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THE GALACTIC GAZETTE: Independent News for the Independent Universe
Cycle 10,448 | Issue #7,221
Is Team Voltron Really The “Team” We Think It Is?
Rising hostilities between Voltron’s Red Paladin Keith Kogane and Blue Paladin Lance McClain have bolstered already circulating ideas that the universe’s “unshakable” belief in the defenders of the universe has been based on a lie. If the last line of defense for galaxies near and far can't stand to be on the same mess hall table, let alone in a five-meter radius on the surface of the same planet, then maybe we need to have a very uncomfortable conversation about whether Team Voltron is actually a team—or just five wildly different individuals who just so happen to share a very large and very powerful robot.
We sourced data from our investigative team, scattered across planets with the intention of compiling intel and tracking movement of our heroes, and from the last phoeb, we’ve produced a scattered timeline of the fiercest Red-Blue friction. Let's review the highlights:
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On a training exercise set on Arus, Lance "accidentally" shot a targeting drone that Keith was using; Keith "accidentally" swiped Lance's feet out from under him. The two were caught being reprimanded by Princess Allura of Altea and Black Paladin Takashi Shirogane, raising concerns about their role on the team.
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On a diplomatic mission to the Olkari homework, Keith called Lance "a liability"; Lance called Keith "emotionally constipated" in front of the Olkari Queen. Brows were raised; Princess Allura pointedly, albeit politely, ignored our request at an interview as the team departed the planet.
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At a post-battle press conference when asked about teamwork, Lance said, "I work great with everyone except one person, and I think you know who I'm talking about." Keith walked off stage.
We managed to get hold of Coran Hieronymus Wimbleton Smythe (Altean Royal Advisor of Team Voltron and the Castle of Lions) for comment. He waved off our concerns with a laugh and the following statement:
"Oh, pish-posh! Keith and Lance have always been like two squabbling Yalmor hatchlings. It's part of their dynamic! The Red Lion is all fire, the Blue Lion is water—they're opposites, so of course they clash, but fear not, when it matters, they come together beautifully! ...Mostly. Usually. Well, sometimes. Look, they haven't killed each other yet, have they?"
A team divided, readers, is a team that falls. Perhaps the universe's "defenders" need to do a little defending of their own team dynamic first.
A team divided, readers, is a team that falls.
Lance thinks he hates this person.
And it is certainly not his fault that Keith has his head so far up his ass that he can’t see out of the front of his Lion. Arus, mind you, was all in good fun (although somebody apparently didn’t take it as such), he was not the instigator on Olkarion, and that press conference was not really that bad because these tabloids do indeed have a nauseating proclivity to blow things out of proportion. And Lance, much to his credit, has at least tried to make it up to Keith by offering a facsimile of a smile or an attempt at clearing the air through a proposed sparring session. The guy chews it all up and doesn’t even spit it right back out, because his lips remain shut long enough for Shiro to let out a long, overexaggerated sigh and dig his spoon loudly into his bowl of goo with a theatrical clang.
He should’ve seen it coming, in retrospect. He should’ve saved his own skin by telling Keith that they both need to tone it down before they’re wrung onto a drying line by the hem of their shirts. He should’ve taken it upon himself to fix his misdeeds, like the good samaritan his job depicts him as. Or even— he should’ve upped the ante and acted particularly like an asshole before this inevitably took place. He should’ve done anything. He could’ve done anything.
He didn’t, and now he’s forced to kiss and make up with Keith. Just make up, actually. Glaring holes into the front of each other’s heads and shooting lasers out of their eye sockets. Certainly not kissing or any of the sort, which is a crucial sidenote.
“I am at a loss of words,” Allura is saying as she paces the Castle’s lounge. “And to think I once had complete faith in you two to put aside your differences when the universe called for it. I thought,” she continues, as Keith sulks and Lance bites the inside of his cheek, “minor interpersonal conflicts to be natural when five strong-willed individuals are placed in high-stress situations. I was wrong.”
She gives them a glare of ice, so frigid it’s nearly scorching, and Shiro looks apologetically on as if to say you had it coming. Pidge is avoiding eye contact, and Hunk, much on the contrary, is looking straight at them both, as if the atmosphere isn’t uncomfortable enough. Lance winces; the expression on Shiro’s face has morphed into a sort of gaunt nausea.
“We’ll be better, Princess,” Keith bites out. He doesn’t sound quite so sure of that.
“Yep,” Lance adds curtly. If Keith can get his act together.
“You’ve said this once, twice, thrice, much more before,” Allura says, looking displeased at their reactions, and the harshness of her words makes Lance recede into the back of the couch a little more, a tinge of regret seeping through his outrage. “We’re going to do something about it.”
The look on Shiro’s face has gotten more and more blatant. Keith seems to have noticed it too, and Pidge is sitting on the edge of her own seat, raising a hand to the bridge of her nose and pushing her glasses higher. Lance opens his mouth—
“This article is spreading fast,” Allura interrupts. “The world works like clockwork; your leader has done much to enlighten me on how it happens on Earth. A single article sets off a butterfly effect; if we do not have the support of the galaxy, we do not have the support of a coalition. We must work to quell the effects of this article immediately.” She turns her head sharply, and Shiro coughs.
“So, we’re going to make you two do some… PR,” he explains, clasping his hands together, and Lance stills. That’s not that bad. They’re going to make them do some team building exercise, look all buddy-buddy in front of the cameras, assuage the blows dealt to their public image by the plethora of articles running around space by petty journalists and pedantic reporters. They’re gonna get some shots of the two of them laughing together, holding boxes, looking all lovely and practically oozing the camaraderie that has been at a dearth recently. He’s going to have to smile at Keith like he means it; Keith’s going to have to put a soft hand on his shoulder like he means it.
Lance swallows. That’s not that bad.
“And by PR, we’ve got… a—” Shiro coughs again, and if Pidge moves an inch off that chair she’s going to fall flat on her ass. “A story.”
“Pray tell,” Keith mutters flatly. Hunk’s biting at his nails, and there is a vicious gleam in Pidge’s eyes that often precedes nothing good.
“To preface,” Shiro says; there is something on the tip of his tongue that spells imminent doom. “This will not be as bad as you think it is.”
“Out with it, Shiro,” Allura says eloquently.
“We’re going to prove the existence of the unshakable Paladin bond with some little pretend play,” he breathes. “Not that it doesn’t exist— surely the battles we have braved attest to that. We just know it’s shaky in some areas. My point being, we’re going to pretend Keith and Lance are in a—”
Time slows, and the words go in one ear and out the other.. Lance ponders the possible substitutes for Shiro’s self-induced silence. Mutual non-aggression pact. Sponsored truce. Hostage exchange. Testing phase of a Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty. He looks to Keith, who, much to his surprise, abruptly looks like he’s just seen the nuclear annihilation of the world itself at their hands in a hallucination. A laugh escapes his lips— a miserable attempt at one, if anything— a strangled, disbelieving sound, somewhere between a cough and a wheeze, shuttering Lance’s reverie to a close. His eyebrows are scaled straight into his hairline, and Lance would laugh if not for such dire circumstances—-
“It will be okay,” Shiro exhales. Pidge has done some sort of victory lap around the premises, and there are fragments of a grin and a sob flickering across Hunk’s face.
"No, Shiro," Keith croaks, and the words come out two octaves higher, "Me and Lance? Pretend? For PR? Like that?" He whips around to Allura, looking hysterical. “You’re insane,” he whispers. “I’ve always known it.”
Allura purses her lips and dismisses him with a hand. “We are proving to the universe that something they believe is absent has always been there. Don’t make me think the same as them. Plus, a relationship— is a, say, good experience for the both of you,” she says, and finally she cracks a subtle smirk, making Pidge dissolve into raucous laughter.
Lance pauses in his mounting confusion. Wait.
A relationship. They want—
“Wait!” Lance shrills. Keith doesn’t even look up from where his eyes are trained perfectly on the floor. “Say what? You want me and Keith to—”
“Yes,” Pidge giggles, punching Hunk on the shoulder. “The hand-holding. The cheek kisses. The lap-chairs. The pet names and the goo-goo eyes. All the glitz and glamour, loverboy.”
“I wouldn’t go as far as… some of that,” Shiro says, looking vaguely amused. “But yes. Just for the cameras, Lance. Drop the act amongst us, in privacy— not that we want to see any of that—”
“I don’t want to see any of that either!” Lance yells. “I don’t— I— how are you okay with this?” he gasps, flailing a flimsy hand at Keith.
“I’m not!” Keith roars back, and his voice tapers out incredulously at the end before he puffs out a faint, disbelieving puff of air. “I just— they’re insane, Lance. They’re insane. They’re not going to drop it.”
“We’re just going to let this happen?” Lance is not exaggerating his shortness of breath. A lapful of Keith Kogane already has blood rushing to his head, let alone Keith’s face in his hands and his lips on his. That’s terrible, because Keith’s lips would be much too chapped and Lance really doesn’t want to think of anything else related to Keith’s face because that would lead to him conceding that Keith has a nice face and he’s not quite sure why he’s thinking about this in the first place.
Whereas Allura and Shiro have resigned themselves to some silent pact of shared glances, probably debating how are we to go about this new fork in our plans? and Hunk is looking far too conflicted to say anything, something has settled on Pidge’s expression— and like he has mentioned tenfold, nothing Pidge does is ever a good precursor to his life.
“Well, Lance,” she says matter-of-factly, and has the gall to pick at her nails as she says it, “I guess that’s one thing Keith’s better than you at.”
Lance is already starting at the statement, awash with a sudden flood of anger, unwelcome and forceful enough to make him want to retch. He’s overwhelmed with such a colossal frisson of emotions, swirling around in hectic splashes in his stomach that he chalks down to shock and annoyance, that his voice comes out squeakier than intended. “What?”
Pidge smiles with a toothy grin. “At being a boyfriend.”
Lance takes a large, deep inhale, deliberately not looking at Keith, who is probably still spiteful over their latest tiff during training. At Keith, who is probably—
“I can live with that,” the guy says darkly, looking at him through big, angry, daring eyes.
Lance chokes.
No can do, buddy.
“No,” he snaps, and the words are swelling and leaving Lance’s mouth before he can fully process them or what he’s agreeing to. “You know what, Shiro, Allura? I’ll do it. I’ll be the perfect poster boy for the perfect poster couple. And I’m going to blow Keith Kogane off his quiznacking feet. In no time flat, the galaxy’s going to think that I can’t get within a five meter radius of separation from my pseudo-boyfriend, and I’m going to do it better than this dropout—” he punctuates the words for extra emphasis— “ever will.”
“Let’s not blow anyone too soon,” Pidge smiles brightly.
“We’ll see about that,” Keith hisses. Pidge raises an eyebrow.
“I’m glad you’ve come to your senses,” Allura murmurs, looking slightly worried. “I will… update you on our upcoming meetings with coalition members. We are heading to a central trading hub and location of a tranquility field, Vexxus-7, in the upcoming few quintants. Their hand in alliance is pivotal; we need neutral ground to conduct safe negotiations with possible supporters. Vexxus-7 has been known for its hospitality to all— we are to ensure that this does not extend to the Galra.”
“Surely,” Shiro says dryly. “Sounds good, Allura.” He peers at his two disgruntled Paladins. “Well, a little friendly competition can’t hurt if it’s for a good cause.”
“A good cause,” Lance parrots irritably, glaring at Keith, meeting his purple-blue eyes from across the length of the room and wondering if the fear and fury and adrenaline sport matching appearances in their gazes.
A team divided, readers, is a team that falls.
Keith can pretend.
He can pretend that this is one, extended fever dream that is far too lucid for his liking. He can pretend that Shiro’s out to get him for stealing the last of the food they managed to nab from the space mall together, and will laugh in his face with a big “Happy Gullible Day” sign tomorrow morning once the panic has had sufficient time to settle in. He can pretend that this is just another one of his ‘rivalry’ byproducts with Lance, where they try to relentlessly one-up each other and succumb at a point where they’re none the wiser and have been chastised into it by Allura. He can pretend that this is a lot of things, and the only thing he falls short of is pretending to do the thing that he’s expected of, which is ironic.
He can also pretend that he hasn’t thought about this… mutual alliance, at times. Of course Keith’s given it a passing mull— Lance is everything he’s not. He’s cosmic; he gets along with every living soul, he warms up to every possible prospect of an ally, and if it weren’t for him, Lance would do better for the team than the worse he’s inflicting now. Keith will never admit it, but he thinks that it’s more or less his fault that they’re in such a predicament, but like hell if he ever lets that idea see the light of day. Now that they’ve been forcibly made to stand on the same side in daunting proximity, Lance can put those skills to the greater good, and Keith will be no hindrance.
Team Voltron aside, Keith has also given that… relationship aspect a minute of ponderance. A minute, really. A single minute, and only now that the potential of it has alighted on him. Of course he and Lance would do better as… anything that isn’t whatever they’ve got going on. Friends. Best friends. Shiro would have a field day. And yet, lovers? It makes his stomach fizzle, makes it feel this way he’s not sure how to coherently describe. He doesn’t know what to think of it, and doesn't particularly want to think of it.
He stabs his bayard at the training gladiators. The double-sided hilt of his blade has his team on one side, his inhibitions on the other. Being in such cahoots with Lance will evidently benefit the team more than they think to realize, especially given the state of their increasingly downturning reputation. And yet he doesn’t want it, all these confusing things that rattle his ribcage and give his insides an uneasy, traitorous turn.
Keith exhales, slumping down onto the floor of the training deck as the simulation shuts down, running a hand down his forehead to wipe off the beads of sweat. He doesn’t want what Lance is planning: to prove himself superior, no matter what misguided way in which he’s trying to do so. He doesn’t want it, all the possibilities, laid out elusive before him. He doesn’t want what unforeseen things the galaxy holds. He certainly doesn’t want a boy with caramel-brown skin and crystalline eyes.
“Keith,” Shiro says kindly from where he’s leaned up easily against the doorframe. “A word?”