Lance rushed into the green lion with Shiro on his heels, but when he froze in place, Shiro ran directly into his shoulders.

Keith and Pidge were tangled together on the floor of the green lion, softly laughing to one another. Their hands were tousled through each other's hair, bodies pressed together as closely as possible, just touching. It was like Shiro and Lance weren't even there; it was like they weren't on the metal floor of a giant space weapon.

"Wait, wait, Shiro! Lance!" Allura cried through the open port. She came into view, running with her skirts gathered in fistfuls. "Whatever happened down there, it's not really them. Get out of there!"

Pidge kissed the underside of Keith's jaw, and his hands left Pidge's hair to grab at their hips, laughs suddenly turning to gaspy moans. Keith forced his hips between Pidge's and rutted forward, opening his eyes lazily as Pidge moaned, unabashed.

His eyes were glimmering magenta, just like the surface of the planet below.

Pidge hooked their thigh over his hip and pulled him closer, rolling them both to one side until Pidge was on top of Keith. Keith gasped, digging his nails into Pidge's armor and tucking his face against Pidge's hair. One of his hands slipped up under their chestplate, and their hips stuttered over his with a whine. They opened their eyes just barely, heavy with eyelashes pressed to their cheeks, shimmers of neon pinks and soft lavenders mixing in their irises.

Pidge's hands tugged and massaged at Keith's hair, brushing it away from his face sloppily, and held him in place to kiss him.

They were a mess, melting into one another, and Shiro and Lance could only stand and stare.

Hands grabbed at the collars of their armor, and Allura dragged them forcefully out of the cockpit of the green lion.

"What are you thinking?! You need to get away until we know it isn't contagious!" She cried, closing up the green lion and tossing Shiro and Lance into the hangar.

"Wh-what-"

"-It's whatever Pidge's scanner picked up in the atmosphere. It's toxic, whatever it is...but…"

"We can't just leave them like that!" Lance cried shrilly, paling.

"I know, Lance, I know, but we can't risk anyone else getting infected with whatever it is, because it could be really dangerous."

"The-their eyes...their eyes were pink!" Shiro finally found it in himself to speak. He stood, twitching, and ran his hand over his hair, trying to calm himself down. "What-do we know what caused that?"

"Coran is looking at the balances Pidge sent up right now. He must have something by now."

"I'm not leaving until we can get them separated." Lance demanded firmly.

"Can't we put them in Cryo Pods?" Shiro asked.

From inside the green lion, something hard and heavy hit the floor.

Lance and Shiro looked at one another.

"We can't put them in the healing pods because they're not sick...though infection isn't accurate, it's as close as I can come to describing what's going on." Coran fiddled with his mustache as he danced his fingers over the screen before him.

Lance stood up again, before sitting just as fitfully.

"What's wrong with them, then?" He begged, glancing back down at the screen in his hand, which was playing live feed from Green's security camera.

So far, Keith and Pidge hadn't made it past rolling their bodies together sloppily and kissing with uncoordinated movements, giggling and cooing at each other. Occasionally, they would roll about too intensely, and hit a wall or the seat of the lion, but didn't seem affected by it.

"Those clouds, the ones we can see surrounding the planet; we thought it was just dust, but it seems to be some kind of airborne aphrodisiac...it's not toxic to breathe, but it seems to trigger some...er, very primal instincts, crossed with some...very personal interests."

"Like...an inhaled drug?" Hunk tried helpfully.

"I suppose so. They're not really 'infected' so much as just...well, I suppose it's just a change in the chemistry of their brains, and we can't really balance out those levels."

"So what can we do to get rid of it?" Shiro asked, glancing over at Lance's screen.

"It's hot in here." Keith was whining, Pidge nodding their agreement, the both of them trying to wrestle off pieces of armor while still grinding and pressing their mouths to any exposed skin.

"We, um, can't. Not-not really." Coran began softly, shutting down the display of his screen. His lip twitched. "The good news is that, while there still may be traces of the dust on their hair, or clothes, it's not enough to infect anyone else, so we don't have to quarantine them, but...they'll likely stay like this until their brains can naturally overcome the imbalances."

"Is there any way to speed up that process?" Lance demanded, already standing again. Allura cleared her throat, shooting a disgruntled glance at Coran.

"You knew about this, Coran, didn't you?" She accused. "At the very least, you knew what that dust was."

"Princess!" Coran cried dramatically, voice pitchy. "I promise you, I would never knowingly put any Paladin of Voltron in danger!"

"But they're not in danger, are they? They just need to be fucked!" She cried angrily.

The entire room let out a gasp as Allura realized what word had just left her mouth. She flushed, and took a deep breath. "My apologies. That was a rather inappropriate way to say what I intended to."

"A-are you saying that-"

"-Yes, Lance." She sighed, rubbing at her temple before shooting a final glare at Coran, who mumbled an excuse and skittered away. "If human brains are anything like alteans', having an orgasm can flood the brain with the same chemicals as what they're experiencing now, and when the brain flushes out the chemicals from having an orgasm, it will flush out a good amount of the excess...I knew that such a substance as this existed, but I did not have very much information on what it appeared as, and I'm sorry I didn't see it for what it was sooner. I'm sure Coran thought this would be a lovely way to jump-start some kind of relationship…"

"I'm sorry, you know about this stuff, and Coran was trying to what?!"

Shiro did his best to moderate his voice, but it cracked with strain.

Allura sat down, another sigh, and Hunk glanced from Lance to Shiro before kneeling next to her and feeling her forehead.

"I'm not sick, Hunk, I'm just…this is a very stressful situation.

"Yes, I did know about this; alteans used to use this very substance after a natural disaster, or when we were projected to need a larger army. It was known to spring a mating season, in a way, but we hadn't needed artificial help with our population in quite some time. I myself have never experienced such a thing, and I don't think Coran or anyone of his generation would have either, unless they were doing so recreationally.

"You know as well as Coran does, as well as I do, that you five are exceedingly rare, because your personalities are flexible enough to respond to at least one of the Lions; I'm sure that he, like myself, thinks that if any of you were to have children with one another, that those children would be excellent Voltron pilots. However...I don't think he understands how unlikely it is for anyone on this team to be capable of carrying children; in all honesty, I'm not sure what Pidge has going on, but they seem to be the only one with the potential to carry children. And...it's not really subtle, that some of our Paladins have feelings for others, harbor them though you may."

Shiro and Lance both let out a tense breath, almost as if ashamed.

"I think we have learned that humans aren't like alteans, at least not in this way. Children often come before a relationship, to us, and it's not uncommon, where humans seem to be the other way around. However, Pidge and Keith likely can only think of reproduce and reproduce with someone you want to raise children with. I definitely think that we need to separate Keith and Pidge, before something happens that they will really regret, but...I think our best option is to just put them to bed and wait for it to blow over." She finished with another sigh, standing slowly. "I'm going to go speak with Coran; I'm sure he's realized the gravity of what has happened, by now, and maybe he knows of some other way to hasten this process. I do not want any of our Paladins to feel like they cannot trust members of their own team."

And with that, she followed Coran out into the castle.

Hunk stood, glaring from Lance to Shiro back to Lance.

"I'm leaving it up to you two to figure this out, because if either of you think I don't know what's been going on with you and them, you've really underestimated me. I'm going to go make sure Allura doesn't stab Coran, or try to shoot him out of an airlock."

And before Lance or Shiro could try to explain themselves or apologize, he was gone, too.

"Is it really a good idea for the two of us to take care of them?" Lance asked, turning to Shiro.

"Let's just get them away from one another, before-"

"-Haa-ah!"

Pidge cried through the security feed.

Keith had managed to fit one of his hands down the front of their pants, now that their belt had been discarded, and they were holding him like gravity was about to give up. They rolled over again, and Keith's shoulder hit the wall, hard, though he didn't react.

"Before that." He managed, already hauling ass back into the hangar.

Keith and Pidge didn't even notice that Shiro and Lance had made their way back into Green; Pidge was pressing their mouth into Keith's neck, and he was trying to hold their hip in place against his own.

Shiro moved first, kneeling and taking Pidge by the shoulders.

"Alright, guys," Shiro tried to sound casual, "let's get you separated."

He lifted Pidge away, which would have been remarkably easy if Keith wasn't clutching them desperately.

"Okay." Lance added, pulling Keith up by his waist, trying to sound casual, "Up you get, mullet."

They both whined pitifully upon being separated, fingertips tangled together, either unaware or uncaring that something was separating them. Pidge's small hand clutched at Shiro's hand around their waist as they tried to break out of his grip.

Lance was faring far worse; without a mechanical arm, and with a much larger adversary, he was holding Keith's back to his chest with his arms around his torso as Keith wriggled, hair stuck to his lips and reaching with all his might towards Pidge.

They were each whiningly mumbling each other's names, fingertips barely touching.

Shiro hauled Pidge up into his arms, breaking their eye contact with Keith.

As soon as they were out of one another's view, Keith and Pidge shifted their attention to the nearest, warmest thing.

"Lan...Lance?" Keith mumbled, his glittering eyes barely able to actually focus. His fingertips dragged over Lance's lip.

"C-Come on, dude, you need to go to bed!" Lance stammered, hoisting Keith's arm over his shoulders and backing gracelessly out of the lion.

Pidge hummed softly, reaching up and fluffing Shiro's hair.

"Shiro...Shiro?" They cooed, seeming distant and confused.

He shuddered, trying to nudge Pidge's hand away.