#keith: space whales? also trauma.

[discordiansamba]

do you ever think Lance feels cheated that he didn't get hit with the 'get buffer in space' beam. I mean. I think it's his fundamental nature to be a beanpole, but do you think he ever looks at Shiro, Matt, and Keith and wonders what he missed out on that they got.

[autisticlancemcclain]

fic rec friday 4

welcome to the fourth fic rec friday! where, on friday, i rec five of my favourite fics.

1. Flip by @icypantherwrites

A very important alliance hinges on Voltron’s ability to perform a Sambayee — a show of athleticism and grace — and Allura had believed she was Voltron’s best candidate. But the aliens do not want an alliance and set an impossible bar that Allura is horrified to realize she cannot reach. There is no way any one can.

Except, she learns, there is. And there is far, far more to Lance than she had once believed.

Gymnast Lance and Allura angst. What more do you need? Seriously, I love them both so much, and the fic treats them both with respect as friends (which can sometimes be tricky, but this does great!)

2. A Wider Universe by @spiralled-fury

Lance, separated from his team, his family, his home.

For them, it wasn't long.

For him, it was two years.

Two years of endless fighting.

New scars, new pain, new hatred.

And new feelings.

I don’t really need to rec this fic -- sixty thousand of us have read it. It’s the voltron epic of all voltron epics. BAMF Lance of all BAMF Lances, slowburn klance, MFE pilots with important parts to the story, and the best Lance & Red relationshop literally ever written. 

3. The Cracks in Your Mask by @chyeahlex16

According to Lance, he has a great life. A large family full of younger kids running around a cozy house, a stern father and a strong, loving mother, a large dog full of love for his owners, lots of space to run around and grow in the backyard. Only light and happiness, no tragedy to speak of. But this is far from the truth.

They’ll never know. If he has anything to say about it, no one will ever know the real truth.

- A journey following Lance as he comes to terms with his past and sexuality in a way he couldn't around his family on earth.

(Basically a very personal self-projection on Lance. Some material can be triggering, but I'm keeping it as vague as possible for obvious reasons.)

A major warning -- this fic is a very heavy deep-dive into the traumatising aftermath of childhood sexual assault. Lance, who was CSA’d as a child, is having more and more triggers in his every day life as a paladin. This story details his worsening spiral into his trauma, and his eventual snap and reliance on his team. It’s an excellent story, the team handles Lance with so much care, and it’s a really important story to read, I think (but, again, tread carefully). 

4. Two Years On A Fucking Space Whale by vrepit_nah

After two years on a damn space whale, the Voltron team see Keith return to them. Lance missed Keith, and well, it seemed Keith didn't feel the same seeing as he brushed past Lance without even a 'Hi.'

Except, this isn't Voltron: The Show, but Voltron: My Retelling (And the one we all wanted.)

Keith changes his mind about ignoring Lance.

This is the reunion fic that we deserve! Sappy klance! Whipped Keith! Flustered Lance! I love reading this one when I need to feel better about season 6. 

5. the electric synthesized pop ballad of why keith can’t have nice things by kay_cricketed

Keith can't have nice things. That's it. That's the story.

(Or, in which Keith slowly learns that sometimes the best family is the one you make, Pidge has strong feelings about peanuts, Lance has a secret but would've spoken up sooner if he'd known it would break Keith's brain, Hunk is the actual best, and Shiro is just relieved he didn't have to give anyone the Talk.)

Is this an ABO au? Yes. Am I a little embarrassed about it? Also yes. But I’ll be real, this fic is really good! It’s well written, it’s nonlinear -- which I love -- and it features absolute conniving shithead Lance, whom I adore. It’s a fun fic with interesting themes, including a big thing on trust, and I really recommend it. 

that’s it for today!! i’ll see y’all back next friday for the next fic rec post!!!  

[erithel]

I know the topic of Krolia has already been brought up, but I kind of want to touch on it again, if you’re interested. (Disclaimer: I haven’t watched the show in a year.)

I like her, but at the same time, I don’t.

On one hand, she’s really cool – she’s this bamf, strong, good-looking, stoic woman who is also kindhearted and compassionate – like DAMN mamma Kogane knows what’s up! But on the other hand, she’s… a terrible mom. I think that her time with Keith didn’t do anything good for his other relationships, and that it most likely hurt his character growth and ironically made him more isolated. Sure, he “matured”, but he lost his spark in doing so. As an adult myself, I don’t believe that maturing and becoming a responsible adult means sacrificing that spark, but I digress…

She was an absentee mother who chose her mission over her family. And while that’s honourable and probably the “right” thing to do in the context of an endless intergalactic war, I don’t think that a child would forgive that so easily, let alone choose to follow in her footsteps and become a carbon copy of her. Keith suffered a lot of trauma as a kid, partially due to her choices, and has lingering abandonment issues as a result. If anything, I feel like the natural reaction for him would have been to resent her.

I don’t know if you’ve watched Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, but I liked how Josuke’s relationship to his father was handled. When he meets his dad for the first time, the audience can clearly see his mixed feelings – anger, resentment, anticipation, shyness – and there’s an entire episode dedicated to these two strangers trying to get over their complicated feelings and form a semblance of a bond. Afterwards, it feels like they both decide to just keep trying to be a father and a son, instead of speedrunning to this loving, familial bond.

The space whale was Voltron’s attempt at that, and I think we can all agree that that was a huge mistake and lazy writing. But even if there had been no space whale, I don’t think that would have made it better. I kind of wish Keith had chosen not to forgive her for leaving, and that he’d given her back the luxite blade she left him. I know it seems like a dramatic gesture, but it would have told the audience that we are more than our blood and our past. It would have symbolized him choosing to take control of his own destiny. It would have also told the audience that sometimes, it’s OK not to forgive those who hurt you and that you can still move on. That family can be found… not literally, but figuratively. What he was looking for was right there all along.

The best scenario for me? That, once the war is over and all is said and done, Keith finally accepts to give Krolia a chance. I would have simply left that relationship open-ended for the audience to interpret as they want.

I feel like maybe we brushed on Krolia, but never really delved into anything yet, at least not to this degree.

But I agree. With basically everything you've said here. (Although unfortunately I have not watched Jojo's Bizarre Adventure because…well, honestly I just really don't like the art style and it's super distracting).

Here's the thing about Krolia.

She embodies one of my least favorite tropes in a weird sort of way.

Did you ever read a book or a series and then got really excited because you found out the author was writing a new series set in the same world with the same characters, just a couple years in the future? I used to get excited for that, until I found out that apparently it's a sure thing that if the main character from the original series you grew to know and love has children in the following series…they are 100% guaranteed to be the person with the absolute least maternal/paternal nature in existence. I despise that trope, because it devalues that original character by turning them into someone who abandons/ignores/never has time for their kids. And that's not a role model.

In a weird way Krolia fits the bill as if she had been the main character of a series prior to VLD, and now she was returning as Keith's estranged mom who was never really meant to be a parent in the first place.

And, well…

sigh…

Some people are not meant to be parents, just as much as some people are.

And that's all I'm going to say about that.

But back to the subject at hand, Krolia was never mother material.

But the one thing I always appreciated about her was that she was consistent. They never wrote her as maternal. She didn't swoop in and immediately become a housewife and a mom. She was a spy and a warrior, and that's what she was always going to be. And I can appreciate that her leaving Keith was a very in character decision for her.

And honestly would Keith's life have been better if she had stayed? Knowing what we know of Krolia and how she was as a person…is that what Keith would have needed growing up? Would it have even made a difference?

I think the one thing we can all agree on, though, is that we wish we could have seen any kind of interaction or conversation with Keith and Krolia on the space whale. We wish we could have seen them actually talking it out and experiencing the memories together in the Quantum Abyss – learning about each other, and their lives apart.

And yes, a huge part of that should have been Keith's journey to (potentially begrudging) acceptance.

Should he have forgiven her for her abandonment? No. It literally was the root of all his issues and insecurities. But could he have come to an understanding on why she did what she did, as he slowly learned who she was as a person? That's definitely possible, and would have been better for character development.

That kind of journey would have been great for Keith because it would have been focused on self acceptance – and also, like you put so well, anon – it could have lead to the idea that he could decide who he considered family. He could make his own family (with blackjack and hookers), and he could be his own person. Just as Krolia was very much her own person.

What anon said here is very good and well put, so I'm going to leave my own response at that (especially before I get onto a…relevant tangent…). But I am gonna link this here, because I adore this fic, and it does a very good job at Krolia's character and her own journey of sorts. It's definitely worth a read, if you haven't read it already:

Due West by europa–report

[astralscrivener]

what's ur fave underappreciated klance headcanon and/or au. what's the wildest most niche au you've heard of it created (probably smth with dnd)

oh god hm. i don't interact with a lot of different parts of the fandom for a lot of different reasons so i'm not sure the difference between what's underappreciated and what i'm just not seeing BUT,

hm. hm. hm. i think keith having anxiety is underrated. i know that when it comes to mental health stuff in general i have seen people focus a lot more on lance (adhd/depression/anxiety/etc, which, yes, he does have all those) but i have seen people focus a lot less on keith. i know autistic keith (my beloved) used to be pretty big, but even then. aside from sometimes that and his abandonment issues, i have tended to see people portray keith as the one without a lot of mental illness, and i think in part it stems from the cooler grizzled older brother thing (this is a space whale hate account) and also that he is the brawler, so because his fight or flight defaults to fight he is seen as somehow stronger. i think. (is this where i insert the disclaimer that this is my blog and these are my onions)

anyway. anyway. i think keith does have anxiety. he is just a lot more quiet about it. i also think he has some kind of neurodivergence cocktail up there in his brain (i subscribe to both autism and adhd but that's my own thing), but i see this get focused on a lot less than it does with lance

i also subscribe to the hc that keith is sillygoofy, his trauma just kind of suppresses it for a while. i know he became shiro 2.0 after season 5 but he's silly goofy. i think he watched a lot of dramatic anime growing up and absorbed it all and once he gets comfortable with the others and learns to trust and let his guard down again he is ridiculous

as far as niche aus go. again, a good question. i don't think d&d is quite that niche bc the show did indeed have a d&d episode (altho i LOVE the idea that, in the paladinsverse, playing monsters & mana, keith would choose to be the equivalent of a beastmaster ranger, even tho a lot of other people choose to make him a fighter or a barbarian). i don't know what the Most niche is tho. hm. hm. i gotta think on that. this is gonna haunt my sleeping hours

anyway im not sorry this is so long. i think abt keith a lot

[kosmo-mckogane]

Can we talk about how the whole quantum abyss bullshit was just lazy writing? It’s like the writers were like “ohh shit, we gotta fix Keith’s relationship with his mom who abandoned him, and we also gotta give him some serious character development so he can be the perfect leader we need him to be for our stupid plot to work. Ok lets mess with time and space and stick him on a space whale w his mom alone for like 2 years and show some timeskips that loosely imply that they sorted shit out, without actually showing them working through Keith’s years of trauma and abandonment issues bc yanno, that would be too much effort and screen time and we gotta do this in like 1 episode. ok and he comes back bigger and cooler to signify that he’s had some sort of character development that nobody gets to see or understand bc we just don’t have time for that. Keith obviously can’t lead votlron if he’s not aged up, and he’s gotta be randomly so mature that its ooc. Let’s completely ignore Shiro as a paladin in favor of completely switching up Keith’s character to fit the role of black paladin in the span of less than an episode. What an amazing idea, great job everyone” 

[blue-likethebird]

Vee El Dee: The Good The Bad and The Ugly

If you’ve ever been on this hellsite, you’ve probably heard of Voltron: Legendary Defender. You’ll find the characters and the ships (and the discourse. Dear God the discourse) in tag after tag and on blog after blog. Now that the show has officially come to an end, I’m reviewing the whole damn thing. Talking about what I think worked, what didn’t, and what exactly the show did to make even the fans look at it so harshly now. (Just a warning “The Ugly” section discusses racism, and homophobia so if any of that triggers you I’d suggest you skip it)

Review under the cut

The Good

The Character Potential:

   Voltron’s characters had so much potential at the beginning. Their motivations, potential subplots, and clues to their arcs the first crew left us were actually interesting. How did Coran know Allura before they were frozen? What happened that caused Shiro to lose his arm? Is Lance going to reunite with his family? The show didn’t answer all of these questions mind you, but at the time they were introduced, those questions felt like they were worth sticking around to hear the answers.

The First Season:

   The first season is the only season that genuinely sticks out for me, way back in ye olden days when Voltron was a character driven show as opposed to plot focused. In season one, the plot took a backseat and the characters were what held up the show, and it’s probably not a coincidence that most of the character development and more emotional/memorable scenes occurred in season one, when there was time for the characters to develop. Likewise, the character focus allowed for everyone to get their day in the limelight -not just the characters who were valuable to the plot at the moment-.

The Balmera and The Return to The Balmera:

     I am never gonna be shy about my opinion that the Balmera arc is one of the strongest arcs that Voltron has had. Allura using the story of her people to inspire others and using Altea’s ancient connection to the Balmera to save an entire damn civilization! The goddamn adorable chemistry between Hunk and Shay! Believable suspense! Unlocking Lion Powers! The Balmera arc had it all and I was fed. Plus, Balmera gave us the introduction of the most blessed couple in Voltron history, hunay.

The Bad:

The Timeskips:

In theory, there’s nothing wrong with a timeskip. But you’ve gotta be able to show that the characters and show’s universe changed in some way during that timeskip and you can’t use them just to avoid actual story and character development. Take season six (? Or was it five? I don’t remember and I don’t wanna) when Keith and Krolia take a two year camping trip on a space whale while Voltron is off doing God knows what. Presumably during that time they developed some sort of mother-son relationship but we don’t get to see that development happening, or how that new relationship changed them, or really any proof that the timeskip happened at all besides Keith getting Galra marks and a teleporting space wolf. That particular time jump felt more like a cop-out to avoid writing Keith bonding with his mom.

Pacing:

To put it plainly, the pace is way too fast for anything to stick. The writing cycles from one season's worth of plot twists and WTF? moments to the next at the speed of light, leaving no time to address how the previous events affected the characters involved or not the show’s universe as a whole. So Lotor was actually evil all along and was using Allura to achieve his goals? Well there’s no time to mention how Allura feels about that, we’ve got three more surprise twists and a magic robot to shove into the plot! On the flip side however, the pacing is slower than a geriatric snail during fight scenes. The giant robot fights are usually the most exciting part of anything, but in Voltron, the fights are so formulaic that they just kinda… blur together into a boring fog. Lemme know if you can name this Voltron fight scene: the team’s fighting some random baddie, there’s a lot of yelling, someone gets a power up just big enough to defeat the current baddies when a bigger, eviler baddie appears who’s more powerful than the power up they just got, new baddie whoops Voltron’s ass, the support team watches in horror, someone else gets a power up that’s powerful enough to defeat the new bad guy, Voltron reins triumphant. What fight scene was that?

The Filler Episodes:

The fast pacing also means that they need to set aside breather episodes just to allow characters to interact besides in battle. That’s all well and good and there’s nothing wrong with filler episodes, if done right they can be some of the most memorable episodes a show can have (The Tales of Ba Sing Se anyone?) that is, if done right. But Voltron filler episodes don’t have that going for them. Filler episodes in vee el dee are an oasis of mud in the desert that is canon, they’re a generally unhelpful standstill point amidst a constantly changing series. I’ll admit that they can be funny at times but for the most part filler episodes are bizarre, unnecessary, and more often than not, poorly timed. If we just heard about a millenniums old empire folding in on itself and we’re just about to see a major character attempt suicide do we really need to see Coran go batshit while planning a space Disney On Ice?

The Ugly:

Racism:

#justiceforallura

I must confess that I am whiter than a polar bear in a snowstorm, but even I know that killing off a black girl (or black coded as the case may be), constantly torturing the Japanese guy, reducing the Samoan guy to food and fat jokes, and having the latino guy flirt with everyone before turning him into a farmer isn’t the best way to handle writing characters of colour. Denying said characters of colour arcs and screen time in favour of giving your white characters the same story in a different hat over and over again is also not the best treatment you can offer your poc characters. That’s not even mentioning other horrible treatment and stereotypes you’ll see the Voltron characters of colour experience. Let us also recall #notallgalra, the “what if the genocide victim was actually the bad guy” au mess in s3, all those “lol lance is stupid” jokes, the black character Kinkade speaking mainly in grunts, Allura dying to redeem the two genocidal dudes responsible for most of her trauma, and Hunk’s (half black half Samoan) family being enslaved at a fucking concentration camp like goddamn what the hell were you thinking Voltron that’s like hetalia levels of fucked up when we remember what kind of genuinely awful shit this show’s done to it’s minority characters.

Homophobia:

If you’re reading my review in the Voltron tag, and you watched the whole series, then there’s no way in hell that you haven’t heard about Adam dying and the backlash against Voltron for it. If you are somehow the .000001% of people who don’t know, Adam (a gay moc) was Shiro’s (another gay moc) fiancé who got a grand total of forty five seconds of screen time before dying when the Galra invaded earth. Meanwhile, L*tor and Allura’s relationship got almost triple that despite being abusive as fuck. But Shiro got married at the end of season 8! In a credits scene, to a guy in the background of a couple of scenes Shiro was also in. When lgbt fans expressed outrage at their rep being hyped up despite having no bearing on the plot or even Shiro as a character outside of one scene, instead of owning up to their mistakes, the crew of Vee El Dee said (or implied) that it was the fault of lgbt fans for hyping ourselves up. Yeah okay. Except after that we got confirmation that Ezor and Zethrid were a couple! Yay! Clearly a win for us El Gee Bee Tees right? Well… not really considering that both of them were depicted as psychotic torturers who also died a couple minutes later. Gotta love those crazy dead lesbians amirite?

Klance:

But why is klance in the “ugly” section!? You cry, I thought you were a klanti! I am an anti and I did ship klance but that’s not what I wanna talk about right now. When I put klance under ugly I wanted to discuss two things, the crew and the shippers. First let’s talk the crew; several folks on the Voltron staff have at the very least, not reacted negatively to the omnipresent ship that is Keith and Lance. I’m sure you’ll also remember that Lance’s VA Jeremy Shada was considered a KICK icon before that went south. The crew was also purposefully misleading when they talked about possible romances for Keith and Lance, the language they used was ambiguous enough that shippers interpreted it as proof that klance would become canon. When it inevitably didn’t and shit hit the fan, the staff backpedaled again. Stating that klance was never meant to be interpreted as romantic and we were all fools for thinking otherwise. That’s happened in the past so it’s a reasonable defence, except for the fact that scenes with Keith and Lance tended to contain unnecessary parallels to canonically romantic relationships, (the bonding moment paralleling an allurance scene in season six and their talk at the start of season eight paralleling two scenes, hunay in season one and l*tura in season five). So it’s not unreasonable to be a little suspicious there. Klance was huge on the internet, it’s impossible for the crew to have been completely unaware of what they were doing.

Next I wanna talk shippers. I’m not saying that being disappointed that a ship didn’t become canon is a bad thing. But when you act like that’s the worst thing Voltron did amidst the sea of ableism, racism and homophobia it gets a little tiring. The fact that so many klancers rushed to demonize Allura after season seven and eight and add on that I saw more people complaining about klance not becoming canon king than Allura dying a completely unnecessary death to redeem L*tor of all people was the final straw. I washed my hands of klance and Voltron as a whole.

———————————————

So that’s my review of V*ltron. I was gonna do a separate review of season eight but I didn’t even finish s8 and to be honest it probably wouldn’t have been any more than the words “Fuck Vee El Dee, Allura Deserved Better” in big pink letters. And I know I probably made someone angry with this review but if you actually managed to stick around my ramblings all the way to the end then I salute you regardless of whether or not you agree with me.

[hephs-thighs]

Burnt

Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender Pairing: Shiro/Keith (Sheith) Rating: Mature Length: 3.1 K Warning: detailed descriptions of suicidal thoughts, graphic descriptions of injuries, angst with a happy ending [ [ AO3 LINK ] ]

Shiro snaps out of the nightmare. The smell of Keith’s burning flesh is overpowering, stronger than it has ever been in his dreams, stronger even than it was that day.

“Shiro, please!” Keith’s voice is choked, desperate, and real. He’s right in front of him, trapped against Shiro’s chest by the white-hot arm holding him tight.

-

Shiro burns Keith, and it breaks the dam holding his trauma back.

Again, WARNING for SUICIDE TRIGGERS.

“Shiro, please!  I love you!”

Keith’s voice, straining against the effort of pushing away Shiro’s death blow, begging him not to do it.  It echoes over and over again on a loop Shiro can’t escape, shaking apart every foundation he has.

The smell of Keith’s burning flesh.

It never gets to the appearance of the Black Bayard and Keith’s bittersweet victory.  His mind is never freed.

“Shiro, please!  I love you!”  The smell of Keith’s burning flesh.

The only break in the loop comes when things that didn’t happen - didn’t happen, did not happen, could not have happened, no - show up instead.  Keith’s grip slips and the quintessent blade drags through his jaw, his neck, his clavicle, searing through to the floor.  Or Shiro’s arm transforms from the sword to the cannon and Keith is gone in a flash.  Horrible alternate versions of what could have happened, almost did.

But mostly it’s the same thing: The truth.  The long mark forming across Keith’s cheek and his cry of pain.

“Shiro, please!  I love you!”  The smell of Keith’s burning flesh.

“Shiro, please!  I love you!”  The smell of Keith’s burning flesh.

“Shiro—  Shiro stop!  Stop, stop!  Wake up!”

Shiro snaps out of the nightmare.  He’s in their bed on Team Voltron’s new ship, a sleek Olkari vessel.

The smell of Keith’s burning flesh is overpowering, stronger than it has ever been in his dreams, stronger even than it was that day.

“Shiro, please!”  Keith’s voice is choked, desperate, and real.  He’s right in front of him, trapped against Shiro’s chest by the white-hot arm holding him tight.

Shiro gasps and the arm switches off.  “No!”  He rips the arm away from Keith, and the sticking-tearing sensation of it pulling off of his lover’s ruined skin is almost enough to make him sick.

Pidge, Hunk, and the Olkari worked together to make him a new arm after they removed what remained of the Galra one.  It has the same weaponized ability, but the neural link is strictly one-way - he can command the arm, it can’t be used to command him.  It was supposed to be safe.

“Keith!”  He scrambles away from him, but at the same time uses his left hand to turn him onto his back.  There’s a huge diagonal burn roughly the shape of his own arm spanning from just above Keith’s right hip to his left shoulder.  Keith’s hands are burned from trying to pry him off.

“No, god, baby— I’m sorry!  I—”

Keith’s trembling with pain and physical shock, he can’t seem to speak anymore.  His eyes look scared.

Pod.  Now, right now.  Shiro has to only think about that, because if he allows any other thought about was just happened, he’ll freeze.  As it is, his own body is shaking so badly it makes him clumsy.  He wraps an arm around Keith’s back and pulls him up.  When he has them both sitting on the edge of their bed, he has to make a choice.  If Keith can walk, he can lift and support him with just his left arm.  He’s been keeping the right one away, terrified of touching him, enough so to override the fact that he’s awake now and the metal is dark and cool.  But the risk of dropping him, the thought of how much that could hurt him, outweighs that fear.

He wipes his right hand off on his boxers, scattering flakes of char onto their bedding.  The entire anterior forearm is covered, but there’s no time.  He tucks it under Keith’s knees and lifts him.

It’s not as easy as it once was, but it doesn’t matter.  The halls outside are dark and quiet - they have a suite separated from the others, ostensibly because they’re the joint commanders, but really for privacy.  No one heard the screaming.

“It’s okay.  It’s gonna be okay.”  Shiro doesn’t believe this at all, but he keeps up a continuous murmur of reassurances.  He wants to pull Keith’s mind away from the pain as much as possible.  He knows the younger man is going into shock, feels his skin grow cold under his hands and the sweat dripping off him despite this.  He knows burns kill by dehydration.

He opens a pod one-handed, and lays Keith inside.  He’s only wearing his boxers, and Shiro feels odd guilt at essentially leaving him on display.  But there’s worse to see.  In the morning, everyone will see what he’s done.

Keith’s lips move; Shiro can see his name there.  Keith tangles their fingers together, swallows, and finds his voice: “I love you.”

Now Shiro can’t speak.  All he can manage is a nod.  He sets Keith’s hand down and closes the pod.  He watches his eye drift shut, the tension leave his expression.  As soon as the light changes to indicate he’s fully in cryosleep, Shiro loses it.

All the emotion he held back to ensure Keith’s survival hits him as full-body sobs.  He sits beside the pod, shoulders heaving and arm wrapped around his knees.  He tries to be quiet - the last thing he wants is for the team to find him like this.  He isn’t ready to explain what he did.  He doesn’t want to see how they’ll react.

But he can’t.  He makes short, aborted attempts at taking slower breaths, or even holding his breath, but they’re interrupted by more loud, loud sobs.  He clamps a hand over his own mouth to muffle the sound.

It takes several minutes for exhaustion to finally stop the crying.  He wishes Keith’s wolf was here, just for something to hold, something that loves him and isn’t able to judge him.  But Kosmo is able to teleport all the way back to the cosmic whale where he was born, so he sometimes goes home for a few days at a time.  Wolves belong in the woods.  As Shiro sits thinking about it, he decides he should be glad for the beast’s absence.  He imagines him somehow smelling Keith through the pod and whimpering in worry.  Or else smelling Keith’s burnt skin on him and lunging for his throat.

He sits in silence for a long time.

He turns to look back at Keith through the fogged glass of the pod.  The burn really is terrible.  It leaves a wide, gory dip in Keith’s body, roughly a third of the surface of his chest and abdomen.

Tears start welling up again.  He wants to say he’s sorry, even though Keith can’t hear him right now.  He just needs to say it, because he keeps feeling it, so intensely and repetitively.  There’s a vice on his throat, though.   

He didn’t mean to do this.  Through the horror, panic, shame, there’s also anger.  He didn’t want to hurt Keith.  He didn’t choose to.  Never in his life has he chosen to harm him, but it keeps happening.  He’s been forced to try to kill him, to punch him, to shoot at him, to burn him.  He has no control over his own body.

The doctors told him that first, not in exactly those words, and he strove to prove them wrong.  Then the Galra told him.  He escaped and thought he’d proven them wrong too.  Of course he hadn’t.  He thought it was over, but now this…

He looks at Keith again.  He can’t stay here.  It feels like he should, some instinct to keep watch and not leave him alone, but Keith doesn’t need company to heal.  And Shiro’s realizing he’s the last person who can truly protect him.

He walks.  He’s also only wearing his sleep attire - boxers and a tank top - and the ambient cold is biting.  It’s warmer in their rooms and warmer during the day, but the hallways at night have no need for it.  He could go back to their room, to dress and wash the gore off him, but he doesn’t.

Their new ship isn’t as large as the Castle, but it’s still built to be a garrison or refugee housing as needed.  He’s in a state as he walks, the sort that he finds himself suddenly snapping out of without being sure how much time has passed or where exactly he is.  He’s in a hallway lined with airlocks, meant to dock several smaller ships.

He walks into one and hits a button, retracting the outer shield and leaving only glass between him and the stars.  He hoped they’d calm him, center him, but it doesn’t work.  There’s a big difference between looking at the sky with Keith, hopeful for their future, and looking at it alone, remembering all that his love for it has cost him.

Every bad thought is piling up inside him.  There’s no escape from everything that’s been done to him.  There’s no escape from everything he’s done.  His original goal of peacefully exploring space, then his new goal of protecting the people of the universe… both feel out of reach.  

The constant repetitive whir of the air circulation is driving him crazy, an extra agitation grating his already raw nerves.  He hits another button and seals the airlock shut behind him.  Finally, silence.  There’s no fresh air supply in here, but there’s plenty to breathe for at least a few hours.  He just needs… a few moments.

He looks down at his hand, the mechanical one.  The weapon.  But what the hell is the rest of him now, but that?  This isn’t his real body.  It’s a weapon, made by the Galra Empire to destroy their enemies.  To destroy the people Shiro loves.

Shiro looks at his left hand, flesh and blood, opening and closing it.  Is he really himself, inside this thing?  How does he know he’s not some simulation from stolen memories?  The clone thought he was him, too.  He’s a thing designed to hurt people.  

He became a weapon long before this body, before the real Shiro died.  In surviving the gladiatorial arena, he became the Empire’s tool for violence.  He thought it was better than death.  Now he’s not sure.

Everything is painful.  Even his good memories, even the things that predate Kerberos, even his most glowing hopes.  He’s panicking, spiraling; his thoughts go round and round without any exit or hope of changing direction.  Their circle tightens, closes like a noose around his neck.  He can’t breathe.

He eyes the wall to his right.  There’s a single button embedded there.  It’s red and covered by a clear lid to protect it from accidental bumps.

It would be so easy.  He can stop himself from hurting ever again, just like that - both senses of the word, hurting others and being hurt.  He can make this choice.  A real choice, his own.  He doesn’t have to be used or part of a “greater purpose,” good or evil.

He slowly reaches over, flips up the lid, and holds his finger just over the button.  The same synthetic digits that just burned their marks deep into the flesh of the man he loves.

He pauses.  He stares at the button, then out at the stars.  He’s not deluded enough to think it won’t be a painful death.  But it won’t take that long, and then it might be a kind of peace, floating among the stars forever.  It’s the only way he’ll ever truly be free.  It’s the only way he can truly protect Keith.

There’s a slam against the door behind him.  “Shiro!”

Keith’s standing there, eyes wide.  His wound has already closed slightly from the pod, but it’s bleeding in places where the cauterized tissue has torn from movement.  He goes to open the door between them, but Shiro’s faster, lunging for the lock on his side and slamming it.

They stare at each other.  “Shiro…  Please, what are you doing?”  Keith presses his hand against the window pleadingly, but it’s the wrong move, Shiro flinches at the sight of his red and blackened palm.

It takes Shiro a moment to ask instead, “Why aren’t you in the pod?”  His voice is quiet, soft.

Keith is shaking.  “I woke up.  Something was wrong.”  Shiro will have to chalk it up to that special sensitivity Keith occasionally shows signs of.  He’s unique, valuable, shouldn’t be risked to save Shiro over and over.

“Shiro, please… Please, come out of there.”  Shiro’s never seen him look so scared.  He saw what he was about to do.

Shiro swallows.  “I can’t keep hurting people.”  It’s the most concise explanation he can attempt.  His eyes dart to the button again.  He’s ashamed of being caught, but if anything he feels even more cornered.

“You didn’t hurt me!  It was an accident!  They must have made the arm too sensitive to your mind… They can fix it!  It’s not your fault!”

Shiro’s too stressed to fully debate that argument.  “You have to go, Keith.  Go back to the pod.”

“Come with me,” Keith begs.

Shiro shakes his head.  “I’m sorry… I can’t.  Please go.”  Keith’s still extremely injured, he could collapse at any moment, and Shiro doesn’t want him to see this.  He lifts the clear lid over the button again.

“No!  Shiro, Shiro, please, don’t, please don’t!”  Keith falls to his knees.

The last thing he wants is to cause Keith more pain, but he’s still hoping he will just… “Leave me.  Get out of here.”

Keith doesn’t stop his litany, tears falling freely now.  “Please don’t. Please don’t. Please don’t.”  It’s painful to see him beg.  Keith always had his pride, no matter what the world thought of him or threw at him.  “I love you,” Keith chokes, “so much.”

“I’m not worth it.  Not anymore.”  His hand is shaking over the button.  His heart is frantic in his chest.  He needs Keith to understand and to just let him die, again and for good.  He leans, extending to touch the solution to his every problem.

“STOP!”  Keith’s voice is forceful, determined almost to anger.  “Listen to me!”  He struggles to stand, using the door to pull himself up, then has to catch his breath.  “You. Are a good. Fucking. Person.  You’re the best person I know.  You died to take down Zarkon, to free trillions of people from him.”

Shiro pulls away from the button slightly, finally meeting Keith’s eyes again.

“Your choices are what define you, and they’re the choices of a hero.  Zarkon, Haggar… they don’t get to tell you who or what you are.  They wanted to defeat you but they never could.  It’s not your fault that they took your arm.”

Shiro feels his breath stutter, and he starts crying too.  He lets his hand fall back to his side.

Keith’s sweating, clearly in a lot of pain, but it’s even more clear he’s not going anywhere.  “None of it’s your fault, Shiro.  The bad things they did to you didn’t make you bad.  You deserve to live… You deserve it so much, so much I can’t even…  I love you.  I love you more than ever because of all the things you’ve done.”

It takes a couple of tries for Shiro to speak.  “Okay,” he says.  It’s a simple and even odd reply to such emotional pronouncements, but he’s weak from emotional exhaustion and he’s just trying to say that he’s heard Keith.  If there’s anyone he can believe, it’s Keith.  It’s enough to make him surrender.  He’s not going to kill himself tonight.

“Will you please let me in there?”

Shiro nods, feeling one level of tension leave him, and unlocks and opens the door.  Keith falls in, managing to stay upright, and pulls Shiro into a jarring hug.

“Don’t, the burn—”  Shiro weakly tries to stop him, but it’s ineffective.

Keith holds him tight, one hand running through his short hair soothingly.  “I’m so sorry.”  He sobs, and repeats it.

Shiro wants to protest that Keith has nothing to apologize for, but he doesn’t want to argue now.  Keith’s sorry for all the agony Shiro went through that night, for suffering so severe it led him to almost make that irreversible decision.  Shiro hugs him back, and they cry together.

After they run out of tears for the time being, they slowly make their way back to healing pods.  Keith tries to walk on his own briefly, but it’s too much.

As Shiro carries him, the guilt creeps back.  With the adrenaline of Keith’s fear for him wearing off, his light tremors turn to shakes, his hands are curled like they want to clench but can’t, he chokes down any sound but can’t keep it off his face.  By the time they get there, he’s drenched in cold sweat and his pulse is dangerously unsteady.

Shiro once again lays him in the pod.  “Don’t wake up before you’re ready, this time, okay?”  He strokes his hair in parting and reaches up to close the glass over him.

Keith’s hand clumsily grabs his own.  “Not without you.”

“What?”

“Get in.  I’m not going into cryosleep without you.”

Shiro wasn’t expecting this, but he guesses he should have.  He knows Keith will die if doesn’t let the pod help him, but Keith thinks Shiro will die if he leaves him alone.  “I promise I won’t… do anything.”

Keith nods, but doesn’t let go.  His expression is clear, he’s not relenting.

“It’s not safe for me to sleep next to you.  I can’t control the arm.”

“We’ll be frozen,” Keith grits out each word clearly.  He’s either going into cryosleep or unconsciousness soon, he won’t be able to stay lucid much longer.  “No nightmares.  No brain activity.”

Shiro considers.  “Okay.”  He doesn’t want to waste time until Keith gets even worse, and honestly, a while without his brain on sounds nice.

He gently scoots Keith over and climbs in beside him, closing the pod over them both.

.

They sleep for almost three days and wake up to exasperated chiding.  The others didn’t have any idea where they were and searched the whole ship before discovering both of their leaders locked in a cryopod with no additional explanation.

Shiro doesn’t let them get too far into their account before turning to Hunk and Pidge and holding out his right arm.  “I want this off.”

That sombers them immediately.  The arm-shaped burn had still been clearly visible on Keith when they found them, and it was no mystery where it came from.

Dealing with a prosthetic design flaw is only a small part.  Keith consults Coran and they locate a professional of a species especially adept in emotional counseling.  After talking it over, Shiro agrees to video sessions, biweekly for a couple of months, then weekly.  They help, and they also help him open up to Keith about what he’s going through.  The new arm is detachable when he wants.

Slowly, with ups and downs, he works his way toward better.

Here is an international list of suicide hotlines, should you need them now or ever.

[valhalla-awaitsfor-us]

A few days ago I wrote this: "I need a fic about Keith knowing the future couples on the team, after seeing the future so many time when he was with Krolia, asap"  

Well, I wrote it myself as a way of entertaining myself while waiting for the real writers do the work.  Is a Kallura centered drabble, but there is also a little Plance in it because Plance is my otp and I needed them in this fic.

Also, english is NOT my first language so i'm sorry if you see some mistakes. I hope at least you find that is a decent story.

After Lotor, they decided they needed a break.

Now that the universes were safe, they didn’t need to pressure themselves anymore. At least for a while.

Also, the return to home would be long and exhausting, and without the castle they had to stop on the allied planets to stay in good shape. Eat, take a shower, sleep ... don’t go crazy trapped inside a lion for more than ten hours. Basic things.

Everyone was tired, and practically destroyed emotionally and physically after the battle. But to think on Earth, on their families, was a beacon of hope that comforted the hearts of everyone.... Or almost everyone.

Allura and Coran were eager to see the home of the paladins, but no one could deny that the two alteans were still trying to overcome the trauma that was to destroy the castle for the greater good.

Romelle also didn’t seem particularly happy to go to Earth, but neither was she annoyed by it. After avenging her family and having met the princess Allura, the girl was happy with any decision that was made.

And then there was him. Keith wanted to return to Earth, but not because he had family like the others. At least not alive. So he wasn’t ecstatic to return. But it did fill him with warmth to think that he could have a family again in that place. His mother and he living under the same roof. It was so weird to imagine. His mother Galra, whom he had once hated for abandoning them, was now, with Shiro and the paladins, his family; and Keith wanted to show her the Earth like his father had never been able to do, because of the Galra Empire threatening to kill them all.

Who would have thought that it only took two years of travelling through space, experiencing visions of the past and future, to strengthen the bond with your mother?

He had seen so many things that he wished he hadn’t seen. Some horribly heartbreaking, and others simply too embarrassing ... Keith knew too much for his own good.

Like for example all the times that a Galra attack would end the lives of thousands of innocents.

... Or the fact that Lance would confess his feelings to Allura to only be rejected.

It was so awkward to know so many things about his friends and pretend that everything was fine, and Keith was not good at hiding his emotions. He might look like a cold person, but Keith couldn't help but show when something troubles him. And knowing everything about the lives of his friends was one of those things. “Oh, hello Hunk, do you want to know something funny? As soon as you see Shay again she will kiss you in front of everyone and you will want to take her to Earth to meet your parents. Coran, I know you'll fall in love with an earthling when we get home, but she'll break your heart. Lance! The whole situation with Allura will be extremely difficult for you. And Pidge ... Pidge I know how many times you are gonna try to play video games with Lance to cheer him up, wrongly believing that he could never reciprocate your  feelings.”

 And Allura ... she...

"Keith. Are you okay?"

It was uncommon that something took him by surprise, but the sudden appearance of the princess, startled the leader of the Voltron.

They were making the first stop on their return to Earth. The allied planet had food impossible to digest for them, and the atmospheric conditions were very aggressive for humans. But at least the citizens were kind, and they had pretty comfortable beds. And considering their situation, everyone appreciated being able to sleep in such a place. But Keith could not sit still. The feeling that Shiro could vanish at any moment was something that tormented him. So he had decided to stand guard in the hallway, while everyone slept in their rooms. Everyone but Allura apparently, who was in front of him, in her sleeping gown and with messy hair.

"Princess" Keith saw her eyes and all his thoughts disappeared for a few seconds. She looked broken. "I'm fine, it's just a bit of insomnia ... but you look ..." Keith wanted to say "Horrible", and two years ago he would have said it. Back then he couldn’t control himself when talking ... but now he was trying to read the emotions of others a little better.

"Pathetic? Hideous? A mess?"

"Exhausted." Sentenced Keith, convinced that that was the best term to describe her.

"I guess that's one way to put it. Can I sit?"

Oh no. The nervousness had returned and with bigger intensity. When they were fighting Keith hadn’t had time to think about it ... but now, in the calm of victory, on the serenity of the night, in quiet of the loneliness, Keith could see his visions clearly. How to explain to Allura that the reason why it was so hard to invite her to sit next to him was because he had seen them in his visions? How to tell the princess of Altea that in the future she would have a relationship with a half Galra half human, and that would create tension in the whole universe?

"Sure"

Allura smiled at him briefly and proceeded to sit beside him. She didn’t seem willing to start a conversation, and Keith wasn’t in the mood for that either. But seeing her so melancholy was heartbreaking.

"It wasn’t your fault. You know that, right?"

"Everyone keeps telling me that" Allura replied between sighs, unable to look away from the floor. "But I just can’t get rid of this feeling. I’ve failed to everyone ... I’ve failed myself"

"Allura, you beat Lotor. You saved all the universes. "

"We did that." Claimed the princess, looking right into his eyes for the first time since she had sat next to him in that deserted hallway.

 "But without you it would have been impossible."

"But…"

"Allura. Stop."

She gave him a genuine smile and took a deep breath. Keith could sense that she was holding back her tears and although the empathy for her friend invaded him immediately -which was amazing because even though he had not seen her for past two years his feelings for her, and for the whole team, remained intact-, the black paladin couldn’t avoid feeling that if she started crying he would  freak out internally; he was really bad at comforting people.

"You know ..." Allura resumed the conversation, and Keith admired her strength to hold back the tears and just keep talking. "One of the reasons why Lotor gained my trust so fast was... you"

Oh no. Keith could feel the heat rising up his neck. Suddenly looking at the wall had become more interesting than maintaining eye contact with Allura.

"Me?" Keith asked noticing how his voice cracked, and instantly wanting to hit his head against that same wall.

"Yes, you. I learned not to judge others, not even the Galra. The only thing that can show the goodness of our hearts are our actions, and you proved to be loyal and courageous. You have your heart in the right place ... Lotor ... he showed me everything I am capable of, and I thought I had also wrongly judged him. But now ... now. I am so confused! …And embarrassed."

Allura buried her face in her hands and Keith stayed a few seconds in silence waiting to hear the drowned sob of the princess, but they never came. She was still fighting to reamin calm, and at that point he didn’t know whether to admire her for that or be concerned.

"There are bad people on all the planets. Everyone can cheat and betray you, but they can also prove you to be extraordinary people. You just need to find the balance. Always be careful but never lose hope. "

Those words didn’t seem to belong to him. Keith wondered if Shiro was still in his mind somehow, giving him advice, because that undoubtedly sounded like something that his friend, slash big brother, would say. Allura seemed to think the same thing because suddenly she uncovered her face to look into his eyes.

"That was ... beautiful, Keith. Thank you."

Keith nodded, and even dared to smile back. It seemed surreal. He hadn’t seen her for two years, but nothing had changed. Everything was the same, except that now Allura was a little more broken, and Keith hated to see her like that. He still remembered her bright smile. It had been a long time but he could never forget Allura's smile. It was one of the few things that never failed to reassure him. But Keith knew it would take a long time for her to smile like that again.

Wait a second. He was thinking about her lips, wasn’t he? He was practically staring at her lips! Abort, abort!

"Do you know that Pidge has a crush on Lance?"

Good one Keith, is that your way of saving the situation? Throwing Pidge under the bus? What a good friend. Allura's expression showed extreme confusion and Keith could barely keep her gaze.

"I see ... How do you know?" Allura asked trying to bring some rationality to the situation.

"Well ..." I have lived for the past two years on the back of a space whale, in a quantum abyss where time does messed up things, while seeing visions of the past and the future. "It's complicated."

"Try me. Whatever you are hiding is clearly affecting you. You are our leader. We need you to have a clear mind. "

Keith didn’t know what to do. There was no way to answer her question without causing the princess to go crazy due to the amount of information. But still, he should tell her. Someone had to know. It was not the kind of secret you hide from your team, from your friends.

"Allura, this is going to sound very weird, but when I was with my mother on a mission, we were trapped in a quantum abyss and ..."

"For how long?"

Keith looked at Allura still open-mouthed. Her eyes revealed growing concern and he just undestood that there was no need to explain all the details. The princess knew what a quantum abysm implied.

"Two…"

"Hours? Days? Weeks? "

"Years."

Silence flooded through the dark and lonely hallway. A disturbing calm enveloped them as Allura slowly brought her hands to her mouth, silencing a gasp. It wasn’t something Keith enjoyed talking about; and the paladins weren’t stupid. The first thing Lance did when he saw him was to point out how old he looked. And if Lance could sense it, then Hunk and Pidge would have figured out right away  that something bigger, and with a possible scientific explanation, had happened to Keith in those months he was away from Voltron.

But saying it out loud was still pretty damn weird.

"Keith." Allura brought him back to reality. "Are you alright?"

Of all the questions she could have asked, Allura had chosen the only one that managed to affect Keith.

"I don’t know." The truth was always the best option in those cases. Keith wasn’t traumatized by having lived with his mother on the back of a space whale for two years, but it was certainly unsettling in retrospect.

"You must have seen so many things."

"You have no idea"

If Keith could, he would eliminate from his mind the image of Coran trying to flirt with the people from earth and scaring them, or the conversation that Hunk would have with his parents in which they would affirm that Shay was a beautiful alien but they were worried because they really wanted to have grandchildren and they didn’t know how that would be possible. Undoubtedly Keith also wanted to forget Pidge and Lance making out in secret.

It was none of his business and Keith felt like a creep, watching the lives of his friends.

"Have you seen anything about ... me?"

Well played Keith. The princess is asking you the worst possible question and it's your fault.

"I can’t remember anything specific right now."  It was late, they were both tired, and Keith felt he had already shared too much information. It didn’t seem like the place or the moment to open up about what he had seen about Allura in his visions.

"Is okay. I shouldn’t have asked.” Allura looked away from him, changing her attention to the wall in front of them, immersing herself in her thoughts. It was pretty obvious that she knew he was lying, but Keith was grateful she didn’t push him. "It is not the moment to know my future; I have to focus on the present. Also, I trusted you. If you had seen something really important you would tell us, just like you did with ... Lotor”

Keith knew the feeling of being consume by rage very well, and it was certainly something he had seen in Allura during the battle. But in the end, when Lotors  version of Voltron had been destroyed, and the Galra leader was unconscious, floating in the quintessence field, neither Keith nor Allura could leave without first thinking of saving him. Yes, Keith knew and understood all about Allura's rage, but he also knew about her kindness and forgiveness; and because of those emotions she was feeling so confused now.

"I haven’t told you yet but I really sorry that ..."

"So ... Pidge and Lance"

Allura looked him in the eye again. A fake smile on her lips and watery eyes, but still refusing to shed a tear. Apparently she also considered that she had talked enough for that night, and Keith respected that.

"Please don’t tell anyone ... I don’t know why I said it," Keith begged, afraid to even imagine what Pidge could do to him. "I'm an idiot."

"The secret is safe with me," the princess assured him, giving him a fleeting smile again before her thoughts began to wander again and her attention drifted away from the conversation.

 "Are you okay, princess?"

"I will be." Her voice was calm and assertive, as always. But her eyes revealed her true emotions.

"Is it because of Lance?" Bad question Keith, haven’t you screwed up enough for one night?

"What?" Allura's cheeks stained with a faint pink. It was understandable. Allura was realizing that Keith probably knew many things about her love life, past and future. That was too much power for one person. "You saw something, didn’t you?"

The heat grew in Keith. Those things weren’t his forte, and he definitely couldn’t lie to her. It would be in vain, she could see through him without problems.

"I don’t think it's is a good idea to tell you what I saw. I don’t want to alter your decisions and make everything worse." Fifty percent of that was true; fifty percent was Keith trying not to remember his visions of Allura and Lance.

"The visions of the quantum abyss show you facts, Keith. Maybe they do not happen the way you saw them, but they are almost always inevitable." The princess explained solemnly, but then she let out a sigh and return to her melancholic state. "... but I respect your decision, and I appreciate it. I have to think about ... Lance, and I have to do it by myself."

"I get it. But try not to burden yourself with that right now. You should rest."

Allura gave him a look full of tenderness and before Keith could begin to process what was happening he could feel the hand of the princess on his. Even after being stuck in a place where the time did crazy things, Keith had never experienced the feeling of the time actually stopping, until that moment. Allura's fingers stroked his hand and Keith had flashes of them kissing one starry night, sitting in front of his house. Allura was wearing civilian clothes, jeans and an oversized sweater; and Keith had returned to his everyday clothes. It wasn’t a passionate kiss, but it was sweet and warm. They were holding hands, and Allura's fingers caressed his just as she was doing in the present.

"I think you're right. I should go to sleep"

Keith blinked a few of times, trying to push away the visions and regain his composure. Meanwhile, Allura stood up, brushing off a lock of white hair from her face and taking a deep breath.

"Thanks Keith. For sharing these moments with me. I'm glad you're back."

"I'm glad too, princess." Keith replied, still trying to hide the blush on his cheeks.

Allura headed to her room, and before opening the door she turned one last time to wish him a good night and to give him a last kind smile, before disappearing.

Keith smiled to himself. All his worries had vanished, at least for a while, by the comforting presence of the princess; and the paladin found himself yawning for the first time that night. Apparently, even after all those years, Allura's smile still had the same effect on him.