the war when the people he cared about were still out there fighting it, so he’d do his best to get back into shape. Maybe he could convince them to find a Coalition planet for him that had soldiers he could fight with someday.

It wouldn’t be the same as fighting with this team, his...his friends. But at least he wouldn’t be completely useless.

He met Pidge’s eyes and realized she was still waiting on an answer from him. Part of him wanted to keep his words to a minimum, not wanting her to hear his new speech impediment, but he swallowed his pride. “It, uh...whatever you guys come up with I’m sure will be great.” He actually hadn’t even been sure whether to expect them to work on it themselves, or put it off on the Tellimites or some other able species. It made sense, though, that Pidge and Hunk would want to jump on this opportunity to design something they had never gotten to do before. He forced a small smile. “But...yeah, let’s hold off on weaponizing it.”

Smirking, Pidge turned off the tablet and stuck it back in her pocket. “Alright, if you insist. Lance is gonna be super disappointed, though.”

“I’m sure.” He could hear the whining and complaining about how boring and unimaginative he was now. 

“So, I was supposed to ask you about breakfast…?”

Keith stared down at his hands. “Oh. Yeah. I don’...think I’m really ready to...try to move around yet, so…”

He was such a bad liar. But Pidge either didn’t notice or was being nice and pretending not to, merely nodding and standing. 

“Okay. I’ll tell Shiro, he’ll probably bring you a plate down here.”

“Thanks, Pidge.”

She turned back from the doorway and smiled softly at him. “No problem.”

.

.

The nightmares came that night.

And the next. And the next.

Snippets of things he didn’t remember during the day, and wouldn’t remember again when he woke. Alarms blaring. Lights flashing. A horrifying crunching sound, then crippling pain and a bitter taste in the back of his throat.

And then...nothing. No one came. No one heard him calling. He stayed there, alone and bleeding in the dark, until the pain became too much and he slipped away.

He woke with tears streaming down his cheeks and a scream on his lips that didn’t quite make it out into the still air of the infirmary, not knowing what he was even crying about other than the nauseating loneliness that weighed him down, pinning him to the bed. 

Forcing his right hand to be the one to clumsily scrub away the tears - because it was going to work, dang it - he gritted his teeth and pushed against the weight to flop over onto his side. 

Get over it. Get over it, get used to it, stop being such a baby. You’ve always known that this wouldn’t last. It’s a miracle they’ve stuck around for as long as they have. If you try to hang onto them they’ll just end up hating you before they leave. 

.

.

He got away with hiding in the infirmary for two days before Fallenta declared him well enough to be up and about, and Shiro and Allura showed up with the Altean version of crutches. They escorted him slowly down the halls of the Castle to the dining room, chatting amiably the whole way. Keith assumed it was meant to either distract him from his plight, or to keep themselves from staring and pitying.

“Hey, look who finally decided to join us!” Lance announced loudly as soon as he hobbled into the room. “It’s about time you were out of bed, Mullet-head.”

“What Lance means ,” Hunk sighed, “is that it’s good to see you up, Keith.”

“That it is, Number Four!” Coran rushed to pull out his usual seat, and his smile was so bright Keith couldn’t even be mad about the special treatment. “You had us all worried for a while there, for sure!”

Swallowing, Keith fiddled with his spork, unsure whether he was supposed to respond. “Um...yeah. Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Keith.” Shiro smiled at him softly, knowingly. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

He just barely kept another ‘sorry’ from escaping. Instead he nodded, picked up his spork with his left hand, and changed the subject. “So, uh...wha’s been going on lately?”

That was all it took for everyone to launch into tales of short missions in the Lions, repairs on Red, and alliances with Tellima. Keith barely remembered to keep eating his goo as he watched all of the animated faces and gesturing hands with a small smile on his face. It was good to be back among his teammates. They were so unlike him in so many ways, it was no wonder that he had never really fit in with them. But he cared about them anyway. They might not feel the same way about him, but he was so glad that they had become a part of his life. 

And now they wouldn’t be anymore. Scowling down into his bowl where no one would notice, he poked at the green goo. How did I let myself get so attached? Before Shiro, it had been many, many years since he had let himself care about anyone this much. He should have known better by then. Letting himself come to consider any person or place home was just setting himself up for heartbreak.

As much as he loved spending this last bit of time with them, he almost wished they would stop acting so natural , as if they weren’t getting ready to kick him out any day now. No one mentioned a search for a new paladin. No one said whether they were headed to Earth, or some other planet. 

He wasn’t going to be able to stand the suspense for many more days. They needed to just get it over with.

.

Later that night, after waking from another nightmare back in his own room, Keith stared at the bare walls, so lifeless compared to the other paladin’s rooms. Maybe I was always prepared for this moment, after all. Or maybe he had just been kicked out and left behind so many times that the ability to settle in was impossible for him no matter where he went. 

Struggling to sit up, he groped for the crutches and pulled himself to his feet. He wasn’t going to get back to sleep anytime soon, and no one had expressly forbidden him from venturing out on his own - not that it would have stopped him even if they had.

It took far too long to make it down the four hallways between his room and Red’s hangar. Walking with crutches used a whole new set of muscles that he wasn’t used to accessing, and trying to force his right side to carry that much weight was exhausting. He had to stop and lean against the wall, panting for breath, several times along the way. 

But he made it, eventually. He paused once more outside the door, debating whether or not he was actually ready to see the damage done to Red, before he sucked it up and punched the scanner.

He wasn’t ready. 

The great mechanical beast was lying on her side, a position that somehow managed to make her look vulnerable despite her hulking size. Her legs were splayed awkwardly as if she had just been dropped there. She probably had.

The worst part, though, was that her face was nearly unrecognizable. What had once been her muzzle was completely smashed in, there were spiderweb cracks across one of her dull grey eyes, and the other was missing altogether. 

Actually, he took that back. The worst part was the cold and the silence. 

No purr in his head to greet him. No eyes lighting up in recognition of her Paladin. No warmth filling up his chest and spreading out to his fingers and toes. With Red, there was always some kind of heat. Now, though, a shiver shook his body.

Clenching his jaw, Keith forced himself a few steps closer, until he could reach out, balancing precariously, and lay a hand against her warped, dented nose. It was cold, too. 

Suddenly tears sprang to his eyes for the first time since his panic attack a couple of days before. “‘m sorry , Red.” He stroked his hand over the metal, feeling all of the bumps that shouldn’t have been there. “I’m sorry this happened to you. You didn’t deserve it. You...you’ve always protected me, and…”

Tipping his head back, he took in the mess of a cockpit again, and this time he saw flashes of his nightmare. Something sharp pinning him to the chair. Blood dripping onto the floor.

One tear escaped, sliding rapidly down to his chin. “I don’t even know how I survived this. But if either of us deserved to survive, it’s you. Please, Red...if you can hear me at all...please don’t give up. I know I...I can’t fly you anymore, but…”

It hit him then, the brutal truth of that statement. He’d never fly her again. He might never fly anything again. He’d known it ever since finding out what had happened to him, but now it stabbed him through the heart, how much he was going to miss this semi-sentient alien ship. 

Before he knew it, he was falling none-too-gracefully to the floor, one hand planted in front of him while the other remained on her snout, crutches clattering loudly to the side. The tears came in earnest, then. “Red...Red I lost my leg . I...I can’t fight anymore, I can’t fly …I’m useless .”

He’d told her that before. That time, though, she had reassured him that no, he was her Paladin, he was a defender of the universe, not useless. Never useless.

But now there was no one to reassure him. Even if she had been able, Red would know the truth. He wasn’t her Paladin anymore, he wasn’t a defender of the universe. He was useless.

Chapter Text

“Okay, this is definitely gonna feel weird. But let us know if it starts actually hurting , okay? We’ll stop and figure out why.”

Keith nodded, his lips pressed together. He was having a hard time coming up with words, at least ones that could escape the swirl of his mind and make it onto his tongue. They got lost somewhere in the vicinity of his throat, creating a lump that made it difficult to swallow.

“Ready?” Pidge held up the prosthetic. She was obviously excited, and he couldn’t blame her. She had been heading the research and design on this thing for weeks, and now her hard work was about to culminate with this fitting. But at the same time, he could tell that she was holding back, trying not to be too overly enthusiastic, knowing how apprehensive he was. 

This was it. He was getting a leg. He didn’t expect much, had told himself over and over again not to expect much. But there was still a part of him that hoped, irrationally, stupidly , that this would be a miraculous moment when he’d suddenly be able to walk perfectly well, run and fight even, without having to work at it. That all of his dread about being alone would prove to be for nothing, and he’d be able to stay. 

He wanted so badly to stay.

Pidge knelt down in front of him, Hunk joining her, and Shiro moved a little closer to his side, clasping his shoulder in one hand. For a split second as the prosthetic approached, he got a flash of the movie Cinderella that some of his foster siblings used to watch. But an instant later a connection was being made, and his attention was pulled to the sensation of cold metal against the stump.

“You okay?” Shiro asked softly in his ear. 

He nodded again, grunting an affirmative this time.

Pidge picked up her tablet, tapping a few times. “Alright, so now I’m gonna activate it, and this is the part where I’m not sure how it’ll feel. We’re gonna be using the Olkari technology to connect the leg to your nerves and such. So again, let me know if it hurts.”

There were twinges and jolts and a buzzing sensation, jumping up and down his thigh, and yeah, a few times it did hurt. But not enough that he couldn’t handle it, not as much as he had dealt with plenty of times before, so he remained silent. 

It took ten or fifteen minutes, but finally Pidge sat back and lowered the tablet, looking over the leg before tipping her face up to his. “Okay. That should be it. How do you feel?”

“Fine.” 

Shiro gave his shoulder a squeeze. “Let’s start out slow testing it, okay? Try just moving your foot first.”

His foot. He supposed it really was his now, despite there being a strange disconnect between his brain and this silver metal thing - with red and black accents, courtesy of Hunk and Lance - that glared up at him. He’d never really had an issue seeing Shiro’s prosthetic as his own arm, so he supposed he’d eventually get used to this being his leg.

Zeroing back in on the foot, he focused on raising it, and watched in something between fascination and shock as it obeyed. Slowly, yes, and shakily, but it was movement. 

Okay, yeah, it was definitely going to take some time to get used to that thing being a part of his body. 

He was antsy to get up off the table and try it out for real, but the others insisted on making him try out multiple movements sitting down before they’d let him. Each time his leg shook, each time the prosthetic took a second longer than it should have to respond to his commands, his heart would sink a little lower in his chest. 

He should have been ecstatic. He had a leg again. Eventually he was going to be able to move just like he had before. And he really was so grateful to Pidge and Hunk and the others for doing this for him. They didn’t have to, they could have just left him on Tellima and let the locals deal with it. 

But that stupid, irrational part of him that had hoped for a miracle had still been hanging on, and now was slowly wilting. By the time he actually got the okay to stand, there was only a tiny spot of hope left, and that shriveled away to nothing as he attempted to take a step forward.

There was no miracle. Walking was going to be just as difficult to start with as he logically had known it would be. He was going to still need at least one crutch for the foreseeable future. 

And that meant he still had to leave.

The question, now that the prosthetic was on, was only when .

.

.

It only took a few days before it happened. That was a lot more days than he was expecting, though, so he couldn’t really complain. He kept thinking that it would be a relief to know, to not be in limbo anymore, but that didn’t stop his heart from plummeting to his toes when the meeting was called. 

“Team meeting,” Shiro had said. “Just to talk over a few things.”

A few things, yeah. If he was lucky, they’d ask for his input on which planet he got left on. He’d been thinking about it, and he had a couple of ideas in mind, places that had admirable armies and where he thought he could blend in well enough to not draw too much attention to himself. He’d be okay pretty much anywhere, though, as long as it wasn’t Earth. If he got left behind on Earth, isolated again with all the memories there…

He couldn’t even think about it for very long.

The walk to the lounge passed in a blur that he couldn’t recall once he got there. For an indiscernible amount of time he just stood outside the door, staring at the white metal, trying to gather up the courage he needed to go inside. To face the music. To say goodbye to the only people who had shown any kind of care for him in a very, very long time, despite the fact that he knew they couldn’t possibly care about him the same way he did them.

Just don’t cry. Whatever you do, don’t cry.

Limping into the room, he avoided eye contact with everyone who had already arrived. He had gotten slightly more graceful at walking with the prosthetic and one crutch over the past couple of days, but it still left much to be desired. Pidge patted the couch right next to her, and as much as he wanted to ignore her and isolate himself to the far side of the room, he couldn’t. 

“So.” Shiro leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and clasped his hands together. “Keith, now that you’ve got your prosthetic, there’s just a couple of things we wanted to discuss with you.”

“First off, I’ve got some good news!” Coran exclaimed. “The repairs on the Red Lion are coming along quite phenomenally! Number Two and I were actually able to restore power today. Now, there’s still quite a bit of metal work to be done, and I wouldn’t count on being able to hear her quite yet, but she is definitely on her way to being her old self again.”

Keith’s chest was so tight that he could barely feel happy at the news. Still, he forced a smile onto his face, and sent out a quick mental message - Red, if you can hear me, I’m so glad you’re getting better. Almost as an afterthought, he added, I hope you find a pilot who’s more worthy than I ever was of being your Paladin.

He hoped they let him say one more goodbye to her before he left. Though he doubted she could actually hear him still, even if she had woken up. She had probably already moved on.

“Yes, that is great news, Coran.” Shiro smiled and nodded before returning his attention to Keith. “The other thing we wanted to talk to you about was, um…”

He couldn’t stand it any longer. He just wanted it to be said, and he wasn’t sure if he could handle hearing Shiro say it.

“I’ve thought about some places I could go,” he blurted down at his hands. “Qua-bon seems like a good option, or Chinpivar. Somewhere that I can get back into fighting, once I can move around better.” His throat was growing tighter by the second, straining to get the words out, but he pushed ahead. “I just...I’d rather it not be Earth, unless there’s no other choice.”

There was only a brief silence while everyone processed his words. Then Pidge turned to him and spluttered, “Keith, with all due respect...what the quiznak are you talking about?”

“Go?” Lance parroted, flabbergasted. “What do you mean, go? ”

“Are you...are you leaving? ” If he didn’t know better, he’d say Hunk’s eyes were welling up.

Great . Obviously Shiro and Allura hadn’t told the others yet. Now he had broken the news in a much harsher way than Shiro was probably planning.

They were just surprised, though. They wouldn’t actually be upset once they got used to the idea.

“Keith…” Shiro was using that voice again, the one he seemed to reserve solely for Keith when he was trying to convince him of something concerning his well-being. “Do you... want to leave?”

No! No, please, don’t make me leave, let me stay, please !

“It makes the most sense,” he heard his voice saying.  He wasn’t sure why Shiro was putting this on him, acting as if it was his decision, but he could play along. “I mean, there’s no reason for me to stay, right?” Don’t cry, don’t cry, suck it up, don’t cry.

“No reason? ” Pidge practically shrieked in his ear.

“Oh, of course !” Lance threw his hands up in the air. “I bet you’re just so happy to have an excuse to get out of this war, right? Well, go on, then, Mr. Lone Wolf, leave. Don’t worry about any of us still stuck here. You-”

“ Lance. ” Shiro’s sharp tone cut through all other sounds, silencing them. “That’s enough.”

The Blue Paladin flushed slightly, but crossed his arms with a huff. 

Keith had folded into himself, not enough emotional energy left to pretend that Lance’s comments didn’t hurt. Everyone’s reactions were confusing him. He thought he was being helpful by going ahead and offering solutions himself, but now...he just wished somebody would say it, just tell him what was going on and get it over with. 

“Keith,” Shiro began again, oh so softly. “Did you think that we were going to make you leave?”

“ What? ” Hunk squeaked, but Shiro held up a finger to stop him.

He was floundering now, unsure of what answer he was supposed to give. He opened his mouth, shut it again. Rubbed his thumb vigorously across his knuckles. “Um...yes?” His voice sounded so small, and he hated it. “I mean, not that you were going to make me -” don’t blame them, don’t make them mad, make sure all the blame is on you - “just that...it made the most sense, there’s...there's no need for me to stay, I can’t fight or pilot anymore, so I...I’d just be in the way, I’m dead weight, and you guys don’t need to have to take care of me, so…”

“Oh, Keith ,” someone sighed, and he flinched, immediately replaying what he had just said, trying to figure out where he had gone wrong. 

Pidge spoke next, with something in her voice that he couldn’t quite decipher. “You...you really thought that because you can’t fight right now we were just gonna...what, dump you off on some random planet and say, ‘It’s been nice knowing you, peace out’?”

“I -”

“That is what you thought, isn’t it?” Hunk gasped. “And you’ve thought that this whole time? Oh, buddy, why didn’t you just say something to one of us, we could have told you that’s not what we were doing…”

“That’s literally never even crossed our minds,” Pidge exclaimed.

Keith could feel anger taking over, rising up to cover all the other overwhelming emotions he was feeling at that moment. “But... why ? Do you guys not get it ? I...cannot...fly. I can’t fight. I can’t do anything useful anymore. Not until I can get used to the way my body works now, which could take months , if not longer! Why would you keep me here? You think all of you have time to play therapist for me, to teach me how to function all over again? We barely have any free time as it is, and that needs to be spent resting, not babysitting. Maybe you didn’t know it was happening, but...Princess? Shiro?” He looked at them each desperately. “Please, just...just tell them.”

Shiro looked as if he had been punched in the gut. “Tell them what , Keith? There’s nothing to tell. You’re not going anywhere, not unless you really, actually want to.”

Princess Allura spoke up for the first time since the meeting began, her voice delicate. “Do you actually believe that you’re only a part of this team because of your usefulness?”

“Yes?” Keith stared at her, still so confused. “I...of course I am. I’m...I was the Red Paladin. That’s the reason I was here.”

“The reason that you were here to start with, yes,” Allura agreed. “You are correct in saying that was the initial reason that you stayed.”

“But now…” Pidge reached out and grasped his right arm, tight enough that he could actually feel the pressure. “Dude, you’re part of the family. ”

The tears that he had been fighting off the whole time sprang to his eyes. “No...no I’m not, don’t say that.” Anytime anyone had claimed to be his family, it had only ended badly. Pulling his arm out of her grasp, he tucked it up against himself and curled inward. “Don’t...I don’t have family.”

Someone across the room hiccuped a sob. Pidge scooted a little closer, but didn’t touch him again. “But that’s what I’m saying...you do now.”

“Everyone leaves,” he snapped without really even meaning to. “No one ever cares unless my usefulness outweighs the work that I take.”

Silence fell for a moment. “Can we tell you what we actually brought you here to say?” Shiro asked finally.

When no answer came, Allura spoke, words carefully chosen and precise. “We’ve found a Tellimite who specializes in both physical and speech therapy. His name is Vadez. He has agreed, if it was alright with you, to travel with us for as long as he is needed, and help you first with the basic movements, and later with training.”

Keith didn’t look up from his lap, but his mind was swirling, trying to discern what was actually true.

“In the meantime, we do still need to have Voltron,” Shiro continued. “Obviously we can’t right now, anyway, not until Red is back in commission. But when she is...our first thought is for Allura to try piloting her.”

She’ll be better at being a paladin than I ever was.

“And if that doesn’t work…” Lance’s voice was way too soft for him. “Blue has hinted that she might be willing to let the Princess drive her. So, you know...maybe Red would be open to...me.”

His thoughts stuttered to a halt then, but he really had no reason to protest. Red could choose whoever she wanted, even if it was the guy who had always hated him.

Shiro took back over. “No matter who they choose, though, it will be temporary. That’s the main point that we need to emphasize.”

“Yes,” Allura stated firmly. “As soon as you are able, we want you to step back in as the Red Lion’s Paladin. Even if it’s only piloting to start with, and I’m still needed to fight on the ground.”

He couldn’t answer. Didn’t know what to say. They actually seemed serious about this, so he was sure that their intentions at least were good. Whether or not it would last, who could say?

Quiet footsteps crossed the room toward him, and Shiro’s familiar figure dropped down right in front of his knees. “I’ve told you before that I wouldn’t leave you, not voluntarily. None of us want you to be anywhere but here...right, guys?”

“Of course not!” Hunk exclaimed. “We’d...we'd miss you so much.”

“Life in the Castle wouldn’t be the same without you,” Allura put in.

“No one else eats my Paladin Specials but you, Number Four!”

Sniffling a bit, Pidge pressed the side of her face up against his arm. “I’ve already lost one brother. Don’t make me lose another.”

“We’d be pretty poor teammates and space family members if we kicked you out for getting injured while saving my butt,” Lance added.

The skin on his thumb was starting to get raw from how long it had been rubbing. He still didn’t know what to say, but he had to say something. 

“I...I appreciate the thoughts.” His voice was hoarse from holding back tears for so long. “It won’t last, though. It never lasts. You’ll...you’ll get tired of me, o-or everyone’ll get used to the new Lions and won’t want to change back, or -”

“Keith.” Shiro’s hand landed on the knee that could still feel it. “I know it’s hard for you to trust this, to trust us. But...can you let us prove it to you? Let us show you, over time, that we really are a family, like a family is meant to be.” He paused. “What do you say, buddy?”

Keith was shaking all over, and a tear finally escaped out of each eye. He didn’t trust it, couldn’t trust it. No one, not even Shiro, had ever been able to prove to him that they would stay in his life. But if they were offering even just a little bit more time…

“I don’t want to be alone again,” he whispered.

Suddenly he found himself at the center of a giant pile of paladins and Alteans, at least half of whom were crying along with him. 

“You won’t have to be alone,” Pidge’s voice came softly in his ear. “I promise.”

A tiny warmth, like the flame of a candle, lit in his chest, and a whisper brushed his mind. My Paladin, always mine. Never useless. 

And somehow, at least in that moment, he believed them.