The Garrison didn't hold a memorial. They barely even made an announcement about it at all. It was just a simple phone call in a cold succinct tone to the affected families ("We're sorry, your son has gone missing…snuck out in the middle of the night…we're conducting an investigation….") and a brief report on the local news ("Three Garrison cadets reported missing…we ask that anyone who has any news on their whereabouts please contact the authorities….") and that was that.

Of course, Colleen Holt didn't even get the phone call.

Pidge Gunderson wasn't related to the Holts. He didn't have any family at all, having been enrolled at the Garrison through their gifted orphans program with their federal-mandated quota.

The first thing that tipped Colleen off that something might not be right, was when Katie stopped answering her phone.

She told herself that she was fine—probably just busy studying, or the battery charge had run out, or she had somehow just not seen the message. Colleen worried that perhaps she was being to overbearing, and this was Katie's way of asking for more independence. But Colleen had every right to worry, with her now being alone in the house with just the dog, with her little girl away at boarding school—

Then she saw the news.

Saw Matt's face—no, Katie's, unmistakably Katie's—staring back at her from the TV screen, alongside two unfamiliar boys, the words 'Garrison Cadets Missing' screaming at her from the headline.

And it was as if the earth was yanked out from under her, and the entire world was crashing down around her, and her head was spinning, and she couldn't think straight, and her breathing was acting up.

Lance McClain. Hunakai Garrett. Pidge Gunderson.

Pidge Gunderson.

Pidge had been a childhood nickname of hers; Matt had given it to her. And Gunderson…that had been Colleen's own maiden name.

And the realization of what had happened hit her like a brick wall. Katie had lied. She'd lied about her school, then lied about her identity in order to break into a government facility that she'd already been banned from.

"Oh, Katherine," she whispered.

Colleen's fists clenched. The Garrison had already taken her husband and son from her. And now they'd had to take her daughter as well?

But if Katie had managed to infiltrate the Garrison, she may have found something.

She'd told Colleen her suspicions that the Kerberos mission hadn't gone missing, and that the Garrison was just covering up for something. She'd mentioned what she found (or rather, what she hadn't found) on Iverson's computer. And she'd talked about the coded transmissions she'd been receiving from Matt and their father, transmissions that said that their ship had already landed safely on the small moon.

Colleen had told her to leave it be, and that this was just part of the mourning process.

But a Katie had lit a spark of hope in the back of her mind, one that she didn't dare to even acknowledge most of the time. And if Katie had been at the Garrison for months now, nearly a full semester, then she may have found something else.

Something that may have prompted the Garrison into covering up another disappearance with a simple "missing".

Colleen muted the TV, reaching for her laptop. She needed more information. She needed to know the whole story, needed to know who those boys were, needed to know what happened the night they all disappeared, needed to know if they'd found anything.

And she wasn't going to let anything stand in her way.

Colleen met the Garretts purely by chance.

It was at a coffee shop. She had stopped in to pick up a large coffee on her way home from work, intending for the trip to be a quick in-and out. But after she'd placed her order and stepped out of line, she'd bumped into another woman, knocking both of their purses to the floor.

"I'm so sorry," they both said, speaking over each other.

The woman chuckled gently, as the two of them bent down to pick up their bags. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "That was my fault."

"No," Colleen protested, standing back up. "I should have been looking where I was going."

They stood by each other in silence, waiting for their drinks, and Colleen awkwardly folded her arms, tapping her finger anxiously.

"So," she started, feeling the need to continue this encounter. "Have you, ah, ever been here before?"

"Oh, no," the woman replied. "In fact, this is only the second time I've been in this state at all. I'm just visiting." She paused, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear. "Had some work to take care of at my son's school."

"Oh, where are you from?"

"California," she said. "But Hawaii before that."

"Really?" Colleen asked, raising her eyebrows. "I've always wanted to visit Hawaii. Is it as pretty as it is in all the pictures?"

"Absolutely breathtaking," the woman assured her. "My family goes back every Christmas to visit my parents."

"That sounds lovely," Colleen replied. After a moment, she held out her hand to the other woman. "I'm Colleen, by the way," she said. "Colleen Holt."

"Lani Garrett," the other woman introduced, and they shook hands.

Colleen hesitated. Garrett was a common last name, wasn't it? She may not be related to Hunakai—or 'Hunk' as he apparently liked to be called—at all. But then, Colleen had seen several different photographs of Hunk from reading every local news article on the disappearance, and this woman had the same dark hair, the same warm skin tone, the same brown eyes….

When they got their drinks, the two women sat down together, finding a small table against a window in the back of the shop.

"When you say 'Holt'," Lani asked cautiously after they had sat down, "do you mean…?"

Colleen's smile tightened. "Yes, of those Holts."

Lani nodded. "I thought I recognized your name. I'm sorry about your family," she said. "My son was a fan of your husband. Read every single one of his books. They inspired him to enroll in the Garrison himself." She set down her cup, staring at it without really seeming to see it. "He was devastated when heard about what happened."

Colleen was frozen, her suspicions about the woman seated in front of her being confirmed. "Hunk," she murmured, and she saw Lani startle. "You're Hunk's mother."

"Yes," Lani said, blinking in surprise. "I am. How did you…?"

Colleen glanced around, noting how many people were in this little café, deciding that this wasn't the best place for such an open conversation. "Would you…like to come over for dinner?" she asked. "I believe your son is a friend of my daughter."

It was then that Colleen decided to reach out to the McClains. With Lani sitting in her living room, Colleen did some more digging on Lance McClain. Through his own social media accounts, she was able to locate his mother's, and from there she found an email address.

She sent an email to Eva McClain explaining who she was and who her daughter was, mentioning that she'd already met with and had begun discussing things with Lani Garrett, and would she be willing to come out New Mexico to meet with them as well?

She received a response less than an hour later.

Lani made arrangements with her hotel to extend her stay another week, and the two of them were joined by Eva within the next few days.

The three of them sat around Colleen's kitchen table, her notes spread out before them. She'd explained the whole Katie/Pidge thing, and how Kerberos played into it all.

"And as I'm technically not Pidge Gunderson's mother," she was saying, "I have no reason to be speaking to them about any of this. And I can't go public with her identity without incriminating her. Which means that I need you to relay whatever information they might have told you that they're not making public."

"Honestly?" Lani said, shaking her head, "Not much."

Colleen frowned. "The articles I read said there was video surveillance, footage that showed the three of them sneaking off the base past curfew."

"Yes," Lani agreed. "They mentioned that when I went to speak with them a few days ago."

"Did they let you see the footage?"

Lani shook her head. "They said it was confidential and that I didn't have the necessary clearance. But they told me that they'd handed the footage over to the police and were conducting a thorough investigation in an attempt to find them."

"They said the same to me when I called," Eva added.

"I'm worried about this 'investigation' of theirs," Colleen murmured. "Who knows if they're even really looking. And if they are, it probably wouldn't take much to piece together that Pidge Gunderson is Katherine Holt, even for an idiot like Iverson."

"I asked to see the progress of their investigation," Eva said. "They told me they'd send it to me at their earliest convenience. It's been well over a week now, and I'm beginning to doubt they have anything of note."

Colleen sighed. "The short of all this," she continued, "is that we have grounds to sue the Garrison on negligent behavior. Our children were under their watch when they went missing. If they had been paying more attention, then the three of them wouldn't have even been able to exit the facility. And it's not clear if they've been conducting a police investigation at all. And we may have reason to believe that this is all a cover-up for something, and they may even have a hand in their disappearance." She folded her hands. "What we need now is to find a lawyer."

"My brother is a lawyer," Eva told them. "And my oldest, Angela, is a Garrison officer, though she's at the Florida base."

"My sister-in-law is a reporter," Lani mused, pulling out her phone. "I'll send her a message.

"I never had a position at the Garrison," Colleen said, "but my husband did. And I still have friends stationed there. I'm sure a number of them would be willing to help us with this as well." She smiled, pleased that things were finally seeming to fall into place. "So we amass our team, put together our case, and confront them with it head-on," Colleen summarized. "Iverson won't know what hit him."

AN:

Inspired by an ask my friend sent me on Tumblr

I know that Garrett and McClain aren't Samoan or Cuban names (respectively). But those were the names used in the original 80s Voltron DotU, so that's what I'm rolling with.
[My roommate is Mexican (as in literally-born-in-Mexico Mexican). But despite being predominately Mexican, they have a German last name. They're like 1/16th German, which is really not a lot. But because their last name comes from the patrilineal line, it was passed down through all these generations. So if my roommate can be 94% Mexican but have a German last name, then Lance and Hunk can have white last names while not really being white. *shrug*
At least, that's how I choose to see it. You guys are all entitled to your own opinions and headcanons on the matter.]

And regarding Hunk's name
'Hunk' is definitely not this boy's real name, that's gotta be a nickname. So I looked up a bunch of Samoan and other Pacific Islander names online looking for one that looked/sounded similar to 'Hunk' (so it would make sense where his nickname came from). I found 'Hunakai' and decided that fit perfectly. (The other name I was considering was Hokulani, which I liked because of the celestial meaning. But the internet couldn't seem to agree on whether that name was unisex or feminine, so I decided to run with Hunakai instead since it seemed more firmly unisex lol.)
If any of you guys are Samoan/Hawaiian/Pacific Islander or know someone who is, please feel free to educate me on this / suggest any other names! That'd be rad.

Anyways, here's Day 6!

Day 5 is coming, I promise! But that fic ended up being waaaay longer than I thought it would be, and I didn't get around to finishing it last night. But I'm super excited for it, so I WILL post that one (just as soon as I'm finished). So have this in the meantime?

I have so many headcanons about these kids and their families and I'm so excited to finally be writing some of that out aaaaaa

As always, please feel free to come say hi to me on Tumblr (this-book-has-been-loved) or the Platonic VLD Discord server (NHYrCz5)

~Brigit