My breath quickly vacated my lungs as the darkness of the elevator shaft enveloped me. The shaft couldn't be any larger than eight-by-eight feet, but it felt like the size of a Porta-Potty stall. It was pitch-black, save the red light marking the end of the tunnel below me. I could feel the deep grasps of claustrophobia clenching the back of my neck like a mother cat clutches her kitten in her mouth. The magnitude of guilt that I suffered from Hunk's sacrifice settled deep in my abdomen like a chunk of heavy lead. I felt sick to my stomach—whether it was from the formerly mentioned event or the three-story free-fall that sent me somersaulting into the darkness, I couldn't tell. The sensation of the fall sent my brain askew; I couldn't breathe, I couldn't think—I couldn't even scream.

For a brief moment, I wondered if this was how Alice felt when she fell down the rabbit-hole.

Probably not. She probably wasn't mourning the loss of two-thirds of her family.

Or being chased by a god-forsaken zombie ghost-clown.

The three-story freefall into the pool would have most definitely had enough force to kill all three of us, I was sure.

I should've thought this through.

I should've thought all of this through.

I could hear Pidge and Lance's terrified screams bouncing back up the elevator shaft, ringing shrilly in my ears and causing my head to spin in circles, adding to the increasingly-nauseating sensation in my stomach. I could feel light of the end of the tunnel rush up at me, could feel the wind whipping my hair back from my face.

This is it, I remember thinking.

This is the end of it all. I'm sure of it.

I squeezed my eyes shut and muttered a half-hearted prayer as I slipped out of the darkness of the shaft and into the freezing-cold Altean water.

For a moment, everything seemed still. The water appeared to slow the mechanisms of time itself. I could see air bubbles drifting lazily up to the surface from underneath my body. The chlorinated water that penetrated my eyes burned like fire. If I squinted hard enough, I could barely make out the outline of Lance's and Pidge's bodies as they swam to the surface.

I gasped for air as my head finally breached the water. For a moment, I searched the surface for Lance and Pidge, the former of whom gave me a small whoop and a wave as he caught sight of my head bobbing on top of the water.

"Hey! Keith! We're over here!"

He had gathered Pidge in one arm and had begun propelling himself towards the pool ladder to our left. I doggy-paddled my way to him and grasped the edge of the concrete between my fingers, spotting Pidge from behind as she climbed the ladder and exited the icy pool-water.

We heaved ourselves onto the dry cement at the water's edge, our soaking-wet pajamas clinging stubbornly to our skin. Lance shivered and rubbed his hands over his arms in a desperate attempt for warmth, leaning his body against mine and taking a deep, shaky breath in. For a moment, he looked as if he were about to say something—but then his mouth closed, his lips pressing together in a thin line as he glanced anxiously over the pool's glassy surface.

"Frick," Pidge cursed, frantically wringing out her shirt. Her teeth were chattering. "Frick, frick, frick. That's freezing. How do you guys swim in that?!"

"Well, Pidgeon, it's a lot warmer under normal circumstances," Lance retorted in exasperation, his eyes still focused intently on the water. I hid my cringe. I knew exactly what he was looking for. The lead in my abdomen grew heavier.

I remembered Pidge's glasses and reached into my pocket to pull them out, shaking them off a little to rid them of the water and passing them into her hands. "They're, ah… They're a little wet."

"Th-th-thank you, Keith," she stuttered, unfolding them and shoving them onto the bridge of her nose. "I appreciate it."

I made an attempt to squeeze the excess water from my hair and my clothing, but quickly gave up. It was no use to even try. It wasn't gonna do any good. After a moment, I realized that Lance had vanished from his position beside me. I groaned inwardly and pivoted my body around in search of him.

No. I couldn't lose Lance, too.

I needed that boy. I couldn't lose him, too.

A sigh of relief flooded between my lips as I caught sight of his tall, lanky figure walking toward us with four huge, fluffy white towels in his arms. He passed one into each of our hands, then looked out over the surface of the water again hopefully. After a moment, he turned back to me, a deep, unbelieving panic growing rapidly beneath the surface of his irises. "Keith…? Where… Where is Hunk?"

I stared back at him, utterly speechless.

How was I supposed to tell him?

How was I supposed to tell him that his best friend was dead?

How was I supposed to tell him that I was the one who let him die?

The panic in his eyes grew more crazed, more pronounced at my hesitance to reply. The remaining two towels in his arms tumbled to the damp concrete as Lance's hands formed into white-knuckled fists at his sides. "Keith… where is Hunk?!"

Pidge paused rubbing her hair with her towel and looked expectantly up at me, her eyes darkening in realization. "No… No, Keith—"

I caught my lip between my top and bottom teeth and bit down on it so hard that I could taste my own blood as it gushed into my mouth. I reluctantly turned my gaze to the floor, ashamed of myself. My fists clenched and unclenched repeatedly. How was I supposed to tell them this?!

Lance inhaled deeply. His breath quivered and hung in the air for a long moment, and then he spoke, the tone of his voice both filled with despair and dead of emotion at the same time.

"He's dead. He's fucking dead, isn't he?"

I didn't reply. I couldn't bring myself to.

"Keith, tell me he's alive! Tell me he's fucking alive! Please!"

I forced myself to look into Lance's eyes. I tried to open my mouth and speak, but a sob strangled the words from my throat before they could escape. All that I could manage to do was shake my head, my bottom lip quivering uncontrollably as what little glimmer of hope Lance's eyes had held shattered into a million pieces.

There was a moment of silence as the gravity of the situation crushed the three of us beneath its tremendous weight. Suddenly, a guttural, miserable growl ripped its way up Lance's throat as he turned to the wall and slammed both fists into it as hard as possible with a loud, sickening crack. He shrieked a couple of Spanish curses that I didn't quite understand as he landed a solid kick into the baseboard, along a few English words that I definitely understood but wouldn't dare repeat out loud. I forced myself to look away from the scene that unfolded before me, anguish and shame tormenting the depths of my mind.

This was my fault.

This was all my fault.

Hunk and Lance had been best friends ever since they had first become roommates in the Garrison almost five years ago. They had been inseparable since. And now, because of my little mishap, because of my misjudgment, because of my inability to focus—he was gone.

"What… What happened?" Pidge whimpered, her voice uncharacteristically meek.

I shoved my head into the palm of my hand and rubbed it over my forehead and into my hair.

No. No, no….

"He was right behind us—… Keith..."

I can't do this. I can't tell them. I can't—….

I looked up at her.

Big mistake.

Her hazel eyes were filled to the brim with tears. They began to pour down her face in waterfalls as her face crumpled in sorrow. "Keith… Hunk was right behind us. And Shiro was right behind me. And Allura was right thereand they're all dead. They're gone. What's happening, Keith? Why is this happening to us?!"

I wish I could've said something. I just stared at her stupidly and tried not to cry as my fingers twisted in my hair, my mouth agape.

Be strong. You have to be strong. For them.

My eyes flickered to Lance, who was still throwing pointless, rage-fueled punches at the white-tiled wall.

You have to be strong. For him, if no one else.

Instead, I turned the subject back to Hunk, taking deep breath and burying the lump in my throat back into the depths my stomach. I couldn't cry. I wouldn't. Be strong. For them.

"He… He told me that he wanted to distract that… That… Whatever that was," I told them. The voice that came out of my throat was barely above a whisper. If I tried to speak any louder, my voice would split in two, and the dam that kept my emotions at bay would rupture. I refused to let that happen. I refused. "He said… He said…."

You're wrong, that evil voice in my head sneered at me. You're wrong, and you know it. He wouldn't fit. You didn't think this through. You didn't focus, you weren't patient, you didn't even try to save him. You were wrong. And, now, Hunk is dead because of your idiocy.

I squeezed my eyes shut and violently shook the thought away. Shut the hell up.

I could deal with the consequences of that later. Right now, we needed our bayards—something to protect us, something to use against whatever was plaguing us.

"He told me… He said… 'if my entire purpose for sticking around in space with you guys after we defeated Zarkon was to give my life up to save yours, then I'm really freakin' glad that I stuck around…' And he told me that he loved us like family, and… And…."

I let my voice trail off. If I spoke any more, then the dam would most definitely break.

The quiet, virulent moments that echoed between the three of us after that were nearly deafening. They seemed to last for minutes.

Hours.

Decades, even.

Lance pounded his forehead against the wall and slammed his fists into the tile again. His anger seemed to melt into sadness in the form of a long, tormented groan as he beat his fists on either side of his head one final time, and then paused. After a moment, he buried his face in the palms of his hands and let out a miserable sob. The tears in his eyes finally began to drip down his cheeks and roll off of his chin in large beads as his body slid slowly down the wall and came to rest on the floor. His forehead was still pressed against the wall, his fists still glued to the tile.

His raw grief nearly sent me into shock. Never before had I seen Lance in such a state as this—no, not in anything like this.

I had seen him cry. There had been many times when Lance had curled up beside me and laid his head in my lap and just cried—cried for his family, cried because he was homesick, cried because being a Paladin is really frickin' hard. I understood that.

I understood why he was crying, now. I understood his anger. I understood his rage. I understood his denial, his despair, his agony, his everything.

But it still caught me off guard to see him like this, to see him cloaked in such grief. It sent another knife of steely guilt plunging deep into the fathoms of my chest.

You're the reason why he's like this. You caused his pain. I hope you're happy.

A few more minutes passed as the three of us sat in mourning. So much had happened in the past two hours. It was getting increasingly difficult for my mind to process the situation at hand. How did this thing get on our ship? How did it take out Shiro so easily? Where had it even come from?

That stupid, God-forsaken voice reared its ugly head in my brain again.

You could've prevented this. It's your fault.

I inhaled deeply, then let my breath escape slowly from between my lips.

Not now, dammit. I don't feel like dealing with you.

You can't just brush me off, Keith, it growled back at me. You'll have to deal with me eventually.

I chose to ignore the voice in my head again for now. We had to get out of here. We had to get to somewhere safe. Surely, it wouldn't take very long for that revolting thing to discover where the elevator shaft had spit us out. Time was of the essence—and we didn't have much of it.

Right now, Lance was my priority. He was the one I needed to focus on. I would argue with the poison in my head later.

If we could just get somewhere safe, where we could lament over this in peace….

My feet carried me tentatively forward to where my partner sat on the frigid cement. I placed a hand on his shoulder; the fabric of his t-shirt was freezing cold and soaked through-and-through. There were goosebumps forming all over his arms. He was still shivering.

I took a deep breath in an attempt to calm down before I finally allowed myself to begin to speak.

"Lance, babe," I began quietly, giving his shoulder a gentle squeeze. "Come on. We need to get out of here and find someplace safe. Somewhere to hide… To regather. Or something. We can't stay here."

"Where do you suggest we go?" he asked coldly, his voice dead and venomous. "Exactly where are we gonna go to get away from this thing? We aren't safe, Keith. We'll never be safe. You can't keep us safe. You can't just play hero in this situation and swoop in to save the day like you always do. You can't keep us safe." He pronounced this last sentence slowly, syllable-by-syllable. "No one can. So, what do you expect us to do?! Where are we supposed to go?!"

"I don't know," I responded calmly, recoiling slightly as his tone. His words stung me, but I knew that he didn't really mean them.

He was in pain. People said things that they didn't mean when they were in pain.

I sat down on the cold floor beside him, my back slumped against the cold tile, and rested my head against him, the skin of my cheek pressed against his shoulderblade. My arm wrapped around his waist and pulled him closer to me. His fists dropped onto his thighs as his tears began to fall faster into his lap.

I tried to search for words to fill the silence. "If we can just find our bayards—"

"What's a bayard gonna do against something we can't even see?" Pidge interrupted sharply, shuffling over to us and plopping down hard on the other side of me. She glumly laid her forehead on my shoulder and hooked her arm in mine. Her voice broke again as she spoke. "Why is this happening to us?" she wondered aloud, her volume steadily increasing with each syllable. "We're freaking Voltron Paladins, Keith. We defeated Zarkon for God's sake. We ended a ten-thousand-year-old threat to the universe and his son in four years. Four-fucking-years! How in the hell are we being killed off like this?!"

I pulled her into a half-hug underneath my arm, burying my face in Lance's back.

"I don't know, Pidgeon," I replied, my voice muffled in Lance's t-shirt. I could feel my own tears escaping my eyes now. "I don't know. I just don't know. If I could just think of something—"

My voice broke off as I felt Lance's body shudder violently under my cheek. He let out another loud, broken sob. I buried my face deeper into the fabric of his shirt.

Then, a morbid thought entered my brain.

If there really is a God out there somewhere, He's probably laughing at us. We're nothing but pawns on a chess board to Him, pieces of a forgotten game on His coffee table, and He's sitting on His throne in Heaven, laughing at us.

Pidge finally pulled out of my arms after several minutes. "Well…" she began, her voice still thick with emotion, "you're right, I guess. We need to get out of here, or at least get to someplace else. Before that creature gets wise and finds us and kills us, too." I couldn't see her face, but I knew that her cheeks were puffy and that her eyes were red and swollen beneath the golden frames of her glasses. "Let's just go get our bayards and kill the bastard."

I began to rub circles in Lance's back with my thumb as he tugged gently at his shirt. "Come on, darlin'. We need to move."

He didn't even utter a word in reply to me. He never argued with me. He never hesitated. He stood without even pausing for a single second and turned to face me, his eyes meeting mine for a moment as he took my hand in his and helped tug me back to my feet.

I felt another sharp, lingering pang in my chest as I saw the heart-wrenching expression looming in the depths of his pupils.

The deep, ocean-blue irises of his eyes—the ones that I loved so much, the ones that I loved to watch glitter with excitement as the stars reflected in their solemn depths, the ones I loved to gaze at longingly as he sang his stupid, lame pop songs as he did that little dance he so often did where he spun in a circle and purposely sang off-key, the ones that I loved to stare into and marvel at as they blinked open drowsily next to mine—were in so much pain. So much pain. The usual teasing laughter that lived deep within those eyes had died, had been strangled in the midst of the terrible things that had befallen us. That laughter had been replaced by a hardness, by an emotionlessness that squeezed painfully at my soul, that yanked at my heartstrings so hard that I was sure that they would snap in two and disintegrate right there in my chest. I had never, never in my twenty years of life seen another human being writhing in so much pain, not since the day after my father's funeral when I had sat in front of the floor-length mirror in the bathroom and gazed vacantly at my own reflection.

But in that moment….

In that moment, as I watched the light die from Lance's eyes, my heart cracked in two.

I just wanted him to feel whole again. The emptiness in his eyes made my stomach churn.

I wanted to envelop him deep in my arms and hug him so tightly that all of the little broken pieces of his shattered soul would stick back together, and then I wanted to hold him until the world around us ended and faded into nothing, until our names faded from the mouths of all those who knew us, until Lance's soul became whole again.

But that wasn't possible, no. Not at this moment—no.

Not at all.