This is a gen piece originally written for the Voltron fic zine Aphelion in 2017

It's a slight AU for the end of episode 2x7 Space Mall and is rated T for injuries

Remains of the Day

By sapphireswimming

Shiro groaned as light filtered through his flickering eyelids— and the fact that he was alive to open them surprised him more than anything.

Hazy purple-white light lingered around the edges of his vision, and he could almost feel Zarkon's iron grip still tightening around his throat, but he was alive and he had escaped. The Black Lion had made its decision on the battlefield, and it had chosen him over its paladin of ten thousand years.

Wearily smiling his thanks, Shiro then turned his attention toward the control panel, hoping to find a clear way to retrace their steps back to the Castle of Lions. Before he could begin to maneuver through the empty stretches of space that separated them from the rest of their team, however, the asteroids surrounding them vanished.

The rocky wasteland that now surrounded Zarkon's once-home planet had been replaced by a wonderfully familiar sight—the safety of the Castle's empty hangar.

Adrenaline drained suddenly through every nerve in Shiro's body, leaving him shaking in the aftermath of his escape from the leader of the Galran Empire.

In its place was gratefulness that he would never be able to voice adequately, although he knew that the Black Lion would feel it loud and clear over their new, stronger connection.

"We never left," Shiro breathed with relief, only to discover that his throat felt so raw and abused that speaking even that much was painful.

He swallowed tentatively, feeling how his muscles pulled and pinched with each breath around what had to have been at least bruised ribs. As the next breath hitched in his chest, setting off a sharp series of spasms, he began to suspect that at least one of them had been cracked when Zarkon blasted him into the ground.

Death, it seemed, was not the only consequence of battle to cross over from the astral plane into this one.

Before attempting anything else, he needed to triage.

Shiro raised his human hand, intending to probe gently around the base of his neck, but as soon as his fingers brushed against the controls, they flared to life with indescribable pain. It speared up his arm, radiating through every nerve and ringing through every bone in the entire left side of his body.

The edges of his vision ran white and he pitched forward, mouth open in a scream that reverberated through the polished surfaces around the cramped cockpit.

Shiro curled in on himself, trying to minimize all movements as he grit his teeth and tried to ride through the waves of unexpected agony. It left him gasping, with tears he didn't even know he'd shed streaming down his cheeks.

It was a long minute before the pain subsided enough for him to start thinking clearly again, and several more before he chanced looking at his left hand.

When he finally glanced down, it was to see the fingers splayed out in unnatural angles, bent in every direction. He stared at them in detached horror as his brain tried to process what it was seeing. The hand was mangled; it had been all but crushed.

Shiro was breathing quickly now— nearly hyperventilating— even though each micro movement sent more searing pain up his arm and throat and chest. The fuzzy feeling of detachment quickly faded as the pain forced it out and made him face the reality of his situation.

Zarkon must have broken every bone in his hand. They were never meant to go in so many different directions, but he'd seen this before—this was exactly what had happened before—

And there was the smash of bones and the roar of the crowd, followed by bright floodlights and long purple-shadowed hallways— creaking straps tightening around his body, leaving him vulnerable and helpless as hulking shapes loomed over—

There was pain and fear and hopelessness and Shiro desperately, blindly pushed them away, trying not to give into the panic.

He had escaped from the Galra. He had escaped from Zarkon. He knew that, and he grasped these truths desperately as he tried not to lose himself in the rush of memories.

He was safe, here in the Castle of Lions, and Princess Allura and Coran and the other paladins of Voltron were just a few hallways away. He was safe. He wasn't there, he was safe.

He was safe, but even if Zarkon could not follow him here, Shiro could not afford to give into the terror that sat just at the edge of his consciousness, threatening to overrun him entirely.

His metal hand pulled at his hair as he tried to bring himself back down from that edge of hysteria and panic, tried to ground himself and control his breathing enough to get the oxygen he needed through each rasping breath in and out.

He needed— to calm down— he needed to calm down, and just take one step at a time. He could do this.

He just needed to get to the hallway. Needed to get out of his lion. Just needed to keep breathing until he got back to the others and then—

It wouldn't be that hard. All he needed to do was simply walk down a few hallways. It shouldn't be that difficult after surviving a one-on-one fight with Zarkon.

He'd been through worse.

After some thought, Shiro decided that the first step was to stand up. That was easier said than done, however, as he found once he pushed up on the console with his prosthetic arm. The world, already coming to him from a hazy distance, swayed dangerously by the time he got to his feet.

He'd only managed to take a few halting steps toward the door before his vision disappeared and his brain began spiraling up out of his skull.

All sense of direction vanished. He didn't know which way was up or down and, if he managed to put out a hand to steady himself, it didn't catch hold of anything.

Shiro toppled heavily to his knees on the floor of the cockpit, only coming to a stop when his mechanical hand clanged against the ground hard enough to reverberate through his entire body.

It was all he could do to breathe.

Shiro's head was just as heavy as his body and his metal arm, and it felt like it was being dragged down by forces he could never hope to combat. He needed help just to stay upright until the world centered around him again, so he leaned over to rest against a wall that wasn't there.

He didn't remember falling to the ground, but the next thing he was aware of was blinking at a strange shape in front of him that eventually materialized into the support to the control panel. The floor was surprisingly smooth and comfortable beneath him and he could have gone to sleep right then and there if he'd closed his eyes— his mind would be gone in a moment.

But he needed to stay awake, needed to—

He blinked harder, desperate to hold onto consciousness, and when Shiro came back to himself, it was quiet and still.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, Shiro pushed up slowly with his metal hand, careful not to overcompensate for gravity and topple onto the other side. He was back on his knees, but bruised, battered, and utterly drained.

The door to the hangar might as well have been a mile away, with his body this heavy and his head this light. The top of his brain tingled, ready to black out as soon as he gave himself permission, but he forced it back, pulled oxygen into his lungs, and blinked repeatedly until he could see clearly again.

He had to crane his neck up to find the control panel above him—dull and lifeless at the front of the cockpit—but after getting a hand underneath him, and pulling himself up the chair he had crashed beneath, he was more or less vertical.

He breathed shallowly, through his nose. In order to get back to the others, he needed to stay upright, and he needed to stay lucid.

Stumbling out of the Black Lion, Shiro's right hand clamped firmly to the metal doorway as his feet scrambled for purchase on the hangar floor.

He'd taken the first steps, and now he just needed to cross the room and the long hallway to get back to the heart of the Castle. Panting, he tried to stare down the distance between him and the rest of his team through sheer force of will.

He could do this.

Patience—

Patience yields— focus.

Somehow, Shiro crossed the floor, and all but fell against the wall for support once he reached the beginning of the corridor.

Everything hurt. His legs were trembling and his arm throbbed with the smallest shift as the bones inside his arm grated and ground against each other in ways they were never meant to move.

He wondered if there was any possible way that they could fix this, and quickly realized that he already knew the answer. There was nothing to be done when bones were fractured, were splintered.

The most talented of druids in the Galran Empire hadn't had any choice but to cut off his right hand, and so he couldn't expect the Alteans, who had been in stasis for the past ten thousand years, to have better options.

They'd have to amputate this one too.

Shiro drew in a shaky breath at the thought, and then let out a funny, thin sort of laugh as he stared down at the mangled fingers.

One Galra arm, one Altean, and he was growing less and less human every day—

Shiro blinked against the white and blue of the Castle's lights and the black of the void that waited to fill his brain somewhere behind his eyes.

Maybe he should just stay here, and let everyone else come find him. He'd done enough just getting this far—

But—he had to keep going. He had to—

Holding onto the wall for support, Shiro continued making his way slowly down the hallway. The door was visible in the distance, but didn't seem to get any nearer, no matter how long he stumbled forward.

His steps were small, unsteady, and his feet trailed behind him like they'd been dipped in lead but Shiro pressed on, knowing that each step had to be taking him that much closer to his destination.

Finally, the door was nearly within reach. A few more steps and he would be there.

Voices filtered through the doorway as he reached forward to trigger the mechanism that would slide it open. The voices were faint and still too muffled for him to hear, but knowing his team was on the other side was enough for the relief of reaching his destination overwhelm him.

Although, not that he was here, Shiro wasn't sure that he wanted to rejoin the others— at least not yet. Each moment he stayed here on the other side of the door was another moment he could live with a human arm.

Sure, it was shattered beyond repair, but he still wanted one, just one of them, and was that really so much to ask, after everything he'd been through? He couldn't—

The door hissed open, and Shiro caught himself against the doorframe. He felt like he was about to fall over, but he had rejoined the others now and there was no turning back. Maybe if he pulled himself together enough—

Everyone was in the room, so Shiro rallied as much as he could before they could notice how badly he was faring.

Coran was talking, excitedly, he thought, from the waving hands, although the scattered words he caught didn't seem to come together to connect to anything.

As Shiro slowly and painfully eased himself through the doorway to lean against the doorjamb, Allura turned to look at him over her shoulder. "Oh, there you are, Shiro. What did you do," she laughed, and it took a momentous effort to hear each word she said through the fog swirling around his head. Perhaps he wasn't doing so well after all. "Take a nap?"

It took too long for the words to percolate through his brain. He grinned as wide as he could—it was all he could manage at the moment— and hoped that would be answer enough.

As Allura stopped and spun around to face him directly, face pinched in concern, he realized that it hadn't worked the way he'd intended.

Swallowing heavily, Shiro desperately tried to kick his brain into gear quickly enough to think of something to say that would assuage any worries before they were voiced. "Not exactly," he croaked, and tried not to wince when it sounded strained even to his own ears.

Instantly, the room went quiet. Pidge and Lance stopped talking about the oversized glove in Coran's hands. Hunk and Keith honed in on him, searching for signs that he was not at his best. They found some almost immediately— Keith's drawn eyebrows and Hunk's sharp intake of breath were clear despite the haze surrounding everything in the room.

He must really look terrible.

Even the mice had trilled nervously as they perched on Allura's shoulder and stared in his direction.

No one seemed to know how to react, and they stood frozen in place as he blinked at them. Even that was starting to become difficult, and the figures ahead of him blurred instead of becoming clearer.

Pidge was the first person to break the heavy silence. "Shiro?" she asked, tentatively.

Shiro wasn't sure how to respond. He couldn't think of anything to say that would convince everyone that he was fine, not with the way the world had started becoming fuzzier. The cloud in his brain was getting thicker, and he was starting to shake. It was nearly all he could do to stay upright.

"Uh, you… don't look too good," Hunk ventured, hands nervously clasping in front of him.

Finally, Keith pushed through the huddle and stormed forward, all temper and concern. "What happened?" he demanded, voice sharp as he walked up to the door. He stopped inches away from Shiro, staring wide-eyed at his throat and forehead, where there must have been an injury Shiro hadn't even realized he'd sustained. "What—"

Without warning, the room suddenly pitched sideways and Shiro began to fall. There were exclamations of alarm from his teammates who ran forward as he slid down the doorjamb and through Keith's hastily extended arms.

Shiro didn't manage to catch himself with a wildly flailing metal arm and he hit the ground hard. Despite his best efforts, his left hand smacked into the floor with a sickening sound and it slid sideways, bone grating against bone.

Immediately, his vision whited out. Shiro lost all sense of direction or thought or any feeling that was not unendurable unending pain.

His chest must have been punched out through his spine, because he couldn't breathe, couldn't make his lungs inhale any of the oxygen he knew was all around him.

He tumbled forward, barely supporting himself on a trembling shoulder, as he retched bile onto the floor before he even knew what he was doing.

His vision returned slowly after that, in pinpricks of white and red and black. The world resolved again, around the fire in his arm, and the hovering faces of the rest of his team, kneeled around him with hands outstretched.

"—Shiro?"

"Are you okay?"

"Are we in danger?" Allura asked, drawing his attention back to the present for the first time. He stared up at her wide-eyed and tried to understand what she was saying. "How did this happen to you? Is the Castle under attack?"

He shook his head a fraction of an inch, but it was enough.

"What happened?" Keith asked again, now that their immediate safety was assured. "Shiro, what—"

Shiro didn't respond, concentrating all of his effort on breathing instead.

"What hurts?" Pidge asked instead, fingers flying across her terminal, ready to make an immediate diagnosis of the severity of his wounds.

Shiro drew a long, shaking breath.

"Okay, here, let's get you up," Hunk suggested, voice calm and low and soothing. But as he reached for Shiro's arm, every injury flared back to life and Shiro cried out, a long keening sound that came out of the back of his throat.

Lance stepped in to help Hunk settle Shiro back against the wall. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, Hunk, hold on, you can't just do that," he said.

"Sorry," Hunk apologized as he immediately took a few steps back. "Sorry, Shiro, I— sorry…"

"'sokay," Shiro whispered, and tried for a smile.

Coran knelt down beside him, examining him closely, but carefully not touching anything. It didn't take him long to find the mess that was Shiro's left arm. "Oh no," he said, voice belying the understatement of the century. "This doesn't look good. What happened, Shiro?"

The next breath caught in his throat, but Shiro leaned his head back against the door frame and tried not to black out. "'mfine," he whispered again, knowing that nobody believed him but desperate not to give up his other hand just yet.

Coran was having none of it. "No, you're not fine, Shiro," he countered. "What happened to your hand? How did this happen?"

Shiro closed his eyes and took a minute to just breathe before the debriefing, "Zarkon."

"Zarkon?" Allura repeated in alarm as her head whipped up to stare straight at him. "What do you mean, Zarkon? How is that possible? I- I thought you were just going to bond with your Lion!"

"Did," Shiro explained haltingly as he found breath. "Took me to… astral plane. Zarkon's… been tracking through… the Black Lion. Found me. We fought…"

"Shiro—!"

"M'fine," he rasped, before swallowing and restating this more firmly, "I'm… fine. I just—" he stared helplessly at his left before his gaze skittered away again. "My hand," he choked, voice ready to break.

No one looked like they believed he was fine in any sense of the word.

Lance leaned in to peer at the deep angry finger-shaped welts around Shiro's throat, already beginning to bruise, and the nasty scrape sluggishly oozing across his forehead.

"You really don't look too hot, Shiro," he said finally.

"'Fine," Shiro said shortly. "Now we know… tracking. Not Keith, or Allura, or Blades… of Marmora…"

"Fine, that's wonderful, Shiro," Allura said agreed, voice tight, "But right now we need to take care of your hand."

His breathing became more strained. "Don't—"

"Shiro," Keith cut in sharply. "Is Zarkon actively pursuing us? Does he know where we are?"

"No," he finally admitted.

"Right, well then our first priority is getting you taken care of," Allura decided. Everyone nodded their agreement behind her. "We have to…" she trailed off as she counted his visible injuries, coming to linger on his mangled fingers. "Your arm…"

Everyone stared at Shiro in concern when he didn't reply. His eyes darted around the room before he swallowed heavily and slumped against the doorframe.

"Okay," he finally whispered, the protest finally draining out of him.

"Alright, you heard him," Coran said, briskly slipping off to the side as Hunk and Lance and Keith all moved forward to help Shiro up from the floor.

It was awkward, trying to find places to take Shiro's weight that wouldn't hurt him further, and he was so shaky on his feet that it became clear he would be of little help when they started moving.

Once he was standing, they decided the easiest thing would be for him to sling his good arm around someone's shoulder to let them take the bulk of his weight. Shiro had no input into the discussion—it was taking most of his concentration to keep the room from sliding out from beneath him.

After a lot of finagling and a near-silent argument between Keith and Lance about which of them was strong and tall enough to support Shiro across the Castle, Hunk managed to step in and position himself on Shiro's right. He gently pulled Shiro's metal arm around his shoulder and didn't say a word when it clamped around his upper arm in a death grip.

The position put as little stress on Shiro's bad arm as possible, but it still clearly pulled on his back and ribs and throat.

"Sorry, Shiro, but I think this is the best we can do," Hunk apologized.

Shiro just nodded tightly in response, head hanging low.

"Okay, okay, this way," Coran said, leading the sorry parade out of the room and down the long corridors of the Castle.

It was slow and painful progress as Shiro limped along to Hunk's small, steady steps. The rest of the team hovered behind them, ready to catch Shiro if needed. Hunk was all patience, though, and didn't let him fall.

When Shiro started flagging, he stopped to let them rest.

"Just a little bit further, Shiro," Allura said.

"Yeah, you're almost there," Lance added, although the encouragement didn't seem to help.

Shiro was becoming more stiff and ungainly as they went. His breathing was increasingly more labored, and more than once, he stumbled and threatened to topple over completely.

Keith stared at the pair in concern. "You okay, Hunk?" he asked, quietly, during a stop in the hallway outside the regeneration pod chamber.

Hunk turned his head carefully, trying not to jostle Shiro any more than necessary. "Yeah, I'm good," he said, just as softly. "We're almost there anyway."

"Okay, uh, Pidge, how about you come with me?" Coran asked as he turned around to face the group. "I'm going to go on ahead and could use your help getting everything set up. You too, Princess."

The three of them quickly crossed the hallway and opened the door to the regeneration chamber. Lance watched them as Coran punched controls that pulled up a pod, hissing, out of the ground.

Shiro's head jerked up at the noise, but it fell again just as quickly.

"You ready to start moving again?" Hunk asked.

Shiro's answer was to clunkily slide a foot forward and Hunk moved alongside him, letting them shuffle the rest of the way at Shiro's pace.

They eventually made it into the room, where Coran's fingers were rapidly flying across the control panel as he programmed the regeneration pod, occasionally asking Pidge to check settings on the pod itself in clipped tones.

Allura immediately turned to lead them further into the room.

"Just a tick," she assured Shiro, although he did not react to the news. He looked pale and washed out as they stood waiting for the pod to be prepped.

"Coran's almost ready," she told the others instead. "Let's bring him over here, and then we'll need to get Shiro out of his armor so that we can work unhampered."

Before they'd even started moving, Shiro stumbled against Hunk and his face drained further. His scar stood out starkly against the pasty white of his face.

The paladins were quick to reassure him that they would take care of the heavy lifting.

"I've got you, Shiro," Hunk told him, carefully readjusting his weight around his shoulders and moving them the last few feet to the pod.

"Don't worry, Shiro," Keith said, as he and Lance started looking for the least painful way to unbuckle the armor.

"Yeah," Lance added, gently patting the chest piece as he ducked down to get a good look at the clasps. "We'll get this off of you in no time. You just hang out with Hunk and we'll take care of the rest."

Shiro was wheezing by the time his armor was piled on the floor.

"What's taking so long, Coran?" Keith asked impatiently as Shiro started slumping further off Hunk's shoulder. Hunk bent his knees and shifted his weight to ease him back up.

"It's a very delicate process," Coran called over his shoulder without looking away from the control panel. "And with so many broken bones in Shiro's hand, I need to set up at least ten different protocols so that we make sure we don't mess anything up."

Shiro's forehead furrowed in confusion and he squinted at Coran. "Wait…" he murmured. "You're not—?"

"Not what, Shiro?" Lance asked, when Shiro didn't continue.

"You can… fix this?" he asked.

Allura was taken aback for a moment, but then said, "Yes, of course we can."

When he still didn't look convinced, Hunk called over to Coran. "Hey, Coran, Shiro wants to know if you can fix him."

That made Coran chuckle. "What, we've had a pod that saved Lance after he was blown up, and another for you after you were hit with a glowing magical druid wound, and you don't think we can fix a broken arm and a few cracked ribs?"

But Shiro just stared.

"What did you think we were going to do, Shiro," he asked, laughing, "cut it off?"

When Shiro didn't answer right away, Coran turned to get a good look at him and immediately stopped laughing once he realized that that was exactly what he had been thinking.

Everyone else turned to stare at Shiro in horror as they quickly came to the same realization.

Shiro hitched a shoulder jerkily. "Don't… have the tech… on Earth," he rasped. "Galra didn't either," he added, holding up his mechanical arm, and everyone finally understood.

Allura and Coran shared an awful look.

"Shiro—" Allura began with infinite gentleness. "Shiro—" she began again, trying to figure out how to say this. "We have the technology. It exists. It's existed for tens of thousands of years. The Galra have it too," she said before she could think better of it.

"I mean," she hurried to say something else. "If your arm had been completely cut off, there really isn't anything we could have done about that, but…" she floundered, turning back to Coran. "But we'll have you as good as new in no time. You don't have to worry," she said, nearly tripping over herself to reassure him. "Right, Coran?"

"Right, Princess," he said, looking between her and Shiro. "It might take a little longer than last time, though, just because those tiny finger bones are always tricky and there are quite a lot of them. But no worries! We can set them all to rights again. No amputation necessary!"

Shiro blinked rapidly at the room at large, silent, but panting hard, and expression far too open for anyone's liking.

Fortunately, Coran was able to break the silence after plugging in the last of the commands and the face of the pod slid open.

"Okay, it's ready," he called, louder than necessary. "Time to get him in."

Hunk quietly led them over to the pod and then five pairs of hands helped maneuver Shiro inside.

"Gently, now, gently," Coran advised from his place in the center of the room.

Shiro winced and gasped as they folded him inside.

"Are you… are you okay in there?" Keith asked as they all stepped back.

Shiro nodded.

"Alright, Coran," Allura called.

"O-okay, then," Coran said, "initiating healing sequence for Shiro now."

The front panel of the regeneration pod slid closed at the press of a button, shutting Shiro off from his teammates on the other side of the glass. The panic that had initially overtaken him in the cockpit of the Black Lion drained away and left something even worse behind.

His arm—he never had to lose it.

The Galra could have just healed it instead of chopping it off—instead of experimenting—instead of stealing his humanity from him—

Emotion threatened to overwhelm Shiro just as much as the pain in his throat, his head, his ribs, and his shattered hand. He didn't have the energy to push back the tears that began welling up in his eyes anymore, so he closed them instead.

The strange coolness of the semi-liquid that filled the pod passed his knees, then his waist, and he could have sobbed in relief as it took his weight and relieved the pull of his strained muscles.

He eased back into it gratefully and finally gave into the layer of hazy darkness that had waited just out of eyesight since his return to the Castle.

Shiro let the unconsciousness wash over him and bonelessly slumped into the pod as the sequence began.