Afterwards: when they've all been found and the Lions are safely back in their hangers, after an emotionally-charged reunion and once everyone has gone to sleep, huddled together on a mountain of blankets and pillows in the common room-
Afterwards, Shiro seeks out Allura.
He finds the princess sat at the top of the steps leading down into the centre of the room, arms wrapped around her knees as she watches the sleeping Paladins who lay draped over each other. It's reminiscent of how a guardian would stand over their ward: protective, and frightened by a threat that had come too close for comfort.
"Princess."
Allura blinks, thrown off from whatever thoughts had taken residence in her head, and she looks up with a smile.
"Shiro. You should be heading to bed, I'm sure you're exhausted."
His side twinges briefly in remembered pain of the Druid's wound.
Keith and he had barely survived the desolate planet the corrupt wormhole had sent them to, with the less-than-friendly inhabitants attacking them while they were at their weakest. Shiro's not sure he would have made it five feet beyond his Lion, if Keith hadn't been there with him.
But they're not on that barren planet anymore, and he's safe and healed up, united with his team.
With a soft huff, he lowers himself to sit on the steps beside Allura.
"You must be tired too," he murmurs. "Coran told me you hardly slept, when…when we were still lost."
Allura merely snorts and raises an eyebrow at him.
"Coran is a hypocrite, and so are you," she says, clicking her tongue in amusement.
Of course, they all are. The entire team is made up of self-sacrificing idiots who are entirely too concerned with saving each other instead of themselves.
"Caught me there," Shiro sighs.
She lets out a little chuckle, then turns back towards the four Paladins. Neither of them speaks for a few minutes, content to sit in silence.
Shiro is almost loath to break it.
"I wanted to ask you something, Princess."
Allura straightens up a little, raising her head to look at him again.
"What is it?"
Everything. Nothing.
"Back when we were on that Galra cruiser, you saved my life."
"Yes…? And you saved mine in retu-"
"You put yourself in danger."
Allura frowns and the air around them seems to shift faintly, charged with the tendrils of irritation he could already feel gathering.
"Shiro, you know we had no-"
"You should have escaped, and left me behind."
Allura stops short and Shiro is entertained with the brief sight of her gobsmacked face before she reins it in. Her eyebrows furrow and she glares him, wholly unamused.
"I couldn't have done that and you know it. You're the Black Paladin, the only-"
"Well, you're the Princess of Altea, the only one who can operate the Castle Ship-"
"Yes, but-"
"And you're the only one who knows anything about the Galran Empire besides Coran-"
"Stop interrupting me!" Allura protests hotly, then winces as they both belatedly remember that they are not alone.
They watch with bated breath as Pidge makes a low grunting noise and twists over onto her side, snuggling into the pile of Hunk-Keith-Lance. She settles in with another grunt, and goes right back to sleep. Lance's arm curls sleepily around her shoulders, pulling her in closer.
Shiro and Allura wait for more movement, and sigh in unison when the sleeping Paladins remain still.
"Sorry," she says, lowering her voice sheepishly. Shiro rolls his eyes, but before he can speak, Allura grabs his wrist, turning towards him.
"Listen Shiro," she says, and she sounds so solemn that Shiro can't bring himself to disrupt her again.
"Whatever happened on the ship, I couldn't have let you fall back into Galran hands. Not after you had just escaped, not after all you have already faced."
Shiro stares at her for a very long moment, long enough to make her shift nervously.
"What?" she asks, letting go of his hand slowly. "What is it?"
He shakes his head in wonder, still trying to process that she had-
"You were worried about that?"
Allura's eyes soften a little, the sharp blue melded into deep cobalt under the dimmed lights of the ship.
"Shiro...I don't know how long you were with them, nor do I know much of what may have happened to you, beyond the little you've told us. But I have first-hand experience of Zarkon's courtesy and I know he is anything but merciful."
What?
The princess's gaze is fixed on the younger Paladins when she speaks, and her voice comes out quiet and strained.
"Zarkon has captured me before, Shiro. It was a few years ba-…well. It was ten thousand years back," she amends bitterly, and Shiro's heart aches for her.
"It was much before all of this, before our loss in the war became so inevitable that my father felt the need to send me and Coran into the cryo-replenishers."
She pauses for a moment, fists clenching, then nods sharply as though reaching a decision. Her hands go to the sleeves of her dress, motions jerky and slow, and then she's rolling the cloth up and revealing-
Blotchy skin, slightly paler than the rest of her, shining, as old burn scars tend to do. There are thick pink lines unevenly etched around her wrists, and suddenly Shiro imagines ropes of plasma, fire and pain, imagines handcuffs cutting into flesh and bone, inflicting pain and rendering one useless, unable to fight.
"These are just one of the mementos I have of that time. I am simply fortunate to be of a race that can hide the rest." Allura's voice is muted as she pushes her sleeves back down hurriedly. She's not looking at him at all.
Something cold yet blistering opens wide inside him as he stares at her.
He forgets sometimes that Allura is a princess in all the ways that no one would wish to be. That she is a princess born into happiness but brought up alongside a war, that she is a princess who had once known her enemy as a favored guest in her kingdom.
He forgets sometimes that her strength is hard-won and bitter, and entirely her own.
Allura was…young. Perhaps Altean years were different from human years, but she was hardly any older than them, really.
And here, she was essentially admitting to having been a prisoner, as a mere child, to the whims of someone like Zarkon.
"I know what you're thinking," Allura is saying, as he regains his focus. "But I was not there for but a few months. The Yellow Paladin of the time, my father, found me and saved me."
Her smile is fond even as she recalls what must have been the rescue of a terrified young child, imprisoned and tortured by the Black Paladin of old, the man one who was once a friend, who was supposed to be a protector.
And even after this, she'd sacrificed herself to stay behind. For him. For Voltron. For her peace of mind, perhaps.
The revelation that King Alfor had in fact been the Yellow Paladin nearly pales in comparison to everything else Allura has said.
With all the intensity of the sun, Shiro hates it. He can't stand how serene she seems; then, he looks at her properly and he sees the signs. Sweat collects on her forehead even with the Castle's regulated climate, and her body is shaking with the slightest of tremors.
"Did they hurt you?" he asks sharply, harshly, because he has to know, he has to- "Allura, did they hurt you this time, when you were ther-"
"No! No, there was no time, Hunk had come to my rescue before they could. You all did."
Shiro exhales raggedly, skin crawling and feeling too wound up to feel any relief, fury burning in his stomach, at himself, at Zarkon, at Allura.
He hasn't been this angry in what feels like eons, especially not in front of his team.
"If you knew, if you've...the Galra have captured you before, why would you let yourself fall into their hands again?"
It's only sheer practice, his mind-set as the former Golden Boy of the Garrison, and his tenacious need to claw at his identity and stay separate from being the Champion of the Arena (the monster of the Arena) that keep him glued to his seat, waiting for Allura to explain herself.
Allura fixes him with a steely look which almost makes him flinch.
"Because Shiro," she says, firmly. "Because being the Princess of Altea with my life-force tied to the Lions means Zarkon cannot afford to kill me without losing a significant piece in his game, and he and I both know it. For you though, I cannot guarantee what he would have done."
"Princess, there are worse things than mere dea-"
"I know that very well Shiro. I knew well what the outcome of this war could be, ten thousand years ago or not, and I have been prepared for any outcome, while you were thrown in with no warning."
She moves forward, deceptively delicate hands clamping on to his shoulders with that strength that still manages to take him by surprise, even now. Knowing what lies beneath the cloth at her wrists, knowing the true strength of the young Princess, Shiro is helpless to do anything but be swept in the torrent of her determined words.
"I did what I had to, because you are the Black Paladin of Voltron and because we need you to command the Black Lion and ensure Zarkon never gets his hands on it again, that you all live another day to bring him down! But first and foremost, Shiro, it's because you are my friend, and because I can take it. For all of you, for all that you do for me and the countless alien species Zarkon has harmed, I can take that burden."
There's a lump in his throat when Shiro swallows. He grabs on tight to the hands on his shoulders, pressing into them as he shuts his eyes. Allura is tactful for once and remains quiet, allowing him the chance to gather himself.
He can't…he doesn't want to accept her words, no matter how true they may ring, because there's a sense of wrongness to them that goes against everything he has known.
Somewhere between stepping on to the Blue Lion that first time and making it back into the arms of his team after the wormhole had torn them apart...they had all become a lot closer than he had ever expected.
They were family, his team. And that included Allura and Coran, these strange aliens who depended on them to take down the Galran Empire, but also saw them as so much more than weapons. The Alteans pushed the team to improve themselves, fed them, cared for their wounds, physical and otherwise. And they threw themselves unflinchingly into danger to protect them.
Shiro opens his eyes, the image in his vision briefly blurring before clarifying into Allura's face again, her forehead creased with lines of worry.
The dark fury in him crumbles as fast as it had formed, in the wake of something much more important.
He breathes slowly, shoving aside the ire and finally gives her a rather pathetic smile, the best he can manage at the moment.
Allura's eyes flit over him as she regards him carefully, and he realizes that he's still got a death grip on her hands. He releases them immediately, panic brewing at the thought that he's hurt her with his prosthetic, but she removes her hands from his shoulders without a word and he's reminded once again of her super alien strength. Right.
"Better now?" she asks him, and he sighs.
There's no other way out except talking it through.
"Allura...I don't think I'll understand your views nor can I agree with them. I was raised with a very different set of principles and abandoning them now is… impossible for me. But before I say anymore, I've just realized I never thanked you for saving my life…so, thank you."
The Princess stares at him for a moment, expression sliding smoothly into gentle understanding.
"I believe Lance would say...no problem?" Her lips curl up into a mischievous smirk as she says it.
It's not really funny, but Shiro still laughs and Allura hastily shushes him when Hunk lets out a groan of irritation from across the room.
The good humour steadies him, as though something out of alignment within him had finally been pushed into its rightful place. He clears his throat as the silence settles again.
"On the other hand, I want to propose an idea which I hope you'll find more little more agreeable. How about, next time, we do our best and ensure that we all get out. No one left behind." He suggests, jauntily raising an eyebrow at her.
Allura grins, crossing her arms across her chest.
"Well, then I have a counter proposal. How about, next time, there be no unfavourable 'next time'?" she asks, and while she's still smiling, there's a glint in her eyes that tells him she's absolutely serious.
It feels good, makes more sense, when they're together on this. No talk of sacrifices or the greater good (a motto the Garrison had often espoused, he remembers now); it's just them, conspiring to keep everyone safe.
He gives her a decisive nod and solidifies it in his own mind.
"I like that plan a lot better, yeah."
Next time, they would be prepared.
Next time, Zarkon would be scrambling to keep a foothold on his empire and he would fail.
Next time, they would win.
Sudden movement from the side makes them both turn as Keith sits up, hair sticking up in messy tufts.
"Whatever you two are talking about, can it wait?" his voice is hoarser than usual in the clutches of sleepiness. "Come on, sleep already."
Various noises of agreement drift up from the pile of Paladins and Keith pats the area beside him as he flops back, squirming into Hunk's side.
Shiro and Allura burst into quiet laughter, unable to help themselves.
Keith mutters something vaguely mutinous and Shiro gathers himself and stands, staggering a little as exhaustion and the full weight of the past few days makes itself known.
He extends a hand to Allura and pulls her up. Before he can talk himself out of it, he quirks his head hopefully at the make-shift bed and lets himself ask.
"Join us?"
Allura gives him a bright smile.
"Gladly."