Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Part one: repercussions

If someone had told Keith two years ago that he’d be here today he would have thought they were fucking with him, well actually he probably would have just punched them because that’s who he was back then. Or maybe it’s who he still is… the truth is when he’s on his own the lines get blurry between who he was and who he is. Keith thinks that this might be because on the outside, he’s the same.

“Keith,” Shiro’s voice snapped Keith back into reality “are you paying attention?”

“Yes,” Keith said quickly trying to look focused.

Shiro sighed “This is important Keith, if you don’t pay attention to the plan then we’ll be unprepared when we get there, I swear you’re as bad as Lance.”

“Hey!” Lance protested with his usual drama, but Keith could hear the hollowness in his words that no one else did.

“I am not,” Keith muttered angrily because that’s what he was supposed to do.

“I was the one paying attention!” Lance said to Shiro hotly.

“Yeah, right.” Keith scoffed “You’re always off in your world!”

Lance turned to Keith crossing his arms defensively but as their eyes met Keith felt no anger, no vicious need to argue bubbling under his skin. Instead, he just remembered a night not so long ago when Keith had said the exact same thing to Lance.

“You’re always off in your own little world,” Keith had whispered, his breath on Lance’s skin as he pressed soft kisses down Lance’s throat.

“Hm?” Lance had hummed softly not opening his eyes as Keith’s kisses moved up his jaw.

“What do you think about?”

Lance opened his eyes lazily gazing down at Keith. “You,” he smiled gently.

Keith rolled his eyes “Sure you do,”

“I’m serious,” Lance poked Keith’s shoulder leaning in closer, “I think about you. Your eyes, the stupid things you say, your hair. Mostly your smile though, because it’s so rare and special that I just like to remember it.” Lance smiled reaching out to cup Keith’s face, softly tracing his lips. “I always used to think of home, now I do sometimes, but mostly I think of you.”

Keith let out a low chuckle “Is this the part where you tell me that I’m your home?”

“Do I need to?”

He paused cocking his head to the side “No, I guess not.”

Keith blinked back in the present where Lance was scowling at him “Well maybe my own world is just better than the one here that has your stupid face in it!” Lance said.

Keith mentally shook his head trying to clear his thoughts, it was always a bit of a shock going from the Lance Keith knew to the one everyone else did. Keith opened his mouth to reply but before he could Shiro cut in.

“Quit it,” He said sharply glaring at the two of them he then turned to Lance “Lance, why must you always antagonize Keith? This is an important mission and if you can’t work with the team then you can stay in the castle.”

“B-but,” Lance sputtered “Keith was the one who wasn’t even paying attention—”

“Lance!” Shio cut in “that’s it you’re staying.”

“What? No!”

“Yes, you can leave now Lance, we don’t need you here.”

Lance rolled his eyes sighing dramatically “Fine,” he huffed but Keith could hear the hurt in his voice.

“I wasn’t even paying attention,” Keith said quickly “I antagonized Lance just as much as he did me. I can stay too.”

“No, no, Keith.” Shiro said his tone softening slightly “No need to feel guilty because Lance is in trouble, it’s not your fault.”

“Okay…” Keith said trying to hide his frown because it kind of was Keith’s fault too “but I’ll stay.”

“No, you won’t.” Shiro said firmly “You’re too valuable to leave behind.”

Keith met Lance’s eyes across the control room as he headed towards the door, Lance gave a small, barely noticeable shake of his head. Keith knew what that meant, let it go. Keith’s first instinct was to fight for Lance, Lance knew that. He shot a pointed look at Keith.

Keith let him go disappearing into the dark halls of the castle. 

“Okay,” He agreed simply as the doors slid shut behind Lance. He wanted so badly to turn to Shiro and demand he apologize to Lance, to make him see how talented, selfless, and amazing Lance really was, but he knew he couldn’t. He let Shiro turn to the rest of the team and go back to covering their mission without a word,

Keith never said a word.

Sometimes he wondered how the hell he’d ended up here.

--

Keith heard the familiar sound of his door opening and he quickly exited his bathroom half out of his armor.

“Hey,” Lance smiled tiredly taking in Keith’s disheveled appearance and state of undress. “Need help with that?” He gestured to Keith’s armor.

Of course he didn’t.

On any given day, they put their paladin suits and took them off multiple times by themselves. In the beginning,  it was difficult but now it was as easy as flying, ingrained in their minds.

But still, Keith nodded. He always did.

Lance came closer and began to remove the armor piece by piece until he got down to the black skin-tight suit underneath. Keith let Lance turn him around and pull down the zipper on the back, he leaned in gently pressing a kiss to Keith’s now exposed shoulder.

“How’d the mission go?” Lance whispered his breath hot on Keith’s skin.

“Would have been better with you,” Keith murmured.

“Yeah, right,” Lance said quietly.

Keith turned around flight suit hanging down his torso “Right,” he said seriously “we were caught in there for a while, no way out. We were able to fight through the Galra eventually but if we’d had a sniper there watching our backs we would have been out much less of a risk.”

“But you were fine.” Lance pointed out “You didn’t need me.”

“We did need you,” Keith said fiercely grabbing his lover’s shoulder. “you should have been there.”

“Well,” Lance said with a humorless chuckle “Shiro and Allura are never going to let me shoot again, so I wouldn’t dwell on it.”

“They’ll come around eventually,” Keith said earnestly.

Lance paused examining Keith with an expression that for once, he couldn’t read. “Of course,” Lance said eventually, but Keith could tell that Lance was simply humoring him.

Things could never go back.

--

Easy chatter filled the training room as the team milled around waiting for instruction on today’s training.

“Okay,” Shiro said clapping his hands to get their attention. “Let’s start with some hand-to-hand sparring to warm up. Who wants to pair with who? Uh, Pidge you’re first.”

“Hunk and I can go together,” Pidge offered.

“I’m cool with that,” Hunk agreed.

“Okay great, Pidge and Hunk can spar together. Who else?” He turned to the next person in line “Uh, Lance. Who wants to go with Lance?”

There was a moment of terrible awkward silence as Allura quickly down to avoid meeting Lance’s eyes and Shiro shifted slightly, uncomfortable.

“I’ll spar with Lance,” Keith spoke up unable to let Lance be subjected to the silence a moment longer.

“Oh,” Shiro said slightly taken aback “You don’t have to do that Keith,”

The way Shiro spoke like Lance wasn’t in the room made Keith's blood boil but he stayed calm “I’ll spar with Lance.” He repeated firmly.

There was a tense pause before Shiro gave a small nod “Okay, I guess that leaves me and Allura as the last pair. Find your space everyone, no dirty moves.” He eyed Lance and Keith as he said it “this is just practice, not a competition.”

Keith turned to Lance and beckoned him to follow to the farthest corner of the room away from the rest of the team.

“You okay?” Keith whispered, leaning into Lance slightly in what Keith hoped looked simply like settling into a stance to everyone else.

“Yeah,” Lance whispered back “honestly I’m used to it by now Red, there’s no need to check in on me every time it happens.”

Keith bit back the urge to argue, the training room wasn’t the place to get into it.

“Okay, okay.” Keith sighed “Just be careful, Shiro’s watching your every move.”

“I’m aware,” Lance muttered.

“Good, then let’s spar.”

--

Fighting with Lance was something that had always been easy, from the moment Lance had first insulted his hair, it was addictive. The kind of high Keith got from pushing the other boy, from always wondering how hard Lance was going to push back. It was almost as perfect as flying.

Eventually, Keith realized that there were more addictive things about Lance then just fighting with him. In the same way they had hated each other so easily they just worked. It felt like dancing, like breathing, like flying, it was just as easy to fit with Lance in other ways too. Having seamless conversations for hours, about nothing at all, working together as a team, flying together. The times when Keith just couldn’t keep his hands to himself and would roughly push Lance up against the wall and kiss him just to feel it, how well they fit. It was easy.

Sparring with Lance was easy too.

Keith knew Lance better than any other person in the universe, he knew exactly how his body moved, but most of all he knew how his mind worked. And Lance knew Keith in the same way too.

This, Keith, had found made Lance the only person who could properly keep up when they sparred. Who couldn’t just match every hit but anticipate it.

People like Shiro and Allura had raw skill sure, but even they could never beat Keith, Lance could and Keith fucking loved that.

He always got caught up in sparring with Lance, really he probably should have thought of that when he volunteered to go with Lance. But he hadn’t.

Keith lunged forward to land his hit and Lance anticipated it, dodging he moved quickly before Keith even knew what had happened his legs were swept out from under him and he hit the floor.

Lance pinned him down and Keith let out a gasp of “I Yield,”

Immediately Lance backed off holding out his hand. Keith took it letting the blue paladin haul him up.

“That was good,” Keith remarked breathlessly “You could have hit me harder though,”

“Oh, forgive me for not wanting to break your back,” Lance rolled his eyes.

“As if you could,”

“Oh yeah? Let’s go again then.” Lance raised an eyebrow and there was a familiar sparkle in his eye that Keith had forgotten how much he loved, he never saw it anymore.

“You’re on Blue,” Keith grinned.

There was a sudden cough as Shiro cleared his throat and the pair spun, caught up in their game they hadn’t even noticed that the whole room had gone silent as soon as Keith had hit the ground.

“No, I think that’s enough sparring for now, we’ll move onto some simulations,” Shiro said.

“Oh, okay.” Keith nodded

“Lance,” Shiro turned to the blue paladin, “I think Coran needs some help reconfiguring the healing pods, why don’t you call it a day and go help him out.”

It was a testament to how used to this Lance was by now that he didn’t even argue this time, he just turned and exited the training room silently. Keith resisted the urge to follow him.

He always did.

“Are you okay Keith,” Shiro asked gently as soon as Lance was out of earshot.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Okay cause Lance got you pretty hard.”

“No, he didn’t,” Keith growled turning on Voltron’s leader “He barely even hit me, and he let up as soon as I yielded. I’m fine, you hit me harder than that when we spar Shiro!”

“I don’t get it,” Shiro said throwing his arms up in the air “why do you defend him, why did you let him beat you today?”

“I didn’t let him beat me,” Keith said fiercely “he did beat me. And I defend him because somebody has to, he’s part of our team!”

“No,” Shiro said sharply “He’s no part of my team. He stopped being a part of it that day on Ajibi.”

“Well, he’s a part of mine,” Keith said simply. And before Shiro could fight him on it anymore, Keith turned and left the training room without looking back.

Shiro had no idea how much those words really meant; Lance was Keith’s team. In fact, some days it felt like Lance the only team Keith did have, he imagined for Lance it was so much worse.

Chapter Text

Lance didn’t like to keep things from Keith, in fact, he was firmly against it. They kept so many secrets in their day-to-day lives that they’d made a pact to not keep things from each other.

Despite their pact though, Lance had trouble telling Keith everything. Sometimes it was just easier to keep things to himself.

Like the conversation that always went silent when Lance would enter the room, the angry looks the team threw his way during mealtimes, the way Hunk, Lance’s longtime best friend wouldn’t even look at him anymore.

Keith knew some of it, how Lance was kept off of missions, they way Shiro always singled him out, but there were some parts of it Lance preferred to downplay just so he didn’t have to see the angry look in Keith’s eye.

Lance knew one of the things Keith hated most was being helpless, and there was nothing Keith could do here. He could defend Lance a little bit but if Keith were to go too far, got too angry or too defensive then it would all fall apart.

So, Lance kept things from Keith, he ignored the whispers, the stares, and disappointed angry looks. It was all fine because at night Lance would creep into Keith’s room and spend a few peaceful hours with his boyfriend before leaving his bubble of happiness as morning came. It was all fine, until the day it wasn’t anymore.

Or Lance supposed, the day he couldn’t pretend it was anymore.

They’d returned from a particularly hard mission only to be paged to the control room by Allura as soon as they’d landed in the hangar.

Lance was the last of the paladins to enter the room, everyone else was already gathered somberly. With an overwhelming sense of dread in his stomach, Lance sat down in the far corner, careful not to meet any of his teammate’s eyes, not even Keith’s. Lance was pretty sure he’d break down in front of everyone if he looked at his boyfriend right now.

“You weren’t able to form Voltron today,” Allura said, her voice ringing through the silent room. “This has brought a serious matter to light. Now make no mistake, this is something Shiro and I have been discussing for a while now, we thought we could put off making this sort of decision but now it’s clear to me that we can wait no longer.”

Next to her Shiro nodded seriously and Lance could practically feel Keith’s glare directed at the black paladin.

“We are not a team,” Allura continued “We are divided, and a divided Voltron is nothing but a group of children with lions.”

What Lance expected her to say next was that they were to go through torturous team bonding or be forced to talk about their feelings. He didn’t expect her next words to be the ones that ended his life.

“We need to be a team again, Shiro and I agree that the only way we can do this is if I take up the mantle of the blue paladin.”

If it was silent before then now it was simply nothingness. Like all sound and time just ceased to exist for a moment while everyone processed her words.

“What?” Hunk asked in a quiet voice, his eyes darting nervously over to Lance “You mean Lance won’t be a paladin anymore?”

“No,” Allura spoke firmly “He won’t. We already know I can pilot the blue lion so there’s no reason for me not to be the blue paladin again.”

“I’ll give you a fucking reason,” Keith spoke up, his voice was positively deadly. Lance knew that he’d stopped the red paladin from blowing up in his defense so far, but it was unlikely he could stop Keith this time. “The reason is that Lance is the blue paladin, not you!”

“Lance was the blue paladin, and for a short time, he was the red paladin too. Roles change.”

“Roles?” Keith scoffed “If Lance isn’t the blue paladin then what is he? What’s his role?”

“Nothing,” Lance said speaking for the first time, his voice was hollower than he’d wanted it to sound and Keith’s gaze immediately fell on Lance. “It’s okay,” Lance said but it wasn’t for the team’s benefit, his eyes didn’t leave Keith’s.

“I won’t let them do this,” Keith hissed.

“Yes, you will.”

“No! Lance I—”

“Red,” It came out different then Lance meant it to. It was soft, pleading, the same way he said it on the darkest nights when Keith swore, he was going to speak up this time, that he was done with secrets. It was private and intimate in a way he was never supposed to show in front of the team.

Keith reacted instantly, his mouth falling shut “…okay.” Keith said quietly after a long moment “okay, okay.”

“Good,” Lance nodded “Well I guess since I’m no longer part of Voltron you don’t need me here.” Lance turned on his heel and left.

--

Lance didn’t cry.

He didn’t cry when he went to say goodbye to Blue. He didn’t cry as she purred in her familiar comforting way.

He didn’t cry until Keith found him that night in his lion— well no, now former lion.

As soon as Keith pulled Lance into his arms he cried, he cried as Keith whispered, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry I’m sorry.” Lance cried, but mostly he just wondered,

How the hell had he ended up here?

The answer to that was quite simple actually…

--

It started the way things usually do, a few unsuspecting people, a robot-lion spaceship, you know, the usual things. Lance insulted Keith as many times as he could, flirted with everyone, made stupid vain jokes to boost his self-esteem. It was the beginning; it was just how things were.

Until those stupid things he did when he was young, scared, and unsure became his “character”. That was just who Lance was and suddenly he couldn’t escape it. He became the comic relief and that was all anyone saw him as. 

He couldn’t be talented, couldn’t be kind, couldn’t be a good fucking shot. He was just the useless jokester. Sometimes years after they first came into space Lance wondered if that had been leading to this, the whole time. If he had made his team see him, showed them that he could be serious and deserved respect, then they wouldn’t have turned on him so quickly.

Often Lance blamed himself, but he knew it was the team’s fault too because Lance’s real self was never invisible. Everyone could have seen it, but only one person did, Keith.

Keith, who was angry and reckless and never looked back or thought twice. Keith, who Lance was so sure he hated until the red paladin was standing in front of him in the middle of the night asking:

“Why?”

“What?” Lance asked shaking his head in confusion. He hadn’t expected to bump into Keith in the halls this late, but he really hadn’t expected Keith to strike up a conversation.

“Why do you pretend to be different than you are?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Yes, you do. You pretend to be annoying and spiteful and basically an asshole. But you’re not. You’re kind and caring you took care of all of us while Shiro was gone, made sure we ate, and didn’t work ourselves too hard. You took care of me.”  

Lance paused looking at Keith, really looking at him for the first time. He seemed deeply tired like he hadn’t been sleeping. The late hours washed away his usual prickliness and Lance found himself thinking that the boy looked quite… soft.

“I did what I had to,” Lance shrugged.  

“And got no credit for it,”

“I don’t need credit.”

“Well, I’m giving it to you. I noticed…”

I noticed, In Lance’s head sometimes he felt he could see the shockwaves coming off of Keith’s words in that memory. Like it was the stone tossed in the pond and everything that was happening now was a ripple, affected by that tiny little stone.

Because Keith, who was a loner, angry, reckless, and rough. Keith, had looked at Lance and seen him.

After that conversation in the hall, something between Keith and Lance shifted. They didn’t stop fighting or competing in their pointless rivalry during the day. But at night they’d meet in the observation deck and talk. At first, it was simple things, the stars of whatever solar system they were in, Voltron, and foods they missed from Earth. But slowly it changed.

Eventually, Lance was spilling his heart to Keith, telling him about his homesickness, his life back on Earth and his family. Keith talked about getting kicked out of the Garrison and losing his father when he was young.

They never meant to keep their new friendship a secret, but it was just easier to bicker and act hateful in front of the whole team rather than explain how exactly they’d become such fast friends.

They didn’t really know themselves.

But it wasn’t meant to be a secret, not until Keith met Lance late one night on the empty observation deck.

“Mind if I join you?”

Lance looked up catching Keith's dark eyes, barely visible in the dim light “Not at all.”

Keith nodded and took a seat. They sat in silence for a while, simply watching the endless expanse of space stretching out in front of them.

“Do you think I’m a bad paladin?” Keith asked suddenly breaking their quiet.

“Huh?” Lance asked in surprise, Keith Kogane, a bad paladin?

“Well…” Keith said suddenly looking self-conscious “it’s just that I got a long lecture from Shiro and Allura today on ‘being too reckless and endangering the team’ after yesterday’s mishap.”

Lance nodded, Keith had pulled a pretty risky move on their last mission, but it had all turned out fine “No you’re not a bad paladin, Keith. You’re the best of us honestly. Look, I get those lectures on the daily except I’m told ‘I need to take things more seriously’ and to ‘stop goofing off’. Shiro and Allura are trying to lead a group of children on a mission to save the universe, they’re just hard on us because they want us to be our best.”

Keith nodded “I get that, but sometimes I feel like they’re too harsh. We’re the paladins that make Voltron, not the robot itself. I think they forget we have feelings.”

Lance nodded “Maybe they do, we’re all under a lot of stress. It easy to only think about Voltron.”

Keith reached out and cupped Lance’s face in his hand, angling him so they were eye-to-eye. “You always defend everyone,” Keith said softly “You can say fuck them you know.”

Lance paused for a moment before taking a deep breath and saying “Fuck Shiro and Allura.”

“Yeah,” Keith agreed “Fuck them.”

Lance’s breath caught in his throat as Keith let his hand slide back down to his side, with only a moment's hesitation he moved forward until he was practically on Lance’s lap.

“Fuck Shiro and Allura for pushing us too hard,” Keith whispered, and Lance could feel the red paladin’s breath on his face. “Fuck them for not thinking of our feelings, fuck them for making us save the universe before I could even legally drink on Earth, fuck them making us paladins, fuck them for not seeing you. They should see you Lance; everyone should see you the way I do. If they did then no one would ever call you foolish or accuse you of not taking this seriously.”

Keith was so close now that even an inch would close the space between them, but neither of them moved. Keith’s gaze flicked from Lance’s eyes down to his mouth.

“But mostly,” Keith breathed “fuck Alfor or the Voltron gods or whoever the fuck made it a rule that paladins can’t have romantic relationships because I would give anything to be able to kiss you right now.”

“You say fuck a lot,” Lance tried to joke but his mouth was dry, and his voice shook.

“Only when you’re looking at me like that and I’m not allowed to kiss you.”

This is when Lance said the fateful words that changed everything: “Nobody has to know,” he breathed

Just like that Keith was on him like he was starving, pushing Lance down and climbing on top of him. As their lips met Keith’s hair fell in his face, tickling Lance’s cheek. Lance pushed it back tangling his hands in Keith’s hair just like he’d always imagined doing.

Before he knew it Keith was pulling off Lance’s old jacket and discarding it to the side, Lance’s hands were at the hem of Keith's shirt helping the red paladin pull it off.

Dimly Lance remembered in that moment thinking of how absolutely perfect Keith was with his pale skin and the scars crisscrossing his body, like little pieces of artwork all telling a story. Mostly though, Lance was focused on the dark tattoo of a constellation on Keith's shoulder. Lance reached up to touch it gently and Keith paused, watching Lance’s face as he gently examined it.

“My star sign,” Keith said lowly, a little out of breath. “Scorpio, my father had the same sign he had a tattoo just like this. I always wanted one too.”

“It’s beautiful,” Lance said softly, it was hard to see in the dim light, but Lance could still make out a little detail and how the stars glittered almost the same as the real ones outside the window.

“You’re beautiful,” Keith said fondly, and Lance blushed.

“I think you should go back to kissing me now,” Lance said in a whisper.

“I agree.” Keith chuckled.

It was like nothing else mattered, nothing but the stars outside and Keith's hands and lips.

Space was only as infinite as the possibilities.

--

Chapter Text

It was five weeks after Allura took the blue lion that Keith walked into the dining room for breakfast and Lance wasn’t there.

Immediately Keith stopped in the doorway surveying the room with a frown.

“Morning Keith,” Shiro greeted looking up from his breakfast.

Keith didn’t respond.

Shiro turned to face Keith fully “Keith? Is everything alright?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah.” Keith shook his head trying to clear his thoughts.

He headed over to the counter and got some breakfast before joining the other paladins at the table. They were all talking about some new invention Pidge was working on to help with an upcoming mission, normally Keith would have joined in and offered his opinion on how they could implement this new gadget into their training, but today he was too preoccupied with watching the door.

After a while, Pidge seemed to notice his silence “Do you like the idea then Keith?” She asked her eye curious behind her big glasses.

“Huh?” Keith tore his eyes away from the door for a moment.

“The design?” Pidge prompted.

“Oh, yeah.” Keith quickly agreed absentmindedly turning back to the door.

“Okay, seriously Keith what the fuck?” Pidge said.

“What?” Keith turned back around to face her.

“Why are you staring at the door like a group of Galra is going to burst in any second? Is a group of Galra coming? Do you know something we don’t?”

“Oh no,” Keith said flustered at being caught so out of it “no Galra. I just… has anyone seen Lance?”

“Lance?” Pidge asked in surprise “No, why?”

“Nothing, he’s just normally at breakfast by now.”

Pidge shrugged “He’s probably in his room still sleeping.”

“No, he’s not,” Keith said without thinking.

Pidge raised her eyebrows “How do you know?”

“I mean, it didn’t look like he was in there.” Keith quickly covered.

Pidge didn’t need to know that Lance had slept in Keith’s room last night.

“Okay, well I don’t know why you want to see Lance so badly but maybe you should go knock. You know how lazy he is, he’s probably still sleeping.” Pidge rolled her eyes.

Keith bit back the urge to tell Pidge that Lance was not fucking lazy and got up dumping his untouched breakfast in the trash.

“Hey,” Pidge called “where are you going?”

“So nice of you to sit and have breakfast with the team,” Shiro joked as Keith quickly exited.

He ignored them both making a beeline for Lance’s room. Keith quickly typed in Lance’s passcode. The door slid open silently and Keith stepped inside.

All the rooms in the castle were virtually the same, when they’d first moved in the paladins had fought trying to find the biggest room, they all insisted they had the biggest until Pidge measured them all and it turned out they were exactly the same. The only differences between the rooms came from the people who lived in them.

Pidge’s was like a junkyard of random half-finished projects and various machine parts, Hunk’s room was bright and cozy. He’d hung brightly colored tapestries on the walls and filled it with plants from different planets they'd visited. Shiro’s room was neat and orderly, it reminded Keith a bit of the dorms at the Garrison.

Keith’s room had originally been pretty empty aside from his clothes and his old knife he'd kept on his bedside table. Lance had changed that though insisting Keith needed to decorate. Keith hadn’t been down for that but eventually, Lance had convinced him to start a rock collection. Now various crystals and rocks covered Keith’s shelves.

Lance’s room was Keith’s favorite though, it felt like a home. Lance collected anything he could, it was filled with various knick-knacks and souvenirs from their missions. Lance said it was for his family when he got to see them again, they could all have something. In general, Lance’s room was a mess of different things, on the shelves, on the floor, lined up against the walls, it was full of life.

So, when Keith walked in and it was empty, he knew immediately;

Lance was gone. 

 Keith wished he was surprised, he wished he could say he hadn’t wondered if this was going to happen. But he couldn’t.

Lance didn’t have a place in Voltron anymore, he spent his days wandering around the castle while everyone else went on missions and trained and fought a war. Lance was never one to sit around doing nothing, but still, Keith had hoped that he would be enough to make Lance stay. Maybe that was a selfish though.

Catching sight of something on Lance’s bed Keith darted forward and grabbed it.

It was a piece of paper. Keith quickly unfolded it recognizing Lance’s handwriting instantly.

Keith,

I know you’re probably pissed at me right now, that’s okay I expect you to be. I just hope you can understand why I’m doing this and eventually, someday forgive me. It's okay though, I don’t blame you if you can’t.

As I’m writing this. you’re asleep next to me, it’s suddenly sinking in that this is the last time I’ll get to sleep next to you and listen to you breathe. It’s almost too much to handle. I want to stay. I want to stay with you tonight and wake up in your arms tomorrow and every day for the rest of my life. But I’m wasting away here babe.  

It kills me, they all hate me, and I can’t fight or help people anymore. I’m afraid that if this goes on much longer, you’ll crack and tell them everything to defend me. It’s so hard because a part of me wants to just come clean about everything even though I know I’d lose you. After all, I’m losing you anyway. But I think that at this point telling the truth can only make it worse.

So, I’m leaving, there’s no place on the team for me now but I know that somewhere there is a place where I’m needed, where I can do good and help people. Shit Red, you know there were only ever two things I wanted; to help people and to fly.

Well maybe three things, to fly, to help people, and you.

Now, don’t you dare think for one second that this is a decision I made lightly, that I’m just leaving you. You’re always going to be the love of my life and I hope that we’ll find each other again one day. Maybe when the war is over. I’m not asking you to wait for me, if you fall in love with someone else there’s no need to feel guilty, I’m leaving I get it. But I do want you to know that there’s never going to be anyone else for me, it’s always going to be you.

There aren’t words to express how incredibly in love I am with you. That’s never going away, nothing can change it. Not a million secrets or years or even galaxies. It’s you and me.

I just have to go. I think you must understand that.

I’ll come back though if you want me to. I’ll come back to you one day. I’m not like your father or your mother or any of the people who left you because I swear on my life Keith, I’ll come back to you.

I’ll see you on the other side Red.

I love you more than all the stars in all of the galaxies and all of the infinity of space,

Yours forever,

Lance

Keith let the letter flutter to the floor, he watched it fall almost in slow motion, and then he followed. Falling to his knees Keith let out a devastated sob and crumbled to the ground.

He wasn’t sure how long he cried, hours maybe. He just lay on Lance’s floor tears pooling on his face and the letter clutched in his hand.

Keith cried until all that was left was shaky exhaustion. When the tears on his face were dry and he was able to calm his rattling breaths, Keith sat up. He felt dizzy like the whole universe was shifting around him.

Maybe it was.

Keith was afraid to leave Lance’s room. He was afraid because as soon as he stood and walked out, as soon as those doors shut behind him then this will have been that last time Keith entered Lance’s room expecting to see him. Once Keith left, he’d never expect to see him again.

But Lance was gone, and Keith wasn’t a coward.

He stood carefully tucking the letter into his jacket and stepped out into the hall. Keith didn’t look back as the doors closed behind him.

Lance had promised he’d come back to Keith one day so looking back would bring nothing.

All he could do now… was look forward.

--

Two years later

Sometimes Keith ran missions with the blade, it wasn’t often since he was still a full-time paladin but he liked the work they did and it was always a thrill. He never expected to meet his mother though, and he really never expected to end up stuck on a giant space whale with said mother and a cosmic wolf, but hey, that’s life.

The funniest part of this though wasn’t even the fact that he’d been crazily reunited with his long-lost-mother, no. The funniest part was that Keith had spent the last two years since Lance left never looking back.

No one ever felt very inclined to talk about Lance in the castle. Aside from the initial conversation when Keith announced that Lance had taken one of the pods and fled. He imagined that some of them at least, were thinking “good riddance”.

Hunk had cried, Keith felt a little bad about that honestly but another part of him was happy. Hunk hadn’t been a good friend to Lance, hadn’t supported him or tried to believe the best, Keith was kind of glad Lance leaving had hurt him.

But after that, they never talked about Lance again unless someone outside of Voltron brought him up.

Keith didn’t look back, never. Not until he ended up stuck in the quantum abyss and suddenly, he had no choice. The abyss really liked to remind Keith of Lance.

--

“So, you’re really going to do it?” Lance asked.

“Of course,”

“You’re sure? Cause you know, tattoos are permanent—”

“I know Lance,” Keith cut him off midsentence “First of all, I already have one. Secondly, so are we.”

Lance blushed slightly “Okay,” he whispered.

“Good, now go get the supplies we need so Allura doesn’t find out I’m getting a tattoo when we’re supposed to be restocking the ship.”

Lance chuckled and leaned in for a quick kiss “She’ll never know. Okay, I’ll see you soon.”

“Bye Blue,” Keith waved and watched as with one last smile Lance disappeared out the door of the alien tattoo shop.

There was a rattle as the tattoo artist came in “You ready?” She asked as she set up.

“Yeah,” Keith nodded.

“Good, where’s your friend? He leave?” She asked somewhat disinterestedly 

“Yeah, he did, had some errands. He’ll be back later.”

“Okay, let’s get started then,”

--

“You ready to see it?” Keith whispered later that night tucked into the warm light of Lance’s room.

“Yeah,” Lance breathed

Keith nodded and pulled off his shirt. The tattoos were different than on earth and they took about an hour tops to heal completely so even though he’d got it only that day, it was already healed and painless. Keith liked that part because it meant Lance could touch it, and he did.

Traced his fingers over the brand-new constellation sitting beside the other, Scorpio and now Leo, Lance’s sign.

“It’s perfect,” Lance whispered, “I can’t believe you did this.”

“Well, you better because I did. Next time it’s your turn,” Keith joked smiling softly at his boyfriend.

“Oh, fuck no,”

--

“Who was that?” Krolia asked the first time he was brought a memory of Lance.

Keith wasn’t going to tell her, he didn’t talk about Lance, but still fresh from the memory somehow, he wound up saying: “Lance, he’s the former blue paladin of Voltron.”

“Former? I’m sorry is he—”

“Dead? No.” Keith shook his head “He’s not dead just gone.”

Krolia frowned “I can tell you love him very much, that’s a shame.”

“Yeah,” Keith said but it was more to himself.

“If he’s not dead then he’s not gone forever. You can have him back.” She said simply.

Keith looked up at his mother, she wasn’t kind, soft, or loving like Keith had always been told a mother should be, but she was honest and real. Keith liked that. Maybe she was right, Lance wasn’t completely gone.

“I’m not so sure about that,” Keith said, “but I’ll hope.”

“Good, I think the abyss helps people find what they need.” She said tilting her head to look at him her expression curious like Keith intrigued her.

“Did I need you?”

“Maybe,” she shrugged “Maybe I needed you, or we simply needed each other.”

--

One year later

The first time Keith called Krolia mom was after a particularly hard memory hit him, the moment when Keith had realized Lance was gone, the feeling of complete anguish was hard to shake off even when the memory was gone.

“That’s what the letter is then?” Krolia asked gently touching Keith’s shoulder “the one you take out sometimes.”

Keith nodded quickly wiping the stray tears that escaped.

“Lance is very lucky to have someone like you,” She said softly.

“Lance doesn’t have me!” Keith said jumping up “We’re stuck here! He left, I haven’t seen him in three years! He could be dead for I know.”

“He’s not,”

“Well, how the fuck would you know?” Keith spat.

Krolia looked at him unflinchingly “I wouldn’t, but you would.”

“How?” Keith demanded.

“You just would,” She shrugged “there’s more that connects people to each other than simple feelings, the universe is greater than that. You’re connected to Lance on a much deeper level than you’re aware of.”

“I-I don’t know what you mean by that,” Keith said quietly, his anger ebbing away.

“Quintessence is a small manifestation of the universe’s abilities. It’s almost like magic, isn’t it? Such impossible things can be done with it. But it’s not magic at all, it’s just one of the many wonders of existence. If Lance was dead, you would know because you’re intertwined.”

“You think?”

“I do,”

Keith nodded wiping away his tears and taking a deep breath “Thanks mom,” he whispered.

She smiled in a rare show of softness “I’m only telling you the truth,”

--

another year later

“Why are you so nervous?” Romelle asked eyeing Keith’s tapping foot “isn’t this your team we’re going to see?”

“Yeah, it’s just been two years for me, I’m a bit afraid I’ll be too different to fit back into Voltron,” Keith admitted.

Two years ago, he never would have said something like this to anyone except Lance maybe. Things were different now. Keith hadn’t known Romelle quite as long as he had his mom, but they were his family.

Keith loved Romelle. He hadn’t expected to, the Altean was bright and bubbly in a way that Keith never used to like. But when Kosmo had taken an immediate liking to her Keith couldn’t help but like her too. She was like the sister he’d never had. When he’d mentioned it his mom had said something about how a family was more than blood that the universe connected them.

Keith still wasn’t sure if he thought that was bullshit or not, but he liked the idea that he was meant to find Romelle.

“Well based on the stories you told; you’ve changed for the better. If you don’t fit anymore then you’re not the problem.” Romelle said, “I’m sure it’ll be fine, we have Lotor’s ass to beat.”

Keith laughed “We sure do,”

--

“Keith!” Pidge yelled as they exited the ship coming into view of the other paladins.

“Pidge,” He greeted hugging her before turning to exchange hugs with the other paladins.

“Wow,” Hunk said “we were worried when you didn’t return from that mission, but The Blade said you were fine. Still, it’s been forever!”

Keith chuckled “You have no idea,” He turned and gestured for his mom and Romelle to come forward “Everyone, this is my mom Krolia and Romelle. We have a lot we need to talk about.”

--

At dinner that night Keith turned to Shiro “Did anyone hear anything about Lance while I was gone?” he asked.

The tired chatter that had filled the room immediately paused. Keith knew he shouldn’t have brought it up, they’d had a long tiring day contacting The Blade, Rebels, and anyone else they could get their hands on. Now the castle was filled with more people than Keith ever remembered there being, but they needed all the support they could get to deal with Lotor.

Shiro frowned “No, why?”

Keith shook his head “No reason, I was just curious.”

“Okay,” Shiro said shooting Keith a confused look before turning back to his food. ‘

Keith figured that would be the end of that, Lance was still out there somewhere, and no one knew where. That is, until after dinner Matt grabbed him in the hall.

“Hey,”

“Uh hey,” Keith greeted.

“At dinner, you asked about Lance, I didn’t want to say anything in front of everyone because clearly there was something about that whole situation that I don’t understand. But I know you and Lance were well… something right?”

Keith’s mouth fell open in surprise “How did you know that?”

“I’m kind of a genius you know,” Matt shrugged

“So is your sister,” Keith pointed out.

“Yeah but she’s blinded my preconceived ideas about the two of you, I’m not so I noticed. It was kind of obvious that the two of you were madly in love, honestly.”

“Obvious?” Keith raised his eyebrows.

“Yes, yes. Point is, I have seen Lance.”

“What! When?” Keith asked in shock.

“It was a little while ago, maybe a deca-phoeb or so. He was working with a group of rebels in the Garixt System, I only saw him briefly but from what I understand he’s part of a group, it’s all top secret though. They work closely with The Blade I believe.”

“How was he? Did Lance seem alright?”

Matt paused for a moment like he was considering something before nodding “Yeah he did, he’s pretty badass honestly, but as I said I only talked with him briefly. He asked me about you though.”

“He did?” Keith asked hopefully.

“Yeah, I told him you were doing good. He seemed happy to hear that.”

“God,” Keith ran his hands through his hair and took a deep breath.

“I’m sorry, I wish I could offer you more but…”

“No, no.” Keith looked up at Matt and without a second thought, pulled him into a tight hug. “Thank you,” he whispered.

As they stepped apart Matt smiled, gently putting a hand on Keith’s shoulder.

“A part of me was convinced that he was dead,” Keith admitted shakily “you have no idea how much this means to me.”

“Of course, Keith. It’s nothing. And I don’t worry, by the way, I won’t mention this to anyone.”

“Thanks, really.”

“No problem, now I’m off to visit my sister and then get some sleep, you should sleep too we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

“No doubt,” Keith agreed “night Matt.”

“Goodnight!” Matt waved before setting off down the hall toward Pidge’s room.

Keith turned and went in the opposite direction to his own room but when he punched in his passcode and walked through the doors he was instantly met with a chill in the air. Keith had slept in a cave on the whale but Krolia had helped him make it comfortable. It was always warm lit by the embers of the night’s fire and filled with plants and flowers.

Now, in contrast, Keith’s room here was unfeeling and cold.

He acted without thinking, grabbing an empty box from his closet he quickly gathered up his collection of rocks grabbed some of his clothes, and went down the hall to Lance’s room.

When Keith punched in the code and stepped inside, switching on the light he ignored the dust in the air that covered every surface from years of disuse and quickly got to work.

Three hours later he was done. The room was bright and cheery again, Keith rocks were on the shelf along with some of Lance’s belongings Keith had found tucked in the back of his closet. It wasn’t the same as it used to be, but it felt like home.

That night Keith fell asleep surrounded by memories of Lance and for the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel like it was going to kill him.

Chapter Text

“What’s that,” Hunk asked.

“Huh?” Keith responded not looking up from the stream he was washing his shirt in.

After dealing with Lotor and losing the castle it was decided, they’d go to Earth. It had sounded like a good idea at first, now however several months into the trip Keith was tired and he missed being able to wash his clothes for real rather then washing it in whatever body of water they could find when they stopped on a planet.

Pidge had been working on some gadget to help them do their laundry but for now, they were stuck with this.

“You have tattoos?” Hunk nodded to Keith’s shoulder.

“Oh,” Keith paused looking over at Hunk “Yeah, I do.”

“Really?” Shiro asked, “I didn’t know that.”

“What are they?” Pidge asked squinting. She jumped up from where she was laying out her clothes to dry and came closer to get a better look. “Constellations?”

“Yeah,”

She frowned examining them, “Those are star signs, right? Uh, that’d be Scorpio and… Leo.” She said identifying them.

Keith nodded.

“Is there a significance?” Hunk asked curiously “One of them is your zodiac sign I assume? I don’t know which though because you’ve never told us your birthday.”

“I don’t like birthdays no need for you guys to try and celebrate it,” Keith shrugged “But Scorpio is my sign. It was also my dad’s; he had a tattoo that was the same so I got it in his memory.”

“That’s nice,” Hunk nodded “I always wanted to get a tattoo in memory of my grandmother. She was incredible and I’d like something to remember her by but I’m too scared of needles and the pain.”

“They didn’t hurt too bad,” Keith shrugged.

“Did you get them both at the same time?” Shiro asked, “because I feel it’s important to note that on Earth you were not old enough to get tattoos.”

Keith rolled his eyes “I got one of them on Earth the other one I got in space.”

“What’s the significance of the Leo though?” Hunk asked ignoring Shiro’s disapproving dad look.

“Oh, um I got that for a person who was special to me.”

“Your mom?” Pidge asked, “How would you even figure out a Galra’s star sign?”

“No, not my mom, just somebody I knew.”

Keith had a sudden flash of Lance’s smile, his long fingers gently tracing the tattoo. For a moment it felt like Keith was back in the quantum abyss as the memory washed over him.

“You okay Keith?” Hunk asked kindly taking in his sad expression.

Keith turned away from his team hiding the tattoo and his expression from view “Yeah, yeah. I’m gonna go get my suit. It probably needs washing too.”

Ignoring the team’s concerned faces Keith headed back to his lion. Once inside he collapsed in the pilot seat letting out a deep breath. These days it felt like Lance was inescapable, Keith thought that maybe it was time to stop trying.

He was tired of lying.

Maybe it was time to face Ajibi,

Time to face the day Keith nearly died.

--

“You have to be careful here,” Allura warned as she briefed them before the mission “Ajibi has a bit of an infatuation with romance and love.”

“Wait, isn’t that kind of a good thing?” Hunk asked in confusion.

“Not on Ajibi,” Allura said solemnly “even the best parts of existence can become monstrous when taken to the extreme, that’s what they do there.”

“How so?” Pidge asked.

“Well, if you were to cheat on your partner on Ajibi it’s the law that your partner must cut off all your limbs and then burn you alive. Couples there are constantly tasked with violent and horrific challenges in order to prove their love for each other. It’s sick.” She shook her head. “So just be careful, the Ajibians haven’t sided with the Galra yet, but there’s no telling what they’ll do.”

“Okay got it, don’t piss off the crazies.” Lance joked

Allura sighed exasperatedly “This isn’t a joke, be very careful. Now go suit up, let’s get this over with.”

--

At first things on Ajibi seemed to be going well, the citizens welcomed Voltron warmly enough and no one had been burned alive yet. They spent a couple of days working on an alliance with the Ajibians against the Galra and by the third day everything was pretty much finalized.

It was at this point when there was a crisis at a rebel outpost not far away, it was small enough that rather than pulling the whole team out in the very last stages of the alliance Allura and Shiro made the decision to leave two of the paladins and have everyone else go to the outpost. Reluctantly Allura chose to leave Keith and Lance, she needed Pidge and Hunk’s technical skills and Shiro’s leadership with the rebels.

She departed with the rest of the team leaving stern instructions not to jeopardize the alliance and to be careful.

Foolishly, Keith thought that he didn’t think anything could possibly happen, they’d be leaving too in a day or so, everything would be fine.

He was very, very wrong.

At dinner that night the ruler of Ajibi—  King Athros, a tall pale alien that seemed to exclusively wear blood-red— made an announcement.

This was when everything went wrong.

“Now maybe you’re unfamiliar with the customs on Ajibi but I must make you aware of something. Secret romances are highly illegal here.”

“Excuse me?” Keith froze.

“We do not condone any secrecy or shame in a relationship. Now normally we’d punish such relationships with death,” The king said casually “But since the two of you are foreigners I think we can come to an adequate arrangement, don’t you think?”

“We’re not in a relationship,” Lance spoke up firmly “you’re mistaken.”

“No, I really don’t think I am,” the king smiled “guards!” he called.

Before either of them could react Ajibian soldiers were upon them yanking their bayards away and restricting their arms.

The last thing Keith heard before the guard knocked him out was Lance’s whisper “Well shit,”

And then there was blackness.

--

Keith woke to a sharp pain in his head. He groaned in pain opening his eyes.

“Thank god,” Lance said scrambling up “you’re awake.”

“Yeah,” Keith said faintly “pretty sure I’ve got a concussion.”

“Try not to throw up,” Lance said, and Keith couldn’t help but laugh tiredly.

“Thanks, that’s real helpful Blue.”

“My pleasure,” Lance said.

They fell into silence for a moment as Keith looked around the cell they were being held in, it was solid stone, with no openings anywhere.

“Allura’s going to be pissed,”

Keith turned his attention away from the cell to look at his boyfriend “Yeah...shit what are we even going to tell her? We can’t exactly say that it’s because the Ajibians disapprove of our secret relationship unless with both fancy getting kicked off of Voltron.”

Lance sighed “You’re right. We can say we don’t know what we did? I mean they have so many customs here it’s easy to break them.”

“True,” Keith nodded “we’ll go with that.”

--

Hours later Lance had migrated from the other side of the cell over to Keith and was resting his head on Keith’s shoulder.

Keith had no idea what exactly they were waiting for but he was absolved from wondering any longer when the door opened suddenly.

“Come,” A guard said grabbing Keith and Lance from the cell and pulling them down the hall. After walking the winding halls they emerged into a large empty arena of sorts.

Suddenly there was a sharp prick at the back of Keith’s neck and he spun “what the fuck was that?” He asked as a guard disposed of a syringe.

“That was a special concoction we have here,” A voice spoke and Keith felt a surge of anger as the Ajibian king emerged.

“What does it do?” Lance asked shakily, his expression worried.

“The effects are quite simple. It’s designed for these trials we have here, to prove your love is worthy and strong. In a few moments the red paladin here will attack you,” He said to Lance “he will be unable to stop himself; this is what the concoction does. The only way for it to end is if one of you either kills or somehow subdues the other. But you can rarely stop the effects without death.”

“No way!” Lance said, “We’re not doing that,”

King Athros shrugged “I’m afraid it’s too late, if the red paladin does not kill you in due time then the concoction will take his life.”

“Why are you doing this!” Keith spat angrily.

“I have no choice,” The king said simply “If I were to go against the scared laws then that would mean the end of my life. I take no pleasure in your deaths, this is why we didn’t execute you both. At least one of you will live, you should be grateful.”

“Oh gee, thanks.” Lance scoffed “that's so considerate of you.”

Whatever the king was going to say in response was cut off as a sudden blinding pain racked through Keith’s body and he fell to the ground with a gasp of pain.

Distantly Keith was aware of Lance yelling his name, but all he could feel was the pain.

It felt like Keith’s own mind was trying to break out of his head, his vision became brighter and the dirt under his hands seemed to shift and move.

Suddenly someone was shoving Keith’s bayard into his hand and he acted on instinct as his sword appeared in his hand and he stood.

As he looked up, he was met with a man standing in front of him, clearly terrified. Something in the back of Keith’s mind was screaming that this man was important, but it was drowned out by the overwhelming need to fight.

So, he did.

Keith’s opponent wasn’t very good though, he held a gun in his hand but he never shot and Keith took him down time and time again. But every time the man got back up again.

Keith wasn’t sure how long they fought, time wasn’t a concept that mattered anymore, there was no need for a clock. Instead, Keith measured it by the amount of blood that covered his opponent's face.

Then finally, when his opponent was covered in blood, it dripped from his mouth and down his armor, finally, the other man didn’t get back up. He just looked at Keith his eyes bright blue and full of tears and he whispered:

“It’s okay, you have to forgive yourself for this when it’s done okay? I forgive you, it’s okay.”

And Keith froze, he remembered.

This was Lance, his Lance who dreamed of seeing his family again, who convinced Keith to start a rock collection. Lance who was kind, selfless, funny, and the most loving person Keith had ever known.  

Keith gasped. “No, no!”

Lance’s eyes widened “Keith?”

“Yes, oh god, I’m sorry Lance.” He backed up from Lance letting his sword fall to the ground.

“Keith,” Lance stepped forward.

“No!” Keith yelled, “Don’t come closer, I don’t know how long I can fight it.”

“Red, I’m scared.” Lance said quietly “What do we do? What can we do?”

“Shoot me,”

“What? No way, I’m not doing that!”

“Yes, you are.” Keith said firmly “I-I won’t be able to control it, I’ll kill you. If you shoot me there’s a chance I won’t die. You’re a good shot.”

“Keith…”

He opened his mouth to tell Lance it was alright but suddenly the blinding pain was back, and he groaned in pain. Before he could control himself, he was grabbing his sword, it took everything in him not to advance forward and take Lance out with one swift blow.

“Sh-shoot me,” Keith gasped and then he was moving forward.

Distantly he registered the roar of a spaceship overhead, but his body forced him forward, and finally…

His opponent took the shot.

--

Keith fell out of the healing pod with a gasp.

“Keith, oh thank god!” Shiro said and dimly Keith was aware of the black paladin carrying him over to a table in the med bay.

“What—” Keith blinked disoriented “what happened…” He trailed off as suddenly the memories came back in full force “Lance?” Keith asked, “where’s Lance.”

“Don’t worry Keith,” Allura said gently “Lance is in a holding cell, he’s not going to hurt anybody.”

“What?” Keith said blankly “Hurt anybody? I don’t understand.”   

“Maybe your memory is a little fuzzy, but King Athros told us what happened. Lance attacked you, I’m sorry it’s my fault.” Allura said sadly “I knew you hated each other but still I left you on Ajibi alone.”

“That- that’s not what happened,”

“It is Keith,” Shiro said kindly “we got there just in time to see Lance shoot you. I’m so disgusted, I’m not sure how we didn’t see what a monster Lance is sooner.”

“No, no it was an accident.” Keith shook his head.

“The king told us. He was there for everything.”

The realization hit Keith and he let out a bitter laugh, the King wasn’t a bad man, he was simply one bound by age-old rules and costumes. He’d kept their secret from the team.  Athros had lied about Lance attacking Keith to save their relationship, it was obvious he’d known about Voltron’s no-dating rule. A planet as obsessed with old rules as Ajibi was bound to be familiar with Voltron’s particular code.

And now the whole team thought Lance was a monster.

“I want to see Lance,” Keith said to Shiro and Allura.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea…” Shiro frowned.

“Take me to see Lance!” Keith yelled jumping up.

“Okay, okay.” Shiro said holding his hands up in surrender “let’s go.”

When they got to the cell in the depths of the castle Keith turned to Shiro and Allura “Now leave me alone.”

Allura started to protest but Keith shot her a deadly glare and she quickly shut her mouth “we’ll be right outside.”

Keith didn’t respond turning to face Lance who had stood inside his cell as soon as Keith had come in.

“You’re okay?” Lance said weakly as the door to the cell block shut behind Voltron’s leaders.

“Yeah, I think I almost died. But luckily we’ve got healing pods.”

Lance nodded tears welling up in his eyes “I’m sorry Keith,”

“Don’t be,” Keith stepped closer “I beat the shit out of you, we’re even, okay?”

“None of this is okay,” Lance said raggedly.

“No, it’s not… why the fuck did you let Athros tell everyone that you just attacked me?”

“They saw me shoot you!” I tried to find a way to explain it that wouldn’t cost us everything, but I didn’t get to in time, King Athros had already told them. I think he thought he was doing us a favor, but god! I said it was an accident, but no one believed me!”

“We’ll tell the truth then, clear your name,” Keith said firmly.

“If we do that, we’re over Keith! At the very least we’ll be forced to end our relationship, at most we could be kicked out of Voltron. The no-dating rule is there for a reason, to make sure Voltron isn’t divided. if they find out they’ll see us as jeopardizing the team. Do you want to be the one to tear apart the only hope the universe has? Because I sure don’t!”

“Okay, okay, I get it. But I’ll tell them it was an accident. I was the one there and they don’t have any proof it wasn’t an accident besides the king’s word. Shiro and Allura will be forced to let you out of here. They won’t be happy about it, but everything will be fine.”

“everything will be fine…” Lance echoed faintly.

“Yes!” Keith replied pleadingly.

“Do you think we made a mistake getting together?” Lance whispered.

Keith paused, looking over the blue paladin, his stiff shoulders and bruised face.  Even after everything, all Keith felt was love.

“I don’t think it was a mistake,” Keith sighed “Maybe it’s wrong… but I don’t regret anything, do you?”

“No,” Lance shook his head “I don’t.”

“Good,” Keith breathed “I’m going to tell Shiro that it was an accident, we’ll get you out of here.”

“Okay,” Lance agreed.

Keith turned away and headed for the door to get Shiro and Allura.

And that was it, the beginning, or the end, or something…

It was how Keith had ended up here.

--

“Keith, you in here?” Keith sat up in the pilot’s seat at Shiro’s voice.

“uh yeah!” He said quickly wiping the tears that had somehow escaped his eyes.

Shiro entered the red lion his face turning worried as he took in Keith’s red eyes “Are you okay? I’m sorry I should have known to stop the team from pressing you on your tattoos earlier. If you kept them hidden you obviously didn’t want to talk about them.”

Keith sighed “No Shiro, it’s fine. It’s not that.”

“Oh,” Shiro said taken aback “Then why do you look like you’ve been crying?”

“It’s not the tattoos, I mean it kind of is but not really… I was just reminded of the person I got one of the tattoos for.”

“The person who was important to you?”

Keith nodded.

“Who are they, someone from Earth?”

“Yeah,” Technically that was true. “I just miss them.”

Shiro shot Keith a small smile “I know the feeling, I wasn’t aware that you had anyone for you down on Earth though, you seemed pretty alone when you saved me.”

“I was then, but there was someone once. I miss them, all the time, every minute. Maybe you miss Adam the same way? It feels like every day that they’re not here I’m living without a part of me. I made peace with the fact that they’re not here a long time ago, but it never got any easier and sometimes I think I’d give anything just to see their face again.”

Shiro nodded a pained expression making its way onto his face “Yeah, I miss Adam the same way. I know I’ll probably see him again when we get to Earth, but honestly, that only makes me feel worse.”

“How come?”

“Because… I’m not the same.” Shiro admitted, “I know I’m a good leader, that I’ve brought Voltron so far, but the more time that passes the more I realize that maybe I’m not a good person anymore.”

“Shiro—” Keith started but Shiro shook his head cutting him off.

“Don’t deny it to make me feel better Keith. This is the first time you’ve really talked to me in years. I don’t know what I did to make you resent me, but I know you do. You’ve been distant and angry with me for so long. All I’ve ever wanted to do was protect you, you’re like my little brother. But I know I must have gone wrong somewhere. I just wish I knew where.”

“I’m sorry,” Keith said quietly “I know you only do what you think is best. I know you love me and I love you, Shiro, I’ve always loved you so much. I can’t explain to you what you did, not today. I will eventually though, soon, I hope. I’m just not ready yet. But know that you’re not a bad person, maybe you’re not always great and you push Voltron too hard but everything you’ve done comes from a good place, I know that.” Keith sighed rubbing his temples “I don’t always agree with it, and sometimes I hate you for it, but I understand.”

“Okay,” Shiro said quietly “I want to be better. I don’t want to push you all too hard, I do though. I need you all to be able to protect yourselves because I wake up every night from nightmares of you and the rest of the team lying in your own blood.” Shiro’s voice cracked and his gaze flicked down not meeting Keith’s eyes “I tell myself that it’s okay I’m unfair with you all because war’s not fair. But maybe that makes me no better than Lotor or Zarkon were.”

Keith reached out to take his brother’s hand “I get it, you can be better Shiro, we can all be better.”

Shiro looked up catching Keith’s eye “Yeah, we can.”

Chapter Text

It was with great relief that Voltron finally arrived on Earth. Keith hadn’t expected things to be so bad there with the Galra, they called for help from the Blade and Rebels as soon as they realized what was going on.

Being back at the Garrison was hard for Keith, it felt like he’d just somehow stepped into the past.

It was not, however, as hard as the day Keith met Veronica. She’d stepped into the room with an air of leadership, the way she held herself was controlled, Keith felt there was something familiar about her immediately.

And then someone said “Ah, Mclain there you are. We need your help with organizing a supply run.”

“Mclain?” Keith asked, “Like Lance Mclain?”  

Veronica spun to face him “Yeah, he was my brother.” She frowned “You knew Lance?”

Keith nodded “I know him.”

Her eyes widened “You mean he’s alive?”

Keith felt a sudden surge of anger at the fact that no one had told this poor girl her brother was alive, but he pushed it back nodding. “As of a couple months ago at least.”

“Oh my god,” Her mouth fell open “I mean I knew he disappeared at the same time as Hunk and Pidge but when they turned up here without him, I just figured…” She shook her head “God… but he’s alive! Where is he?”

Keith paused “I-I don’t actually know, Matt Holt said Lance was in the Garixt System last he heard with some rebel group.”

Veronica’s eyes widened “Okay and where’s Matt Holt? I need information.”

“Matt doesn’t know anything more,” Keith said, “but he should be coming with reinforcements any day now, you can grill him as soon as he gets here.”

“Good, I will. What’s your name again, I mean I know you’re a paladin, you’re Voltron’s leader, right?”

“Uh, what?” Keith said surprised at her assumption “No, no that’s Shiro. I’m Keith the red paladin.”

“Oh, okay… I figured you were the leader, you seem like one.”

“How?” Keith asked curiously “I mean I did lead for a short time while we thought Shiro was dead… but I kind of sucked at it.”

“Well, you were the first person to even mention Lance to me, no one else bothered. I just thought something as great as we’ve been told Voltron is must have an equally great leader and the best leaders take care of their team and the people around them like their family. Good leaders care.”

“I thought the best leaders won the wars?”

“Sure, they do that too, but winning a battle is hardly an accomplishment if you can’t keep your team together when you’re not fighting.”

“That’s… a really good point.” Keith frowned “You’re very smart you know.”

She laughed “I do know actually, it’s why I’m at the Garrison. But thank you uh… what did you say your name was?”

“Keith,”

“Her eyes widened, Keith? As in the guy Lance was obsessed with as a cadet?”

Keith blushed slightly and was suddenly glad the rest of the team wasn’t there “Oh yeah… that’d be me.”

Veronica cocked her head examining Keith seriously “Why isn’t Lance with everyone else, why isn’t he a part of Voltron like Hunk?” she said her tone turning serious.

Keith shifted uncomfortably “He was, at first. He was the blue paladin, but he left.”

“Why?”

“Honestly?” Keith took a deep breath “It’s kind of my fault. Lance made mistakes, Shiro made mistakes, and I really fucked up. I mean it wasn’t all on me, Lance made decisions with me… but if I’d chosen to do differently Lance would have agreed eventually. I just made the wrong call, and he left me.”

“Obviously this is hard for you to talk about,” Veronica paused looking Keith over “I’ll let you leave it at that for now, but tonight after I’ve figured out this supply run or whatever they need, I’m hunting you down and you’re telling me everything. Do you understand?”

“Yes ma’am,” Keith saluted, and Veronica rolled her eyes.

“I’m not sure if I like you or not,”

“That’s okay,” Keith shrugged.

She gave him one last look Keith couldn’t read before turning away.

--

“So, you’re totally head over heels for my brother?”

“Yes,” Keith sighed.

He and Veronica were spread out on the floor of Keith’s room, lying side-by-side. They’d started the night sitting up while Keith told the story but as it had worn on, they’d wound up on the floor staring up at the ceiling.

“I knew it as soon as I saw you, no one besides family has ever said Lance’s name that fondly.”

“Lance was my family.” Keith shrugged as best as he could while lying on his back.

“Until you fucked up,”

“Yes, yes but I don’t shoulder all the blame here. Lance was there too.”

“Yeah but I’d expect this from him, I want better from the leader of Voltron.”

“How many times do I need to tell you that I’m not the leader of Voltron?”

“Until you can’t because you are?”

“I…I have no idea what that sentence means Veronica.”

“It means that you’re going to be eventually.”

“What? Are you going to kill Shiro?”

“Hm… that’s tempting,”

“You can’t kill him,” Keith said reaching over to poke her shoulder “he has issues you know.”

Veronica rolled over on her side to face Keith and he turned too “We all have issues; you can’t excuse him because he has issues.” She said seriously “think of it like yourself, you were in a difficult position, right? An impossible one really, and you chose to make bad decisions, but you clearly aren’t excusing yourself for that. You’re mad that you chose to stay quiet rather than defending Lance, and you regret not trying harder you blame yourself for that. Even though you were in a bad situation you don’t use that to excuse yourself. Do the same with Shiro, accept that he does have issues and war is hard and this influenced his decisions, but he still was blind and did terrible things. You can love him and still choose to hold him to his bad choices.”

Keith was silent for a moment thinking over what she’d said, “You are very smart you know.”

She smiled “I know. I’m very good at figuring people out, it’s a gift.”

Keith laughed “It sure is.”

--

After a couple of days the Blade and some rebels joined them on Earth and they began to prepare for an attack, the Galra could go for their big strike any day now and it was best if they brought everyone up to speed as quickly as possible.

“We’ve contacted every group and ally we have around the universe,” Kolivan was saying to the crowded room of BoM, Rebels, Garrison employees, and Voltron during a briefing. “In particular a team I’ve worked with many times Estrella will be arriving tomorrow, we’ll need someone to greet them and quickly get everyone briefed.”

“We can have a paladin do that,” Allura offered “we’re all at highest clearance so any of us can easily make sure they know everything they need.”

Kolivan nodded “very well,”

“Okay,” Shiro stood as Kolivan stepped back “let’s all break for lunch, we have a long day of getting informed ahead of us so go get some food and be back here before one!”

Everyone nodded and the room was filled with the noise of chairs being pushed back and people gathering their things. Keith followed the crowd to the cafeteria and quickly got some food before joining the rest of the team minus Hunk who helped in the kitchens during meal times.

“…Look I’m not an asshole,” Pidge was saying as Keith sat down “I’m just saying it’s annoying to sit through shit we already know, we’ve fought the Galra a million times we hardly need to be briefed on their fighting techniques.”

“You’re there to help Pidge,” Shiro said exasperatedly.

Before Pidge could no doubt protest the conversation was interrupted by a shout “Keith!” Veronica yelled bounding over in a way that reminded Keith so much of Lance.

“Vee?” Keith said confused by her excitement.

In the past few days, Keith had spent every moment of his time that he wasn’t working, recounting any moments from Voltron with Lance in it, which meant that in some weird way Veronica now felt like Keith’s sister too. She’d even insisted that Keith not call her Veronica because only work people called her that.

“Who are you?” Allura asked curiously leaning forward as Veronica grabbed Keith’s hand in excitement.

“Veronica Mclain,” She said quickly to Allura before turning her attention back to Keith “Do you have Spanish in space?” she asked him.

“Uh, no.” Keith raised an eyebrow “Why?”

She paused “It could be a coincidence…”

“What could be?” Keith pressed her.

 “Estrella, the rebel team that’s coming, well, estrella means star in Spanish.”

“Oh my god it does,” Keith said his mouth falling open.

“You recognize it right? I’m assuming Lance used to say that ’mi estrella’, right?”

Keith nodded “Right, he did.”

“And Matt said he was with a rebel team,” Veronica pointed out.

“I see where you’re going, but I wouldn’t get your hopes up.” Keith warned “I mean he was in the Garixt System, that’s very far away from here. It’d take ages even in a high-tech ship to get here.”

“Yeah, but you said Matt saw Lance months and months ago.”

“Well that’s true, but still…” Veronica looked at him pleadingly and Keith sighed “Okay, okay how about this? I’ll meet the team tomorrow they needed a paladin to brief them anyway and I’m free. We’ll go from there.”

“Perfect,” Veronica smiled “I knew you had it in you team leader!”

Keith rolled his eyes “I’m not—”

“Yeah, yeah, not yet.”

“Quit saying that,” Keith grumbled.

“You’re Lance’s sister?” Allura cut in suddenly.

Veronica turned to look at her “Yes, I am. And I have to go now because I’m trying to find my brother whose whereabouts are unknown thanks to you,” she said to Allura then she turned to point an accusing finger at Shiro “and you.”

“And me,” Keith raised his hand.

“Yes, and you too you little asshole. Don’t worry I haven’t absolved you from blame just because I like you, and I do like you quite a lot. In fact, I might have even wanted to date you if you weren’t taken.”

“and gay,” He pointed out.

She laughed and leaned forward to pat his cheek “And that too. Okay, I’m off to hide from briefing and my superiors, I can’t wait until Adam gets back, he’s the only decent Garrison guy around here.”

“Tell me when he does,” Keith reminded her as she headed towards the door.

She shot him a thumbs up before disappearing down the hall.

“How’d you become friends with Lance’s sister?” Pidge asked curiously “I mean we haven’t even been here for long, plus you hated Lance. It’s a little weird to befriend his family”

On instinct, Keith started to bite back what he wanted to say, push back his defense of Lance, but then… he stopped. Hadn’t Keith been the one to say they could be better?

He decided now was the time to start so he took a deep breath and said: “That’s not true.”

“Huh?”

“I didn’t hate Lance, I never hated Lance. I liked him, a lot actually. We fought all the time and sure there were times when he annoyed the shit out of me, but I enjoyed fighting with him. He pushed me and egged me on, he got me out of my comfort zone, no one had ever done that before. So, no I didn’t fucking hate Lance, he was important to me actually and maybe it’s our fault that none of you could ever see that, but it’s your fault too! Lance is smart and funny, he’s the kindest most selfless person I’ve ever known, he does everything just to protect other people and he took care of us. No one ever gave him credit for that because you were all blinded by what you thought you knew.” Keith shook his head “Maybe it’s time for you to take a closer look because I can’t sit by one more moment and let you all say things that aren’t true.”

There was a moment of silence while his team took in what Keith had just said. After a moment Pidge nodded.

“Okay, so you were friends?”

Keith sighed “Yes,” he wasn’t quite ready to explain the whole dating thing.

“I had no idea, you know, I’m supposed to be the smart one,” Pidge frowned “I guess it’s stupid but it was just easier to put everyone into a box of what they were and what they weren’t, then everyone has their boxes and I could just focus on the war. I always knew where I stood with people because I knew where they fit into. I must have forgotten, that people are more than the labels I put on them, I’m sorry that was my mistake. I won’t do that again… and I think I owe Lance a big apology, that is if we ever see him again.” Pidge’s face fell suddenly “Aw shit," her mouth fell open gaping up at Keith "was it really an accident when he attacked you on Ajibi? I didn't believe you, the king was so sure it was on purpose... but why did I ever let myself believe that was a concrete possibility? The evidence was way too shifty...”

Keith reached out to grab Pidge’s hand “You’re a good one you know Pidge.” He said gently “and you’re right Lance didn’t attack me as I said a million times, not that anyone believed it. And no before you ask, I’m not telling you what happened, at least not now because that’s a long story.” He said holding a hand up “But point is, you made a big fucking mistake, I’m familiar with those. All you can do now is be better.”

“Okay,” She whispered, “No more boxes?”

“No more boxes,” Keith nodded

“Okay, tell me something about yourself that doesn’t fit into your box? By the way, your’s is a very broody, loner, I-hate-everyone box.”

Keith laughed “Okay, let me see… um, I’m in love with someone? Bet you didn’t know that,” He laughed softly “he’s my soulmate, and I’m one-hundred percent going to marry the shit out of him as soon as this war is over. Assuming he’s down for that.”

Pidge’s eyes widen “wow broody, loner Keith has a boyfriend? I didn’t know that, actually, I didn’t even know you were gay until you told Veronica like a minute ago. That makes me feel like the worst teammate. Actually, thinking about it, we may be a great team when it comes to saving the universe but in every other aspect Voltron is pretty shit.”

Keith paused “We’re divided,” he said softly almost to himself “all that and we’re divided anyway. Really puts things in perspective.”

“What does that mean?”

Keith shook his head “Nothing, nothing.” He sighed “Now it doesn’t look like anyone else fancies trying to better themselves at this moment,” Keith said surveying his team who besides Pidge all looked pretty confused and a bit taken aback “so I’m going to get some more bread before they run out, I’ll see y’all in the briefing.”

And with that Keith turned away feeling weirdly positive, nothing was fixed yet, but it was a step in the right direction.

--

The next day when Keith went up to the landing strip to meet the Estrella team and was surprised to see the other paladins there as well as Kolivan, his mom, and Veronica.

“I thought you only needed one paladin?” Keith said as he made his way over, the wind whipping his hair into his eyes.

Kolivan shrugged “They volunteered too,”

Keith’s eyes narrowed but he was stopped from glaring by Veronica’s hand on his shoulder, her look was clear: don’t go into attack.

Keith let his guarded stance relax, whatever they were doing if this was Lance, then the last thing he needed was to be an angry mess.

Before Keith could agonize any longer there was the unmistakable roar and Keith looked up as a dark ship touched down expertly, Keith didn’t want to say the flying was definitely Lance, but Keith sure felt like he recognized it.

There was a moment as the ship communicated with the staff on the landing strip who were yelling things into walkie-talkies, and then the door opened with a hiss.

Armored figures piled out. They all wore dark blue suits with a star emblem on the chest.

“They’re awfully put together compared to the other rebels,” Veronica noted.

“That would be because they’re not simply rebels,” Kolivan said to her “we have often worked closely with them, they are their own group. Estrella branched off from the initial rebels to make their own way.  It’s quite admirable actually, their leader saw a different way and took initiative.” He nodded approvingly.

A figure in blue approached then “Kolivan,” they nodded their voice robotic-sounding through the helmet.

“Emetz, where’s your daring leader?”

Emetz chuckled, presumably the title was a joke “Our daring leader is in the ship, once again getting his leg fixed,”

Kolivan frowned “It’s not acting up again, is it? I had The Blade’s very best create that leg for him, I do hope he’s being careful with it.”

“of course he isn’t, you know him! But it’s nothing major, just a little bit of damage from some Galra we encountered on the way here.” Emetz turned as someone emerged from the ship “Ah look there he comes now!”

Another figure emerged from the ship, he looked mostly the same as the others with dark blue armor and helmet, the only differences were a lighter blue ring around the star emblem which seemed to signify his leadership, and a slight limp which Keith assumed must be due to a mechanical leg Kolivan had mentioned.

“Is your leg alright?” Kolivan asked. It was closer to caring and further from formal than Keith had ever heard in Kolivan before.

The leader nodded.

“Good, then I suppose welcome to Earth.”

The leader laughed “Believe it or not, I’ve actually been here before,”

And no robotic filter could disguise that voice, Keith knew him with absolute certainty “Lance,”

At his name, Lance turned, and even though Keith couldn’t see his eyes with the dark helmet on, he could feel Lance’s gaze. Keith’s instinct was to go right over, but he knew that someone else deserved to see him first.

“Vee,” Keith turned and grabbed her arm from where she was standing behind him uncharacteristically timid and he shoved her towards Lance.

“Go,” Keith whispered and she wasted only one moment to press a grateful kiss to Keith’s cheek before running into her brother’s arms.

“Lance! Oh god, Mama is going to fucking kill you! I swear, I’m going to kill you!” From there she dissolved into a steady stream of tearful Spanish while Lance tried his best to simultaneously comfort her and avoid being hit over the head.

They talked quietly for a moment in Spanish before Veronica hit Lance roughly.

“Ow jeez, Vee!”

“There’s no way that hurt you’re wearing a helmet.”  She rolled her eyes “but do please take it off I’d like to see my brother, thank you!”

Lance reached up to comply, he hit a button and the helmet collapsed merging into the color of his suit.

When it was off Veronica grabbed his face and pulled him into another hug, Lance hugged her back just as tightly.

After a while, the siblings released each other and Veronica grabbed Lance’s hand and pulled him over to everyone else while grumbling: “I can’t believe you lost your fucking leg, I’m going to murder you.”

Lance looked different, he had really grown into himself and he looked strong and pretty badass honestly.

“I only lost part of it,” Lance defended “just up to my knee. It’s no biggie really.”

She glared “oh right, well you can go and tell Mama that it’s no biggie then huh?”

Whatever Lance was going to say back never came out because as he opened his mouth to speak his eyes fell on Keith and suddenly it was like Lance remembered he was there.

Keith felt oldy exposed as Lance’s eyes flicked over him, he frowned at the still-new scar on his face but then his frown was quickly wiped away as he gasped.

“Are you fucking taller than me?” He scoffed.

“Uh, yeah, I guess I am.” Keith shrugged.

“How did that even happen?”

“I got two extra years while living on a space whale in the quantum abyss where time passes differently,” Keith said casually.

“Shut the fuck up, that’s not true.”

“It is, I also got a cosmic wolf and met my mom,” He said gesturing to her.

“Are you pulling my leg?” Lance gaped.

“I don’t know you’re the one who went and lost it dumbass.”

Lance just shook his head dumbly “You really have a space wolf?”

“A cosmic wolf,” Keith corrected “Kosmo,”  

“Kosmo? Please tell me that’s with a K,”

“Yeah, it is,” Keith admitted with a laugh.

The conversation fell into silence as they just looked at each other for a moment. Keith took a step forward and then another until he was standing face-to-face with Lance.

“Before anything else, I have something very important to say,”

Lance nodded his eyes wide.

Keith reached into his pocket and pulled out Lance’s letter. It was worn and almost unreadable from years spent in Keith’s hands, but he didn’t even need to read it these days, he had memorized every word years ago.

Keith held up the letter for Lance to see what it was and then very carefully ripped it in half, not looking away from Lance’s face “Fuck you,” Keith said angrily.

He let the letter drop to the ground and the wind snatched it up instantly carrying it away, but Keith didn’t care “Fuck you for leaving me!” He said tears beginning to spill down his cheeks.

“Red…” Lance said faintly “I’m sorry—” he started but Keith cut him off.

“No! Don’t be sorry, you were allowed to go, I’m not mad anymore, not really. I just had to say that. But if you ever fucking leave me again, I swear I’ll cut off your other leg.” He threatened.

Lance nodded  with a laugh, and then under his breath, he whispered: “I’m going to kiss you now, are you okay with that?”

“No time like the present to change for the better right?” Keith asked softly.

And then Lance’s hands were on Keith’s face gentle of the scar on his cheek and they were kissing. Lance’s finger snaked into Keith’s hair like he’d always liked it and Keith held onto Lance so tightly Keith was sure he’d never be able to let go.

And in that moment, he was faced with something he’d been avoiding for a very long time,

Keith had been scared.

Every moment of anger, every stupid decision and mistake in hiding their relationship and choosing not to tell the truth, it all boiled down to one thing, Keith was afraid.

He was always afraid, had been since the day his dad died. He was so young at the time he didn’t even fully understand what death was yet, but from that moment forward he was fucking terrified. When he got older, he learned how to mask it with anger and hate. He rushed forward thoughtlessly in dangerous situations simply so he wouldn’t have time to be afraid.

Every time he was with Lance, he was overwhelmed with the unthinkable fear of losing him, and so Keith had lied, and lied and lied.

And he’d lost him anyway.

So, as they pulled apart breathlessly with all of team Voltron watching in complete shock, Keith laughed giddily.

He had no idea what was coming next, what kind of consequences he’d face for his years of lying, whether the Galra would win this war, if Lance was really going to love Keith forever, or if he was going to slip away again, the entire future was uncertain.

But Keith knew he could make the best of it no matter what happened.

“I’m not afraid anymore,” Keith said breathlessly his eyes glassy.

“No? I’m glad, I never wanted you to be scared but I didn’t know how to fix it.” Lance admitted and by the softness in his voice, Keith could tell this was a secret Lance kept close to his chest for a long time “I tried to do everything to keep you from the things you were afraid of. Looking back that wasn’t the right thing to do, you had to overcome your fear on your own.”

Keith nodded “I’m still a little scared I’ll lose you though.”

“Babe, I spent the last couple years feeling like I was dying without you trust me, you’ve got me.”

“Good,” Keith whispered and as Lance smiled gently his eyes bright, Keith couldn’t help but think that nothing else mattered.

Chapter Text

Keith thought that if kissing Lance on the landing strip with the wind whipping around them had been the end of the story, he would have been happy with that.

But it wasn’t because life wasn’t that simple. That was one thing Keith knew to be a fact.

As Kolivan led Lance and the rest of Estrella through the Garrison they all walked in silence Voltron trailing along in the very back seemingly uncomfortable. Lance walked beside Kolivan and Keith stood behind him.

They turned a corner and stepped into a conference room to get Estrella up-to-date and Krolia grabbed Keith’s wrist.

“I’ve got to go,” she said squeezing his hand.

Keith nodded “Sure, do you have time to check in on Kosmo before you get to your work?”

“I can do that,” his mom nodded.

“Okay, thanks. I’ll see you later.”

“Okay, I love you.”

“Love you too, mom.”

She gave him a half-smile and then with a respectful nod to Kolivan she quickly departed.

“I can’t believe you have a mom now,” Lance said with a laugh.

“Technically I’ve always had a mom,”

“Yeah,” Lance rolled his eyes “but you know what I mean you dumbass.”

Keith shot him an offended glare but otherwise ignored Lance.

“Okay,” Kolivan started “anyone who is not crucial or has not been pre-approved to be here for this briefing may leave,” He glanced over to Voltron “now let’s begin, Estrella has a lot to catch up on.”

--

After a long day of briefing yet again, Keith joined Voltron in the dining hall. This time however when Keith sat down they were completely silent and no one except Pidge met Keith’s eyes.

Lance had stayed behind to talk with Kolivan about something quickly but after a little while the door opened and Keith looked up as Lance entered the dining room with Emetz. 

Keith locked eyes with Lance and could see his considering his options, after a moment he gestured to Emetz and Keith moved over so they could sit beside him.

The tension in the air made Keith squirm a little but before things could get too uncomfortable they were interrupted by Romelle as she skipped over.

“Oh my gosh,” She said excitedly grabbing Lance’s hand “You must be Lance! Keith’s told me so much about you, I’m Romelle!”

“Oh,” Lance chuckled “Hi Romelle, it’s nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Romelle grinned throwing herself down in a seat beside Allura and ignoring the other Altean’s offended glance at her personal space being violated. “I’m so glad you’re back, now Keith can stop being so grumpy.”

“I’m not grumpy!” Keith protested.

Lance laughed “you so are,”

Romelle giggled as Keith narrowed his eyes in a glare.

“How long?” Allura said suddenly and their laughter immediately died off.

“what do you mean?” Lance asked carefully.

“How long were you and Keith together, it was while you were both a part of Voltron I assume. I just think we’re owed an explanation.” She said not meeting their eyes.

“Firstly,” Lance said “we don’t owe you anything, I don’t owe you anything. Secondly, I do think everything needs to be explained but not here or now. Why don’t we all meet in the west wing briefing room in an hour, then we can explain everything because there are some explanations I’d like too.” Lance’s eyes flitted to Shiro before quickly looking away. “But for right now, Keith can I please meet your dog?”

Keith laughed at his sudden change of topic “He’s a wolf technically, but yes. Let’s go.”

--

“So,” Keith started “you left me.”

Lance didn’t slow as they walked the Garrison halls he just nodded “I did, I know you don’t want me to apologize—”

“Then don’t,” Keith interrupted “It won’t do anyone any good, I know you’re sorry, I’m sorry too. Being sorry won’t change that we made bad decisions.”

Lance tilted his head, biting his lip in thought “…okay.” He nodded “do you think- I mean do you ever wonder what would have happened if we’d just told the truth.”

“I do, all the time.”

“You think it would have been better?”

“I don’t know,” Keith shrugged “it might have been. When I think about it sometimes, I’m so mad at myself because what the fuck were we thinking? But I think the thing is, it only seems simpler in retrospect. We thought we were making the right decisions at the time and there’s no changing that.”

“We wasted a lot of time,” Lance remarked softly.

Keith turned grabbing Lance’s hand “No more,”

Lance cracked a gentle smile “Okay,” he nodded “we have a lot of catching up to do you know. Like firstly, how’d you get that scar on your face?”

“Fight with Lotor,” Keith shrugged “I found out what he was doing when I was in the Quantum Abyss and went to Voltron to take him down, it didn’t go super well. I mean we won, but not without consequences. Lotor’s dead, he didn’t really deserve that.” Keith frowned “I think deep down he was a good person, he thought he was making the best decisions he could, and I mean son of Zarkon? That’s some shitty cards he was dealt.”

They came to a stop in front of Keith’s room and Lance stopped to gently touch the scar on Keith’s face. Keith let him for a moment just watching Lance’s expression until the other man pulled away and Keith unlocked his room letting them inside.

They were accosted by Kosmo as soon as they stepped through the doorway and Lance laughed in delight getting down on the floor to pet the space wolf.

Keith watched them struck by the surrealness of having Lance here, now, in Keith’s room petting his wolf. In a way, it felt like nothing had changed. Even with Lance’s new suit, the mechanic leg, and his broader shoulders Keith still felt exactly the same as he had all those years ago when they’d kissed for the first time.

Lance sat back and Kosmo climbed into Lance’s lap— or tried to as the wolf was a bit too big. Kosmo settled in for a nap and Lance looked up catching Keith’s eye.

“How’d you lose your leg?” Keith asked.

“I think that’s a story for another time,” Lance said shrugging off Keith’s question “but what you were saying earlier, about how we made what we thought was the best decisions given the situation and Lotor did too,” Lance said thoughtfully “do you think that’s true? Does everyone just do their best with the cards they're dealt?”

Keith lowered himself to the ground to sit next to the former blue paladin “I don’t know, maybe. Most people try at least.”

“But then how do we know where to draw the line? Are we supposed to excuse everyone for every terrible thing they do just because of the bad things that influenced them? Should we excuse Zarkon? I mean the things that made him that way wasn’t his fault, he was part of Voltron once.”

“I don’t think we should be forgiving or excusing people just because of the situations that influenced their decisions. The choices people make are still wholly their responsibility, I just think we need to be understanding, right? You can have empathy for terrible people and still hold them to the things they did. Maybe if more people were forced to take responsibility but also shown kindness then we’d have more people who became better.”

Lance didn’t respond at first, he just watched Keith, blinking like he was in shock “Wow,” Lance breathed shaking out of his frozenness “did I just get preached empathy and kindness by Keith Kogane?”

Keith chuckled lightly “I guess you did.”

“You’ve changed,” Lance noted.

“I know,”

“Do you think anyone can be better?”

“Not anyone, some people can’t be redeemed. But I think we’d have a much more peaceful universe if more people tried. I think we need to stop telling bad people they’re unredeemable because then the ones who could actually be better will never try.”

“Everyone should try,” Lance said softly, seeming to catch onto what Keith was saying “even if you can’t erase the wrong things you’ve done you can at least grow and stop doing them.”

“Exactly,” Keith said “exactly.”

--

“So we’re here,” Shiro said awkwardly rubbing his shoulder where is prosthetic was attached. Lance’s gaze flicked to Shiro’s arm and Estrella’s leader shifted his weight slightly, Keith wondered if Lance was thinking about his own leg. He still hadn’t told Keith how he’d lost it.

“You are,” Keith said standing up and moving to the head of the room, it looked so much bigger without the usual large crowd there to be briefed, now it was just Voltron plus Veronica and of course Lance. Keith briefly wondered if anyone had even told Coran about this, in recent years he’d been quite withdrawn from Voltron but even in the beginning he rarely involved himself in personal team affairs. “and I’m thankful that you’re all here, I’m sure you’re all a bit confused because I’ve been lying to you for years. There’s a lot you don’t know. I take full responsibility for keeping secrets and lying to you all. I know it was wrong and I’m sorry, but I stand by my choice even if was wrong. I hope you’ll all be able to find empathy and understand why both I and Lance made the choices we did. I expect explanations from some of you too,” Keith let his eyes fall on Shiro for a moment “and when you give them, I’ll listen and try my best to understand. I hope you’ll all do the same for me and each other.”

“Yes sir!” Veronica said saluting dramatically from the back of the room and Keith rolled his eyes.

“Vee,” Keith groaned.

“What?” Veronica asked innocently “I’m simply showing the leader respect.”

“I’m not anyone’s leader!” Keith said exasperatedly.

“You can be my leader,” Lance volunteered with a wicked smile “I’d let you lead me anywhere.” He raised his eyebrows suggestively.

“How do you manage to turn anything into an innuendo?”

“Talent,” Lance laughed.

Keith shook his head turning back to the rest of the group, somehow the little joke had eased some of the tension in the room. Pidge was giggling a little and Hunk’s cheeks were red, presumably due to Lance’s joke. Keith had no idea how they’d been best friends for so long when one slightly sexual joke had the yellow paladin blushing. Shiro and Allura still looked uncomfortable with the entire dynamic between Keith and Lance but the room felt less like a bomb waiting to go off.

“Okay, I suppose I should start from the beginning,” Keith took a deep breath his gaze falling to Lance who gave him a small nod of encouragement “I did hate Lance at first, it wasn’t all an act. But when Shiro disappeared and I was the black paladin Lance helped me out a lot. He didn’t take any shit from me and he was level-headed and smart, I only survived that because of him. I… I was scared at the time, of leading anyone. I’d only just learned how to be a part of a team and suddenly I was forced to take care of one. But Lance helped me, and I guess I realized he wasn’t the person I thought he was. He taught me empathy and somehow, we became friends. It wasn’t meant to be a secret; we didn’t even think of it as one. It was just easier to keep our new friendship to ourselves with the war and everything. It was difficult to explain how or why we’d stopped hating each other, we didn’t even understand really. Then we fell in love,” Lance caught Keith’s eye with a soft little smile and Keith was glad he couldn’t see whatever mushy expression was on his own face.

“Okay, but how on Earth did it even happen?” Pidge asked curiously. “I never saw that one coming.”

Keith shrugged “How did the universe we live in even exist? No one knows, it just is. Some things just happen, Lance and I were one of them. I didn’t see it coming either.” Keith laughed lightly “So we fell in love,” he bit his lip the smile falling from his face “but we knew romantic relationships were forbidden in Voltron. We probably shouldn’t have pursued it, I never meant to but I guess it came to the point where it didn’t even feel physically possible not to. So we had a secret relationship, we hid it from everyone. I’m not sure what we were thinking, that it’d somehow all work itself out? Obviously, it didn’t. Which brings us to Ajibi.”

“Oh my god,” Hunk said in realization “They had all those weird love rules, that had something to do with it right?”

“Right,” Lance spoke up “they were offended by the fact that Keith and I had a secret relationship, they didn’t believe that love was something to hide. The king… he wasn’t a bad guy really, but he was bound by customs, so we were forced into a trial. Keith was given some kind of drug which made him lose control of himself, he had to fight me. We were supposed to kill each other to end the fight. I was going to let Keith kill me, but he fought it. He—"

“I asked Lance to shoot me,” Keith cut in as Lance’s voice wavered slightly. Keith moved around the room lightly touching the back of Lance’s neck as he passed. The former blue paladin relaxed slightly under Keith’s touch. “I couldn’t live with myself if I’d hurt him. I actually meant for Lance to kill me, but he’s too good a shot for that so he just injured me enough to get me down. Which is exactly when Voltron arrived. Which now leads me to the part where I get to ask what the actual fuck was wrong with you all? Lance attacked me?” Keith scoffed “the king lied because he thought he was doing us a favor, but what I don’t understand is why on earth you all believed it?”

“I-I didn’t at first,” Hunk spoke softly, his eyes fixed on his hands “I mean Lance was my best friend I knew he hated you— or I guess I thought he did. But I mean, we’d seen Lance shoot you with our own eyes and neither of you would give us an explanation. You just kept saying it was an accident without saying how, the little evidence we had pointed to it being true. And well…” Hunk trailed off his eyes flicking nervously to Shiro for a moment “Shiro seemed completely sure that it was true and he’s our leader. He’d never led us wrong, so I believed him. I knew some things didn’t add up but I just ignored it because that sacred me because if Shiro was wrong about that” Hunk’s voice fell to a shaky whisper as he choked out the last words “…then what else was he wrong about?”

A heavy silence flooded the room as Shiro shifted in his seat his expression blank.

“A lot,” Keith said his voice ringing through the silence. He turned to face his big brother and for the first time in what might have been ever, Keith looked at Shiro and he saw a man. Not a hero, not a leader, not Keith’s protector and savior. Just a man who’d left Earth years prior, a normal guy with a fiancé and hopes and dreams, who had come back something else entirely. Keith came to the sudden realization that Shiro had no idea what he was doing half the time, all this time he’d been playing the part of the perfect leader, but it was no more real than Keith and Lance hating each other.

“Yeah,” Shiro swallowed meeting Keith’s eyes “I’ve been wrong about a lot.”

“Like what?” Pidge asked.

When Shiro didn’t answer Keith did for him “Well Ajibi for starters. And that mission in the Aagtari Sector when Shiro had us leave; we should have done a stakeout. Fuck the ‘unnecessary waste of supplies’ or whatever he said, the base there got attacked and that was our fault because we left when we knew they were at risk. That risk mattered regardless of how small it was. The way we did our training was wrong, it was too focused on individual sparring and skills without enough stress on working as a team, without that kind of training we grew divided. We knew how to fight together but Voltron isn’t about fighting together Voltron is fighting as one. We could never do that because we didn’t have enough team bonding, we didn’t trust each other. Without that trust that should have been fostered, we fell apart easily.” Keith shook his head “It’s so fucked up because Lance and I went through hell knowing we were breaking a huge rule, that we could be dividing the team when we’d all already broken the biggest rule, to be as one. I don’t think anyone should give a fuck about who’s dating who when we were never even a real team. And…” Keith took a deep breath “I think that Shiro did do a lot of good as our leader but he wasn’t the right person to lead Voltron, that’s been proven time and time again.”

“So, you’re saying I’m a bad leader?” Shiro asked, his eyes were dark with something Keith couldn’t read but he didn’t seem angry, just stiff.

“I’m saying you were a bad leader for Voltron, I knew you when you worked for the Garrison, you were great at that, Voltron was different though.”

“I…” Shiro started sitting forward “I was different.” He met Keith’s eyes for a brief second, the black paladin’s expression was far away. “You’re right I wasn’t a good leader, if not for all the bad choices I made at least for the fact that I knew from the beginning I wasn’t in a place mentally to lead anyone, but I did anyway. I didn’t want to lead. It’s why I was so determined to train Keith to lead instead. I- I’m not completely… sane, I guess. Sometimes I wake up and I don’t even know who I am, sometimes I see things that I know aren’t there, after being captured by the Galra…. I shouldn’t have been leading anyone. It’s not an excuse, I know that. I-I went through trauma, I didn’t become dumb. But I just felt like you were all my responsibility and I had to be hard on you, I had to do bad things for the greater good, the fate of the universe, all that. And Lance,” Shiro looked over to Estrella’s leader “I’m sorry. I don’t expect you to forgive me. The truth about the whole thing is that I thought you were the weak link. I couldn’t stand the thought of your blood being on my hands if things were to go bad, which I thought would be inevitable, I know that’s selfish. With the thing on Ajibi, you hurt Keith, I saw it myself. I was angry about that but I also knew that there was more to the story. I just didn’t care.” Shiro admitted his voice cracking, he took a deep breath steadying himself, before carrying on “I saw it as the chance I was looking for to put you on the sidelines. I thought I was taking you from harm's way and eliminating Voltron’s weakness, obviously, I was wrong.”

“You were,” Lance said firmly his eyes blazing with a burning energy Keith had always loved, it was one of the few things the two of them had in common. “you don’t deserve to be forgiven, but I forgive you anyway.”

Shiro’s mouth fell open slightly in surprise “Why?”

“Because I think people pay their price. If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that the universe takes what it thinks is owed. I don’t need to be the one dealing it out” Lance stood, reaching down to tap his prosthetic leg “the day I lost my leg I killed someone. She was innocent, hardly any older than I was but she’d been captured by the galra and modified. Her emotions were tied to a bomb that was in the core of the planet. It was a sick experiment but what else could you expect from Haggar’s folks? The planet was hugely populated, full of other innocent people, kids. The girl tied to the bomb, her name was Hanneala, she was imprisoned and left for us to find her. When we found her she started to freak out, I would have too if I found out my emotions were connected to a bomb. I couldn’t get her to calm down.  I- I could actually feel the ground heating up under me as the bomb powered up. When she wouldn’t calm down, I did the only thing could think of, I killed her. I remember the look on her face as I raised my blaster, she looked so betrayed. I was supposed to save her and instead, I shot her in the head. Killing her set off another bomb that had apparently been implanted inside of her. I should have died, I was right in the middle of the explosion but somehow I didn’t. I survived with one less leg and a shit ton of burn scars, but still, I lived. Killing Hanneala was for the greater good or whatever, but the universe still thought I had to pay for it, and I did. So I see no point in holding a grudge against you Shiro, you’ve gotten what you deserve.” Lance turned to look over at Keith “Plus, someone told me recently that people can’t become better if you never give them a chance, you have one Shiro, so you better not waste it.”

“Okay…” Shiro nodded dimly his eyes on his hands as he chewed his lip, then he looked up “I quit.”

“What?” Pidge shrieked, stunned.

“I quit,” Shiro repeated “I can’t be the black paladin anymore, Voltron deserves better. This is something I’ve actually been thinking about for a while but now I know it’s time. I quit.”

“Me too,” Allura spoke up, she’d remained quiet this entire time but now she stood “I quit. I never wanted any of this, my father wanted it for me and then I woke up and found out my entire civilization was dead, and I was alone in the universe with nothing but a bunch of robot lions my father left me with! I hate those fucking lions, I hate my life! I hate me because I was in love with Lotor and I hate us because we killed him!” She didn’t bother wiping the tears which glittered on her cheeks, breathing heavily she continued but softer “Do- do I have a chance too?”

“Of course,” Lance said gently.

“Okay, good then,” She said drawing herself up “I’m out of here. I’m going to work on the Altean Colony, I’m going to rebuild my civilization, and I’m not going to do anymore goddamn fighting!” with that she was gone walking briskly away.

“Well,” Veronica said breaking the stunned silence that followed Allura’s exit “that was an interesting turn of events.”

“Uh, I feel the need to point out that we’re now two paladin’s short.” Hunk frowned.

Keith laughed “Actually, I don’t think that’ll be a problem.”

--

It was two years later when Voltron’s Pride defeated the Galra. It hadn’t been easy, but Keith hadn’t expected it to be. With the support of the Garrison, the BoM plus the Pride, they did it.

They’d won. It still didn’t even feel real to Keith.

After Shiro and Allura had left Voltron they’d needed to make up for the lost paladins, part of that was easy, Keith became the black paladin much to Veronica’s glee.

“I told you so!” she’d shrieked in excitement “Fuck yeah, team leader!” after that the next choice had been obvious to Keith.

He’d offered her a position as a paladin. At first, Veronica had been hesitant, she wasn’t convinced that any of the lions would accept her. But apparently, the blue lion had a thing for Mclains. That left only one lion without a paladin, Red.

Keith wanted Lance to be the red paladin but he understood that for Lance, Voltron had brought very little good into his life. Lance led Estrella and while there was a place in Voltron for Lance, Keith feared there wasn’t a space in Lance’s life for Voltron.

“Five people can’t save the universe,” Lance had said one night, his hands tracing the lines of Keith’s jaw. At Lance’s words, Keith sat up so suddenly that he knocked Lance to the floor as an idea struck.

“What the hell Red?” Lance groaned rubbing his arm where he’d hit it as he fell.

“Sorry, sorry.” Keith jumped up and grabbed Lance’s hand pulling the other man up and back into their bed. “I just had an idea,” Keith said as Lance lay back down and wrapped arms around Keith’s waist, all the while still grumbling about being knocked over.

“What’s your idea that was so brilliant you had to violently assault me?”

Keith rolled his eyes even though he knew Lance couldn’t see it in the dim light “I did not assault you, you baby. But what you said made me realize something, we’ve never been united. Voltron has alliances with the Garrison, the Blade, and so on, but it’s always just been the five of us and Voltron has never worked seamlessly or fully with any other group. That’s wrong, we need a real team.”

And so, Voltron’s Pride was born.

Lance rejoined Voltron as the red paladin but rather than taking a second in command position he became a co-leader with Keith.

In combat, Keith took the lead as black paladin, that was his specialty. But Keith listened to all suggestions from the rest of the team and always seriously considered any points that the other paladins brought up on their tactics.

Since Keith’s skills outside the battlefield had always been a bit lacking Lance was in charge of all diplomatic situations, everything else they took on together. Estrella integrated into the Pride quite happily and anyone who wanted to continue more of the stealth work that Estrella was known for but Voltron was not, could join Voltron’s Estrella unit.

As time passed Voltron’s Pride became strong, stronger than Voltron ever had been on its own. They worked together seamlessly, they respected each other. Trust was fostered through team-building exercises and Keith quickly became known for his vigorous training, together they didn’t just build a team,

The built a family.

It’s what Voltron should have been all along.

--

“Look at our children Keith!” Lance said “they’re all grown up, they defeated the Galra! I love them!”

Around them, a party went on happily as the members of the Pride celebrated. They’d defeated the Galra if there was ever a time to celebrate it was now. The mood in the room was probably the brightest Keith had ever seen since the war had begun.

Keith laughed taking the glass from his tipsy boyfriend’s hand “Okay that’s enough to drink for you, any more and you’ll be asking me to marry you again and this time I’ll say yes just to spite you.”

“No!” Lance gasped “you can’t do that Keith, I have it all planned out already, we can’t have a drunken proposal!”

“You’ve had it planned for years,” Keith rolled his eyes.

“For your information, I’ve had it planned for fourteen months, that’s not years.” Lance huffed “And I was waiting until the war was over, now it is I can finally carry out my plan. Do not ruin this for me Red!” Lance said pointing his finger at Keith sternly.

“Okay, okay. Just saying, I’m pretty sure that normally the person you’re proposing to isn’t supposed to know.”

“When has any of this ever been normal?” Lance asked gesturing to the room of people around them, humans, Alteans, Galrans, and more.

“Good point,” Keith chuckled.

Lance reached over grabbing Keith’s waist and pulling him over. Keith melted as Lance pressed a small kiss to Keith’s forehead.

If someone had told Keith nine years ago that he’d be here today he probably would have punched them.

But he wasn’t that person anymore, so he rested his head on the shoulder of his boyfriend— and no doubt soon-to-be fiancé and smiled.

The end.