Voltron Legendary Defender - Shining Like the Stars [100] [Shklance]

[scriveyner]

Title: shining like the stars [100]
Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender
AU: slts
Characters/Pairing: Shiro/Keith/Lance, Team Voltron
Rating: NSFW/E
Length: 8655
Summary: Allura stood in the center of the med bay, her arms crossed and a stormy expression on her face, her back to the operating cryo replenisher. “As soon as it’s out of the pod, I want it off my ship.”




Allura stood in the center of the med bay, her arms crossed and a stormy expression on her face, her back to the operating cryo replenisher. “As soon as it’s out of the pod, I want it off my ship.”

It was Shiro who stood in opposition to her, his arms folded as well and still in his Paladin armor. He was absolutely exhausted, Keith could read it in his face as well as his posture. Lance had been all for shoving him into a cryo replenisher as well but Shiro flat-out turned them down. He didn’t want to go under unless he absolutely had to, and; well, Keith could relate. Besides, there wasn’t really anything wrong with him that a good night’s rest couldn’t fix. Lance was unsatisfied with this, though, and stood just behind Shiro at his elbow and was watching him like a hawk.

“He,” Shiro said pointedly, “was a prisoner. And he may have information that was can use. If nothing else, he might know why I was aboard that ship and be able to clear up some holes in my memory.”

“Prisoner or not, that,” Allura half-turned and jabbed her finger in the direction of the functioning pod, “is a Galra. Our enemy.”

Keith resisted the sudden, massive urge to shift forms. “I’m Galra too,” he reminded Allura icily, and she turned back to him. Some of the tightness in her face lessened, at that. “You didn’t want to put me out the airlock when you found out, either.”

“That is because I know you, Keith,” Allura said. “And I know that the Red Lion would never have taken you as its Paladin if your heart lay with the enemy.”

“Somehow,” Pidge muttered, standing in front of the replenisher with her datapad, “I don’t think his heart’s going to be with the Empire after they abandoned him to die like that.”

“Be that as it may,” Allura’s voice was cold. “I don’t want him loose on my ship.”

“He isn’t loose,” Lance pointed out. “He’s in a pod.”

Allura’s eyebrows twitched, and then her ears - Keith had never actually seen her this angry, it was kind of impressive. “I. Don’t. Care.”

“Allura,” Shiro said, and the way he said her name even made Keith want to snap to attention. He never addressed her as anything other than ‘Princess.’ Allura too was visibly startled for a quick moment, before her brows drew together once again. “This is your ship, yes. And Voltron is your father’s weapon. But we are a team, and as a team we reached an agreement that we would not turn away anyone in need. No matter who they are, or where they came from.”

Allura tilted her head away, jaw clenched tight, before she let out a long sigh and dropped her shoulders. “I don’t know which is worse,” she complained, still glaring off toward a wall. “The fact that you’re right, or the fact that you sound like my father.”

At that, Lance and Pidge both let out identical choked noises. Shiro sighed the resigned sigh of someone who was going to hear about that at a later time, in detail. “Fine,” Allura said after another moment of letting that hang in the air. “But only until he is healed, and out of the replenisher.”

“When that happens, we’ll revisit this,” Shiro said calmly.

Allura gave him another long, measured look, and then stalked past him regally. Lance watched her leave the med bay in a huff and then looked at Keith and shrugged. Shiro still held his shoulders tight, almost as if he were afraid to relax his stance. Keith wondered if he was worried that he wouldn’t be able to stay upright if he did. “Hey, Pidge,” Lance said, and Pidge tilted her head to indicate that she was listening. “Any reason why you can’t run that mind-dump memory matrix thing that Coran was using on Sendak on our new furry friend?”

Shiro flinched slightly at the mention of Sendak’s name, but Lance had a good point. “That would be a quick way to get the information we needed,” Keith said. “And then we can leave Verus on the next habitable planet without ever letting him out of the pod on the ship.”

“Oh, that’s cold, Keith,” Lance said. Keith shrugged.

“Allura isn’t wrong. He is an enemy. If we can pull his memories we can gauge his intentions, at least.”

“No go on that, I’m afraid,” Pidge said. “Remember when Alfor’s AI went sideways and almost put us into the heart of a neutron star about to collapse?” She wiggled her hand in the air at sideways. “It fried that part of the processor core. It’s non-essential ship functions and while Hunk and I are both getting real good at figuring out how to make the Altean tech go, even that is a bit beyond our scope at the moment.”

“So, we just have to wait, then,” Shiro said. “Any idea how long he’ll be under, Pidge?”

She shook her head again. “His vitals were poor. Like, I’m-not-sure-this-thing-is-still-alive poor. It could be a few days, but most likely it will be a few weeks.There’s no way to tell how well he’s going to respond to the pod’s treatment, either. But I’ve set an alarm in our system for when the pod decides that he’s done so we can manually release him, it won’t bring him out from under before then.”

“Sounds good to me,” Lance said. He wormed his hand under Shiro’s folded arms and hook his arm through at the elbow. Shiro looked down at Lance’s arm with a puzzled expression, and then looked at Lance. “In the meantime,” Lance said, and patted Shiro’s arm with his free hand like he was an old grandmother. “I need to put this guy to bed before he passes out and we have to drag him.”

Shiro smiled fondly at Lance. “You don’t have to turn into a mother hen,” he said, amused, but put up little resistance when Lance began to steer him toward the door.

“If you think this is me mother-hen-ing,” Lance said, “you better never get sick, mister.”

Shiro laughed at that, but even his laugh sounded worn down. He cast a glance to Keith before they left the room and Keith wanted to follow them, but he had something he needed to do, first.

“You all set in here, Pidge?” he asked, and Pidge tapped her datapad a few more times. The cryo replenisher beeped in reaction, and then the pod slowly retracted into the floor, its occupant slumbering safely within.

“Gotta say,” she said, “I don’t think the others are gonna be too happy about our new passenger either.” She sighed and then tapped the corner of her datapad against the palm of her other hand. “But Shiro’s right, too, and I hate it. How can he be so forgiving, with what the Galra have done to him?”

Almost as soon as the words were out of her mouth she looked at Keith in alarm, then touched the datapad to her mouth as well, as if to stop other words from escaping.

“He isn’t,” Keith said, neglecting the implication of her words intentionally. Pidge was blunt, so was he. Keith touched his throat with the fingers of one hand, the ghost of a hand still on it, and then made a fist. “He’s just being practical.”

“And what about all the other aliens on that cruiser? We’re just going to leave them?”

It was the same question he’d put to the Black Lion as they flew back to the Castleship; Lance had answered the comm because Shiro needed all of his concentration to pilot. It was Lance’s answer that he had now, but something about it still didn’t set right with him despite what he knew now. “Some things are just beyond saving.”

Pidge looked as unhappy with that as he was, but she was the one who has looked up kapili trees in the Castleship’s database. Apparently they were a carnivorous, symbiotic plant, and they thrived by infecting the local fauna with spores consumed from its fruit. The proteins in these spores attached to the neural stem of the host and … well, the aliens on board that ship weren’t so much people anymore than they were zombies. “Trust me on this one, Pidge. It’s bad.”

She nodded her head finally. “We’re going to stay put in system for a little while at least,” she said. “Since the star is dying, it’s throwing weird interference in the scanners, which is bad for us because we can’t get accurate out-of-system readings at the moment, but is also good for us because it means that we can’t be easily found in the distortion.” She stretched her arms over her head and yawned big. “At least with Shiro being wiped out it means that you three can’t keep the rest of us awake,” Pidge muttered, loud enough that Keith could hear as she hit the door.

Keith flushed at that, slightly. “The rooms are soundproof!”

“Not really,” Pidge called back, and the door closed behind her.

#

Keith changed out of his Paladin armor in the ready room, putting it back where it was supposed to go instead of in a haphazard pile like Lance had left his and Shiro’s. He could very easily see Lance just leaning in the door and dumping their armor for Coran to clean up later. Slightly irritated, Keith put away their armor as well and engaged the clean cycles, because he was stalling on returning to Shiro’s room and he wasn’t entirely sure why.

After lingering around the ready room he took a shower, quietly paranoid about having been in contact with a giant host organism that turned people into mild zombies, and scrubbed his hair more thoroughly than he had in a while. The article had specified that the kapili’s spores had to be ingested and it probably took more than an hour or two in its presence but there was no point in risking it.

Damp and hungry, he went in search of a snack and to his surprise found the galley empty. He could almost always find Hunk in the kitchen when he wasn’t tinkering on bits of the Castleship; and usually whenever Keith was in the mood for a snack Hunk would be there cheerfully working on something or the other. It was a little weird, but Keith fished around in the refrigeration unit until he came up with one of the protein drinks that Hunk had concocted for him and Shiro. They weren’t exactly the tastiest thing he’d ever had, but they had all the nutrients one needed and filled you up. Now curious about Hunk’s location, Keith wandered the halls with a straw in his protein drink and a towel around his neck.

Turned out that Hunk was in the last place he would ever think to check looking for Hunk, and that was the training deck. Traditionally, like Lance, Hunk avoided the training deck at all costs unless it was mandated team training; so Keith thought it quite unusual to find Hunk there. That is, until the doors actually opened and he walked in to find Hunk flat on his back on the boxing mat and Illianya straddling him.

Keith did an almost comical turn on his heel and immediately headed for the door. “SORRY,” he yelped. “I didn’t see anything!”

“Keith!” Hunk’s voice was slightly strangled. “Help!” He gargled for a moment on that syllable, and then Illianya started laughing and Keith cautiously peeked over his shoulder to see that she had slid off Hunk and was now lying on her side on the mat, arms around her stomach as she laughed. Hunk had sat up on his elbow, one hand rubbing his upper chest and looking offended.

“Uh,” Keith said, and turned fully around. “Am I … interrupting something?

“No,” Hunk said. “I bet wash duty for a month that she couldn’t keep me pinned.” He pointed an accusatory finger at Illianya. “Do you know how strong Alteans are? They’re stupid strong, that’s an unfair advantage, Illya, you have to disclose stuff like that before wagers are made…”

“Can I help it that I like watching you do the washing? It’s so fascinating.” Illianya sat up on her knees and kissed Hunk’s cheek, and then tweaked his ear. “You humans and your weird ugly ears,” she said, as Hunk turned a brilliant cherry tomato red.

“I am interrupting something,” Keith said.

“No, you’re not,” Hunk said and it came out so fast it was almost one word. “You’re definitely not interrupting anything nothing at all has been interrupted.” He did not stand up.

“Uh,” Keith said, and a voice in his head that sounded suspiciously like Lance told him the exact reason why Hunk wasn’t going to stand up and he wanted to strangle it, and possibly Lance as well for infecting him like this. “I was just looking for you to see if you’d try to go all-out on a meal for Shiro? I have a feeling that Shiro needs more than a single night’s sleep to get back up and running and you…” he shrugged, because often it was Coran who made their breakfasts and as a direct result they rarely ate breakfast … or maybe that was just Keith. “You make great food,” he finished lamely.

Now Hunk sat up on his knees and beamed at Keith, and then gestured excitedly. “Oh, man that’s awesome,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to do a big breakfast spread for a while, before we hit Eaphus Coran brought back some giant eggs that I froze after I made sure they weren’t, like, full of spiders or anything.”

‘Eggs full of spiders’ had not previously been on Keith’s rather exhaustive list of things to be worried about, but now it was highlighted, bolded, and underlined because apparently it was A Thing.

“Okay then,” Keith said, and waved his hand awkwardly, fully ignoring the sour look Illianya was giving him for putting a damper on their evening. “Thanks, Hunk. I owe you one.”

#

Lance was sitting on the floor in Shiro’s room, his back against the bed and Pidge’s stolen and long-since-given-up-for-gone headphones on his head. He had plugged the green headphones into his phone and he was squinting intently at the display when Keith returned to the room with a damp head and an empty drink container. Lance immediately put his finger against his lips, finished reading the line he was on and then darted a look up at Keith, who was smiling as he touched the spot on the wall that popped open to reveal laundry and dumped his damp towel down the chute.

Shiro was asleep on the bed behind Lance. He was out almost as soon as his head hit the pillow, and Lance knew that Shiro could be a light sleeper if the situation called for it, so he had done everything possible to minimize noise with the exception of actually leaving him alone to sleep. He took the headphones off his head gingerly and glanced back to Shiro to make sure that Keith’s entrance hadn’t disturbed him. His face was angled away, toward the inset wall, but his steady, slow breathing hadn’t been interrupted. “Shhhh,” Lance hissed at Keith, finger to his lips again.

Keith dropped his drink container in the bin. “He won’t wake up, Lance.” Keith wasn’t at normal volume despite that, but he wasn’t exactly speaking in a hushed whisper, either. “Not when he’s this exhausted. It’d take an act of god - or, well, Matt jumping on his bed hard enough to shift the mattress - to get him out of bed right now.”

Lance frowned at Keith, and at that reminder that Keith, Matt and Shiro had a small shared history that he wasn’t privy to. “Where have you been?” he asked, as Keith sat himself down next to Lance on the floor, stretching his arms over his head and yawning.

“Looking for Hunk,” he said. “I wanted to special order a big breakfast, Shiro’s gonna be famished when he finally wakes up.” He was still smiling, a soft smile that once might have seemed out of place on Keith, but Lance had learned that it meant he felt comfortable sharing that emotion with him. Lance smiled in return and leaned into Keith, so that their shoulders pressed together; and Keith tilted his head so it leaned against Lance’s.

“Was he bonking his girlfriend?” Lance asked, amused.

“Kind of?” Keith sounded unsure, and Lance flailed upright and stared at him. “I mean, I guess Illianya was bonking him if you want to get specific-”

Lance was trying to make a sound come out at a low volume and instead was making a sound not dissimilar to helium escaping from a balloon. Keith stared at him without comprehension before it clicked and he hissed, “they weren’t having sex, Lance!”

The helium noise died down a bit, until Keith added, “I think.”

Keith had to bite his fist to stop from actually laughing out loud as Lance whapped him in the shoulder repeatedly. He laughed hard, and Lance whacked him a few times more until it became obvious he wasn’t going to stop Keith from giggling like an idiot so Lance crossed his arms, stuck his chin down against his chest and muttered, “dude, at least we don’t have sex out where people could stumble upon us.”

Keith was still wheezing out the last of his muffled laughter. “Speak for yourself,” he said, and wiped his eyes. Lance stared at him, and Keith pointed right at his nose. “You sucked my dick in the hallway down by the Red Lion’s hangar. Allura caught us on camera.”

“Oh yeah,” Lance said, but didn’t sound ashamed. “I’d forgotten about that.” He wiggled his hips, lifting his butt off the ground suggestively. “I’m going to expect payment back on that with interest, you know.”

Keith tilted his head and regarded Lance for a moment, and then leaned into him again. “With interest?” he said softly, and his voice had pitched low enough that it sent a tingle down Lance’s back. He wet his lips, suddenly strangely nervous as Keith’s hand brushed his cheek, turning his face so that Keith could kiss him.

One of Lance’s hands made it to Keith’s plain tee shirt, gripping it and holding him close as they kept kissing, hungrily. Keith kept moving forward, leaning more and more into Lance’s space until suddenly Lance toppled over, having run out of room against the bed and falling backwards across the floor. He let out a little startled gasp and then covered his mouth guiltily, as Keith put his hand on Lance’s knee, laughing softly.

“Asshole,” Lance hissed, his face flushed from the heat that had crept up his neck. He shifted and tried to kick Keith, but Keith caught his flailing leg and then pulled off his shoe. Lance’s immediate reaction to that was to squirm like his life depended on it, because shoe removal meant foot tickling and like hell Lance was going to go down without a fight. However, Keith did nothing of the sort, although he did remove Lance’s sock. “What are you doing?” Lance was as quiet as he could be, and straining to make certain that Shiro’s breathing hadn’t changed tempo.

“Paying you back,” Keith said, as he caught Lance’s other foot and removed that shoe and sock as well. “With interest.”

Lance gaped at him as he leaned forward, catching the waist of Lance’s jeans with his fingers. He almost managed to get Lance’s pants down his hips before Lance caught his wrists with both hands and stared at him in horror. “Shiro is sleeping right there,” he hissed, and Keith smirked at him.

“Guess you’d better be quiet then,” he said, and shrugged off Lance’s hands.

#

Lance clamped both of his hands over his mouth to keep the sounds in, his eyes screwed tightly shut and his shirt rucked up his belly, Keith’s hand resting warm on his naked skin. His other hand was wrapped tight around the base of Lance’s cock, and the rest of it was in the wet furnace that was Keith’s mouth. And god, it felt so good, Lance’s eyes would be rolling back if he hadn’t closed them tight.

Keith was paying close attention to every aspect of what he was doing, tongue and fingers nimble. His free hand brushed over Lance’s stomach, adjusting his leg over Keith’s shoulder before drifting down lower to gain a better grip on Lance and pull him closer. Keith never once lifted his head or diverged from his mission, although his eyes were angled up, watching Lance as best he could as he took Lance to pieces with his mouth.

He paid close attention to Lance’s cock but that drifting hand skirted lower, and even with his hands clasped over his mouth a noise escaped when one of Keith’s fingers pressed inside him.

Keith lifted his head, Lance’s cock falling from his mouth with a slick pop. He was laughing again, damn him, and Lance opened his eyes to squint angrily at Keith. “That’s not fair,” he mouthed, because he didn’t trust his voice to cooperate with him and maintain a soft tone.

“I said, ‘with interest,’” Keith murmured, and turned his head to kiss the soft skin on the inside of Lance’s thigh. That sent a shiver up Lance’s spine and this time the noise did escape, a soft moan on the edge of a sigh. “If I get you sloppy enough we won’t need any lube.”

Lance flushed red to the tips of his ears and he squirmed as Keith kept a tight hold on him, not letting him get away. “If we’re gonna do that,” he said, “we need to go to your room, or my room, or something becAUSE-” Lance’s voice rose as Keith pushed two fingers into him this time, his eyes fixated on Lance’s face. Lance clapped his hand over his mouth and his eyes darted to the overhang of sheets, the only bit of the bed he could actually see now with his back on the floor.

“He won’t wake,” Keith assured him, and pressed his fingers deeper into Lance. Lance made another sound, this one entirely muffled, and he might have been swearing at Keith but Keith wasn’t going to lift Lance’s hand to find out. He might get bit, after all.

#

Lance pressed his forehead against the edge of the mattress, fingers digging into the sheets that were drooping over the edge and biting his lip hard enough that he had drawn blood. He wouldn’t lift his head to look up at Shiro’s sleeping form, sprawled on his stomach but facing the wall with one arm vanished under his pillow; he felt guilty enough as it was, looking at Shiro only made things worse. Then Keith’s hands settled on his hips again and Lance groaned before he could stop himself, because Keith was inside him now and the pressure and the friction were delicious.

Keith’s hand covered Lance’s where it remained on the very edge of the bed, and he kissed along the collar of Lance’s shirt, his mouth settling over Shiro’s claim mark. Lance wasn’t going to be able to keep it together if Keith kept that up, his body moving firmly against Lance’s; and before Lance could let a choked noise escape Keith’s hand covered his mouth, his fingers shoving in for Lance to suck on. That gave him something else to focus on as Keith pushed him over and through a climax he had been holding off on for far, far too long.

They laid on the floor together for a little while after, Keith slightly atop Lance, his hand scratching through the short hair on the back of Lance’s neck. Lance had his cheek on his arm, his eyes closed but not asleep and so relaxed he felt boneless. “Yeah, okay,” he said finally, unsure of where the voice was actually coming from because it didn’t sound like his at all, too hoarse. “I think that settles that particular debt.”

Keith laughed again, his voice a low, contented rumble that settled in Lance’s chest in a good way. Lance rolled his head so that he could look at Keith, and he was so happy and content it felt like he was going to burst. Keith’s fingers rubbed over the scar on the back of Lance’s neck, he’d bit over the claim mark when he had climaxed; both hands on Lance’s hips as he emptied himself inside. The skin felt raw now, but Lance didn’t jerk his head away. “My mark is gone,” Keith murmured, a little sad.

“Yeah,” Lance sighed. “I’m pretty sure the cryo replenisher took it out.” Keith’s rubbing fingers hesitated, and Lance let out a small laugh. “Stop worrying about it, Keith.”

“You said you were scared of me,” Keith’s fingers resumed their scratching, and Lance leaned into Keith’s hand, his eyes going closed. “Are you still?”

“Well, scared isn’t really the right word,” Lance said. “Maybe intimidated?” Keith made a curious sound at that and Lance opened one eye, then sighed dramatically. “Fine,” he said. “I’m only gonna say this once, and if you ever tell anyone I said it I’ll deny it to my dying day.” The expression on Keith’s face was perplexed, and slightly apprehensive, and now Lance couldn’t not tell him. “You’re freaking amazing, and strong, and you’ve been through so much shit and yeah you’re weird as hell but you’re incredible, man. I love you so much.” Lance buried his face in his arm, face blazing hot because the words had come out so fast that he couldn’t have stopped them if he wanted to. “I’m more scared I’m gonna lose you,” he mumbled into his hand, but then Keith’s hand slid up his scalp and pulled him up so that Keith could kiss him, his mouth desperate and face wet.

“Dude,” Lance gasped against his mouth and brought his free hand up to push his palm over Keith’s cheek. “Man, Keith, don’t cry, I don’t know what to do if you cry, I’m not equipped to handle that-!”

Keith wrapped his arms around Lance as Lance rolled over, burying his face against Lance’s and laughing as they kissed again, tears still tracking their way down Keith’s cheeks.

#

When Shiro woke, his mouth was dry and his eyes were gummy. He shifted slightly in bed and rolled over, to find Keith stretched out under the covers at the far edge of the bed. Keith wasn’t asleep; or if he had been Shiro’s movement had woken him before it woke Shiro himself. Shiro pressed the palm of his left hand against his eyes and swallowed. “How long was I out?” he asked, and his voice sounded like he’d gargled with gravel. He made a face and Keith laughed a little, and the sound was like home, to Shiro.

“Twenty-seven hours,” Keith said lazily, and Shiro shot straight up in the bed so fast it made him dizzy.

“What!?”

Keith pushed himself up on his hands and knees and caught Shiro’s shoulder as he tilted worryingly to one side, his hand on his forehead. “How could you let me sleep that long, I need to-” when he tried to move he was a little too woozy for that so he settled back into sitting upright. “Keith.”

“As Lance was saying, your battery was at 1%,” Keith said, and squeezed Shiro’s shoulder. “You needed it, Shiro. You wouldn’t let us stick you in the pod for a few hours, but your body takes care of itself.”

Shiro looked at him, and while Keith was sleep-tousled he didn’t look half as bedraggled as Shiro felt. He shrugged out from under Keith’s hand and instead slid his arm over Keith’s shoulders, pulling him in for a hug. Keith relaxed against him as Shiro buried his nose in the fluff of Keith’s hair. Keith’s scent was so thick and intoxicating, and he knew now what the strange tinge to it mean; he could smell the Galra on him even if he couldn’t see it and that fact didn’t make a hard knot form in his throat any longer. “Shiro?” Keith asked, his voice a little muffled against him, and Shiro loosened his grip on Keith, allowing him to lean back. “We need to talk.”

Were there any four such terribly loaded words? They froze in Shiro’s lungs and he actually, literally, stopped breathing for a few seconds. Keith’s eyes went wide at the expression he must be wearing and Keith sat up on his knees, both his hands on Shiro’s shoulder’s now. “No, no,” Keith said. “Not like that, Shiro, god no.”

“Then don’t say it like that!” Shiro said, sounding harsher than meant to but the tone just rolled off Keith and he didn’t bristle like Shiro was expecting him to.

“I’m sorry,” Keith said, and he meant it. “I didn’t mean to scare you like that, really I didn’t. I just meant….” now his tone dropped off, worryingly so. Keith sat back on his knees now, his butt on his heels and then, finally, he spoke. “Why did you save that Galra?”

Shiro’s brow furrowed. He didn’t quite understand the question. “He was being held unjustly,” he said. “If we left him, he would have been killed.”

“But he’s Galra,” Keith said, and his next words sat in Shiro’s gut like lead weight. “You hate the Galra.”

He could remember the tone, the rage, the absolute blind hatred - and the feeling of Keith’s neck under his hand, his yellow eyes wide and ears back and waiting for his fingers to close. Shiro rubbed his face with both hands, inhaled deeply and then looked at Keith. Keith was watching him silently, tousled black hair and no judgment in his violet eyes. Then he closed his eyes, and right there in Shiro’s bed, he changed.

When Keith opened his eyes again, it was a glimmer of gold between his lashes. He looked at Shiro with the same calm, open expression but now it came from a Galra face; his enemy. But it was also Keith’s face … and Shiro reached out his hand touched Keith’s face, sliding his palm across Keith’s cheek until he cradled Keith’s face in his hand, his thumb sliding across the soft fur.

“I can’t forgive them for what they did to me,” Shiro said, his voice soft. “And I can’t forgive them for what they did to you. But…” Keith’s eyes were riveting and intoxicating like this, a soft golden glow that spilled over his cheeks like the warmth of the sun. “Individuals are not the Empire,” he said finally. Keith closed his eyes and turned his face into Shiro’s hand, and Shiro slid his hand again, catching under Keith’s chin and turning his face up so that he could properly kiss him.

Had he yet kissed Keith like this, in his true form? He wasn’t certain, but Keith was hesitant so Shiro refused to be, both of his hands sliding to cup Keith’s face, to keep him there and continue to kiss him until he’d had enough. “I acted like an ass,” Shiro said when they parted finally, panting. Keith’s ears twitched and he frowned, and Shiro kept his hands on Keith’s face so that he couldn’t turn away. “In the memory core.”

“I should have told you a long time ago,” Keith said, and Shiro brushed his thumbs over Keith’s cheeks.

“None of that,” he said. “Let me apologize.”

“Don’t,” Keith said, and put his hands on Shiro’s wrists. He pulled Shiro’s hands from his face and looked at their hands for a moment, before sliding his hands down from Shiro’s wrists into his hands, so that their fingers could curl together. “I hate this part of myself,” he said. “I don’t think I ever won’t, so believe me, I understand. But I love you, and I just want to put this all behind us.”

Shiro brought Keith’s hands up to his face and kissed his knuckles, and Keith let out a small laugh, pulling one hand free. “Dork,” he said, and pushed Shiro’s shoulder. Shiro flopped back dramatically in the bed and yanked Keith with him, and Keith yelped in surprise as they went over.

“That’s me,” Shiro said as he kissed Keith again. “The dorkiest dork who ever lived.” Keith smacked his shoulder, his features melting back to human, but he kept kissing Shiro without complaint.

#

When Lance returned to the room, he was wearing a wet pair of swim trunks and a pleased expression. “Did you that Alteans don’t do bikinis?” he said as the door opened. “They just do like, swim trunks and don’t - oh for god’s sake.” He put both his hands on his hips, realized that the door was wide open and that anyone passing would be able to see in the room and then quickly stepped inside, shutting the door behind him and locking it.

Keith leaned back, arching his spine and pulling his shoulders back at the same time as he was riding Shiro slowly on the bed. “Shut up, Lance,” Keith panted, his hands braced on Shiro’s thighs.

“No, I’m not shutting up,” Lance said crossly, kicking his wet trunks across the floor and climbing into the bed with Keith. Shiro laughed breathlessly and leaned up into Lance’s kiss, moving his hand from Keith’s knee to Lance’s head.

“Did you get a show?” Shiro asked in amusement.

“Well, not quite as good as this one,” Lance sat on his knees and wet his lips. “But Illianya’s got a nice rack. I think Hunk drowned.” He tapped his fingers on his knee, watching the rise and fall of Keith’s hips, his eyes drawn to Keith’s dripping erection. “Matt didn’t seem to have any reaction, though, he must have seen them before.”

“Or he’s gay,” Keith said, the edge of a gasp in his voice.

“Matt’s not gay, and he’s into Allura,” Shiro said, and then pushed his hips up, making Keith shudder.

“Fuck,” Keith said, tilting his head back. “Fucking, knot me, Shiro….”

Lance smacked Shiro’s shoulder and he groaned, Lance looked appalled. “He is not into Allura,” he said, and Shiro said through gritted teeth, “a little occupied here, Lance…”

Lance climbed over Shiro’s legs, slotting himself behind Keith and feeling Keith go rigid at the press of Lance’s body against his back. “Lance,” Keith whined as Lance tucked his chin over Keith’s shoulder and looked down his chest. Lance stuck his tongue out between his lips at Shiro, and Shiro groaned again when Lance flattened his hands on Keith’s stomach.

“Lance, don’t be a dick,” Shiro said, rolling his hips and making Keith whine again.

“Yeah, yeah,” Lance kissed Keith’s shoulder as he took Keith’s cock in his hand, stroking him firmly. He grinned against Keith’s neck, nuzzling Shiro’s claim mark there and feeling Keith shudder. “I bet you can’t come hard enough to get it on Shiro’s face,” he murmured almost directly into Keith’s ear.

“Lance,” this time his name was a gasp on Keith’s lips, his free hand flailing back blindly until it smacked against the side of Lance’s head, fingers curling immediately to lock into his damp brown hair. Lance bit Keith’s shoulder lightly, stroking him firmly in time with the rolling thrusts from Shiro below them, as between the two of them they worked Keith into a shivering, dripping mess.

#

“So, what are we looking at?” Shiro asked, hands on his hips and standing at the fringe of the holographic field, head tilted up. A star map encompassed the entire hologram, and about half the visible systems were color-coded.

“Okay, so,” Pidge said, fingers flying over her keyboard. “This is a map of the Galra Empire that existed when Allura went into cryo-sleep ten thousand years ago.” She gestured at the portion of the star system that seemed to be encased in a violet misty nebula.

“That’s a lot of systems,” Lance said, leaned back against the railing, his arms crossed. “What do the other colors represent?”

“Pockets of resistance,” Allura said. She pointed to a much smaller pink cloud that seemed disparate, with violet all around it. “What remained of the Altean colonies,” she said, sadness tinging her voice. “Zarkon targeted those personally, after Altea was destroyed.”

“Well, that looks promising,” Hunk said, jabbing his finger at some of yellow and orange clouds, a decent distance from the violet one.

“Hold on to your butts,” Matt said, and Hunk groaned very loudly because that sounded like the opposite of promising.

Abruptly, the star field shrank as the violet miasma blossomed in size, overtaking all the visible quadrants and obliterating the other colors. “And this,” Pidge said grimly, “this is an updated map of the Galra Empire that I cribbed from the data downloaded from the Galra prison ship.”

“We’re boned,” Hunk said, his voice small.

“Hardly,” Illianya said. She pointed to small splashes of color that were almost completely obscured by the violet cloud demarcating the Empire’s territory. “These are pockets of resistance that we’ve identified as we’ve been hopping around the galaxy following the prison ships.”

“What are the purple lines?” Keith asked.

“Prison ships, and their known courses,” Pidge said. She pointed. “The star systems coded in yellow have research facilities, according to this data.” Keith’s frown grew more pronounced. “Blue are production facilities. Green are centers of commerce.”

“What’s silver?” Rian asked.

“Planets that have been destroyed,” Coran said.

There was a heavy silence at the amount of silver glittering throughout the map.

“The Galra Empire has had ten thousand years to spread like a cancer,” Allura said. “We are going to put an end to it, once and for all.” She pointed to a dark burst of violet, almost red. “This is where Zarkon is,” she said. “The heart of the Empire.”

“We’re not strong enough to take that on yet,” Shiro said. “We need to start with something smaller, like disrupting their trade lanes.”

“And destroying some shipyards,” Keith said. Shiro nodded his head.

Lance pointed to a pocket of blue near one corner of the map. “What’s that?” he said. “Allies?”

“Potential allies,” Pidge said. “It’s a system cluster that has been holding out against the Galra for a few decades, at least. There are recent reports about sending additional ships, and…” she grew quiet for a moment. “I think these are referring to what Hunk called ‘robeasts.’”

Lance stood up straight, arms folded. “If they’re still actively resisting, that means they have ships and resources, right?” He looked at Allura. “If we want to get this coalition off the ground, we should start by helping that system. We can barely defeat the robeasts as Voltron, they don’t stand a chance.”

Allura nodded her head in agreement with Lance’s assessment. “Shiro?” she said.

Shiro was silent for a little while, studying the map. Then he nodded his agreement. “I like Lance’s idea,” he said. “We should head that way and offer assistance. Princess, do you think we can wormhole there?”

“I wouldn’t go all in,” Matt said, and Shiro glanced at him. “We should do some intelligence gathering first, if they discovered that Pidge compromised the ship’s system and has this data-”

“Which they definitely did, because I left them a laughing virus,” Pidge said, and Matt high-fived her.

“Who knows how their troop movements have changed,” Shiro finished before Matt could.

“It’s just as well,” Coran said. “After those quick jumps the teludav is in poor order. We’ll just have to travel at warp instead, until we can get it serviced.”

“That would give us plenty of time to send some probes out and gauge the situation,” Illianya said.

“If the teludav is damaged, repairing that should be a priority as well,” Allura said with a frown.

“Not to worry, Princess,” Coran said. “I know just where to find some new lenses!”

Allura nodded her head. “That gives us about two weeks before we arrive in the,” she paused to look at the map, and Pidge said in a stage whisper, “Cartann.”

“Right,” Allura said. “The Cartann system.” She folded her arms and grinned sweetly at the rest of them. “We’ll be running drills and working on our teamwork until then, I don’t want another fiasco like Eaphus.”

Lance and Hunk audibly groaned, and Shiro somehow managed not to smile, although a smile was tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I agree, Princess.” He looked over them. “Team, suit up. We’re going to put those simulators in the Lions to good use.”

#

Lance let out a long, dragged-out moan as he stood under the hot, stuttering spray of the shower. Every single part of him ached, after Shiro had them running simulation drills they ran real drills in the training deck and Lance really couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this tired. He heard Keith chuckle from the stall beside him, and shot Keith a dirty look over the divider.

“Can’t keep up?” Keith said sweetly, his arms folded over the thin piece that kept the shower stalls separate and his chin resting atop his arms, watching Lance with a smirk.

“I can keep up with your ass, flyboy,” Lance retorted, scrubbing his hair roughly under the shower. “I can shoot your sword out of your hand without even singeing your glove, just try me.”

“Dude can you two like, not flirt in front of me?” Hunk said from Lance’s other side. He shut off his shower and wrapped a towel around himself.

“Lock your door,” Lance called in a sing-song voice after Hunk. Hunk flipped Lance off without looking at either of them, and Lance laughed, ducking his head under the spray again. The water felt cool against his skin and he suddenly shivered, feeling a tingle at the thought and recognizing, suddenly, the ache he’d been ignoring all day. Oh.

“Well, that’s a face,” Keith commented, and Lance winged his washcloth at Keith, nailing him right between the eyes. Keith yelped as the terrycloth dropped to the tile floor, and he scrubbed the suds out of his eyes. “What was that for!?”

“Shouldn’t you be cleaning up?” Lance said, and Keith glared at him. “I mean, I know I’m hot as hell and you can’t resist my fine brown ass but you’re just wasting water.”

Keith snorted, and slowly looked Lance up and down. “Your heat started,” he said, and Lance flushed red, ducking his head under the water.

“No shit,” he hissed at Keith. “With your fucky cycles it’s completely thrown me off mine! And I’m just about out of suppressants now too. That’s going to be fun.” He groaned.

“You’re claimed, though,” Keith drew patterns in the condensation on the divider between them. “I thought that helped.”

“Some,” Lance muttered. “The suppressants help with the physical stuff, too. That way I’m not, like, leaking constantly and just about ready to climb on any dick I see.”

“Well you can climb on my dick as much as you want.”

“Gee thanks Keith, I can hardly even tell you’re my boyfriend.” He rolled his eyes and Keith stuck out his tongue at Lance and they stared at each other for a moment, startled, before they both started laughing. Lance scrubbed his face under the water and turned toward Keith, who had shifted slightly and propped his chin in his hand. Lance wrapped his arms around himself self-consciously. “I wonder if Shiro could tell that my heat started early,” he said. “Especially during training. God, I bet Pidge was smelling me. Hunk is so lucky being a beta, he doesn’t have to deal with this shit.”

“I’m sure Shiro knows,” Keith said, with an absolute deadpan certainty in his voice that made Lance give him a strange look. “Right?”

Lance blinked and then almost jumped out of his skin when he felt a heavy, familiar hand settle on his hip. “Right,” Shiro murmured, burying his nose against the side of Lance’s neck. The sudden tension ran out of Lance like water down the drain and he leaned back into Shiro’s warm, welcoming embrace. Lance didn’t even have to look to check that he was naked, he could feel Shiro’s length pressed against his back, and he sighed as he felt it stiffen further.

“I thought we talked about the sex in the showers thing,” Lance said, as Shiro kissed his shoulder.

“Yeah,” Keith said. “I wasn’t listening.”

“Me either,” Shiro said.

Lance groaned as Shiro’s hand slid between his legs, and then he laughed despite himself. “You two are hopeless,” he said, as Keith joined them under the steady spray of the shower.