One hundred and nine beats per dobash.
Breath rate, eighteen.
Neural oscillation averaging thirty-six hertz.
The ranges were human.
If it was human, it was frightened.
If it was human, there were two people it could have been. Possibly three.
She would have wanted to see any of them.
Sometimes there were things more important than the team. Her friends called out to her when she ran ahead, but she didn't stop. "There's a human on this ship," she patched back to them.
The one living thing on the ship besides them.
It might not have been human. But she hadn't seen a scan like that from anything else.
It had to be.
Her breath began clouding her visor.
A distressed human. Injured, maybe. She wasn't going to wait for her team to get a grip on that while he bled out onto the floor.
When she burst into the room, she saw him. No apparent injury. Wearing strange clothes, but still with a human look. The noise made him flinch.
"Don't be scared," she said. "It's me!"
He was clutching a gun to his chest. He stepped back.
"Please," she said, hands up. "Who are you?"
"…Katie?"
She knew that voice. It was her brother.
He dropped the gun and he held her tight. She could feel that he was shaking.
"How can you be here?" he breathed. "How can you be okay?"
"I haven't been okay since you disappeared," she said into his shoulder.
"Neither have I."
She squeezed him tighter. He was there, he was real. She could practically count the beats of his heart, one hundred and nine per dobash.
"What did they do to you?" she asked.
"It doesn't matter. I finally found you."
"You mean I finally found YOU."
He laughed bitterly.
"I should have known you were too smart for them. I was so worried, Katie. I thought you were gone forever."
"Everyone said you were dead. I thought I'd never see you, either."
"It's okay, I'm here."
The tears were starting to come out of her eyes.
"You'd better not leave again."
"Not in a million years," Matt said. She could hear the smile in his voice.
"I don't think I've ever said enough," she began to choke on her words, "how much I love you."
"Don't worry, I know. I can't say it enough either."
Not everything had to be said in words. They held each other and they cried.
"I just can't believe you're okay," Matt said again. He ran his hand across her as though to convince himself she was real.
"Well I didn't think YOU'D survive either, you fuckhead," she sniffed.
"Hey, language," Matt chuckled. "You never know what aliens are listening."
"Well they can go quiznak themselves."
Matt laughed a bit harder.
"At least I can't be blamed for teaching you THAT one."
"Well, you were a good teacher anyway."
"Of course. My little sister deserves the best, after all."
"Too bad I only got YOU," she punched him.
"Oh, you little mongrel!"
He picked her up and hugged her even tighter.
It was like being home.
"But we can't stay here forever," she said as he put her down. "We've gotta get back to my team."
"Your team?"
"Yeah, I'm with Voltron!"
"What's that?"
"You're gonna fucking love it, we have giant combining cat robots."
"Wow. Yeah, I'm pretty jealous."
"And we're using them to liberate the universe!"
"What else would I expect from my little sister?" Matt smiled. Then his smile faded. "How did you escape?"
"Well. You know. On a cat robot."
Matt looked puzzled for a moment, then laughed.
"I've heard weirder stories."
"And you're gonna tell them all to me, right?" Pidge asked.
"Of course, when we get somewhere safe."
"This place isn't safe?"
"Not for long," Matt said. "Once somebody finds us."
"So what are you doing here, anyway?"
"Recon. I'm due back any moment."
"You're… working with the rebels, then?"
"Yeah. Sounds like you are, too."
"Sounds like we're on completely different factions."
"Well, TRUST ME, we'll need all the help we can get."
There were footsteps at the doorway. She could feel Matt tensing.
"Pidge," someone called. "You can't just run ahead like that."
It was Hunk. She motioned him in when he appeared.
"It's my brother," she said. "He's here!"
"Seriously?" Hunk said.
"I have never been more fucking serious."
Matt stuck out his hand.
"Matthew."
"So I've been told," Hunk smiled. "You know, you've been kind of dead celebrity back on Earth ever since the Kerberos mission."
"Kerberos mission?"
"Pidge, that was INCREDIBLY dangerous," scolded Allura, following in behind Hunk.
Pidge nearly had the wind knocked out of her when Matt pushed her away and snatched back the gun.
"Get the fuck away from her!" he pointed it at Allura.
"Matt, what are you DOING?"
"What am *I* doing? What is SHE doing?"
"She's with us, don't shoot!"
Matt's hand tightened around the gun. He didn't look angry anymore. He looked afraid.
"What do you MEAN she's with you? You're on HER side?"
Allura drew out her bayard.
"Who are you?"
"Don't hurt him!" Pidge cried.
"What is even going ON right now?" Hunk whimpered.
"You tell ME!" Matt snarled. He stepped closer to Allura, nearly ramming the gun into her chest. "Were these the terms of release?"
"I have no quiznakking idea what you're talking about!" Allura pushed the gun aside with her weapon.
He shoved it right back.
"I've shot plenty of Alteans and I'll shoot you too!"
"Wait, WHAT?" Pidge shouted.
"I don't care if your cock-choking empire NEVER falls, I'm taking back my sister!"
"What empire are you TALKING about?" Allura spat. "What ALTEANS are you talking about?"
"Please, Matt, put the gun down…"
Matt growled and pulled back.
"Is she making you say that?" he asked Pidge.
"No, she's our friend…"
"You've been shooting Alteans?" Hunk said.
"How ELSE are we going to save the universe?"
"Since when are there even Alteans to shoot?" Pidge said.
"They really hurt you, didn't they?" Matt said quietly.
They all jumped when someone else entered from across the way.
"Matthew! Hurry up! You were due back at the meeting point several dobashes ago!"
It was an alien they'd seen before.
"Slav? What are you doing here?"
Slav gave them a cursory glance.
"This is not the reality where I answer your pointless questions," he said.
"It's not pointless, we thought you were staying on Olkarion."
Slav scoffed.
"Only a complete fool would set foot on Olkarion. That would be an eighty-six percent chance of instant death."
"Since WHEN? Are the refugees okay?"
"Matthew, if the Altean is not attacking, we should leave these creatures and go."
"We can't," Matt said. "It's Katie. I found her."
She felt Slav's eyes on her as he cocked his head.
"You sure about that? There is only a 0.02 percent chance that she could have escaped safely."
"My sister is one in a million. Of course I'm sure."
She couldn't help feeling a little proud.
Slav still looked skeptical.
"Take your helmet off, human."
She was confused but she did it.
She felt Matt's hand reach behind her.
And then something changed.
She'd never seen him look that way before.
It was something beyond horror. It was someone who just heard the trap spring, someone who saw the putrefaction of everything he held sacred.
"Who are you?"
"What?"
"You're not MY Katie."
"Matt, what are you talking about?"
"I saw her. I saw what happened. What are you?"
"Matt, stop it, you're scaring me."
"Yeah, well you're scaring ME!" he snapped. He'd never yelled at her like that. "Are you a droid, are you a clone?"
"Neither," Slav said. "She must be from an alternate reality."
They stared at each other. It was something between familiarity and disdain.
"How?" Matt finally said. "How is that possible?"
"Well if you listened to half of the things I tell you…" Slav began.
"Never mind," Matt growled.
She was starting to feel sick. Like the trust inside her didn't know where it was. It looked like Matt was feeling the same way.
She didn't know him, but she'd been ready to tell him all her secrets. They were going to live together again, they would have taken on the universe.
It was the most disgusting feeling she had ever had.
"Matt…"
"It's Matthew."
Who the fuck was this person?
"Then call me Pidge."
Katie was some bitch who didn't deserve to take her brother away again.
But he didn't call her Pidge. He didn't call her anything.
He took a few breaths, unclenched his fists, and finally he spoke.
"I was going to take you home."
He was crying.
"So was I."
He moved closer to her, warily. After a moment, he pulled her into his arms.
"It's gonna be okay," he said. "Don't cry, you're gonna find him."
Matt would have said something like that, too.
But he wouldn't have hugged her so gingerly. If she couldn't have anything else, she would at least have THAT.
"I miss him so much," she sobbed, pulling him in tighter. There was snot coming down her face.
"I know," he said. "I promise, he misses you too."
Of course he did.
She didn't know him but she felt like she loved him.
What if her Matt was dead? What if this was the only one left?
She didn't want to let him go.
Something beeped.
"There's an enemy cruiser coming in right now," Slav said as he checked a scan. "We have to escape right away."
"What about THEM?" Matthew said.
Slav turned to the group.
"If you happened to come to this reality through that glowing rift, it would probably be a good time for you to go back through it."
Pidge buried her face into Matthew's chest.
"I don't want to go."
She knew it was pointless.
"You have to," he said, stroking her hair. "I want you to be safe."
He didn't sound like he really wanted her to go, either.
"Well, who's coming?" Hunk said. "Can we help you hold them off?"
"Much safer to just leave," Slav said, shaking his head.
A loud clang ran through the ship.
"Lance, Keith," Allura patched. "Abort the search and take your Lions back through the strange mass we entered. We'll catch up with you on the other side."
"Are you guys gonna be okay?" Pidge asked Matthew and Slav.
"Yes, we'll be fine," Matthew said.
"Actually, in about sixty-one percent of realities–"
"We'll be FINE."
"Pidge, let's go," Hunk said.
The Lions were on the far side of the ship. More sounds erupted through the halls.
She squeezed tight and broke away.
She hated everything in that moment.
She felt like she'd been scraped empty with a backhoe.
It was hard to pay attention to getting out safely.
Out in the corridor, something moved.
Like the Altean equivalent of a sentry bot.
It was a Gladiator. It hadn't been there before.
It saw them and came closer.
And then there was another, two more, flushing the halls from multiple sides.
They started firing.
She didn't remember anyone shouting at her to get away. She didn't remember anyone coming towards her.
But she remembered the blast, and she remembered Matthew jumping in front of her.
The sound when he hit the floor.
"Oh no," she heard Slav say. "Not one of THESE realities…"