Title: This is so Die Hard

Chapter: 9

Rated: T for violence and language

Author's Notes: Pidge angsty by request - Set near the end of season 2

Pidge sat on the floor in front of the three occupied cryopods. She was not crying. She didn't care who said otherwise. She was frozen in place. Her brain just couldn't get past a single thought that kept wrapping itself around and around her skull like a vicious little python. "It's my fault." Over and over and round and round it wormed.

Coran had put her into a pod shortly after examining her. She was in for about a half a day. She had awakened to a warmed blanket and Hunk's eager hugs. Coran and Allura were asleep on a makeshift bed. Hunk said the forcefield had actually drained their quintessence a bit and they were exhausted.

Allura had said she expected they would sleep for at least an entire day and not to worry. She had established that there were no other life signatures in the castle and set the perimeter alarms on their most sensitive settings. She had also contacted the Nitomians and basically gave them the don't call me I'll call you line.

Hunk had found a stash of some kind of food goo bar and hydration packs. He had gathered blankets from Allura's room which was the closest and there were enough in there to keep everyone comfy. Pidge just thought he didn't want to go in the castle by himself right now. He was sitting in front of Lance's cryopod snoring right now.

She gave a little sniff. He was exhausted too. He had stayed up until she got out. He told her Coran had scanned him three times before he had decided he really wasn't injured other than a couple of busted knuckles. Hunk told her he had punched someone who deserved it. He had some bandages on his hand and he said Coran had put a cream on it to reduce any swelling.

When she got warmed up, he made her check her vision on an impromptu vision chart. She seemed to answer everything to his satisfaction. She wondered where her glasses were. They had fallen off when she had gotten smacked in the hall. She shivered remembering the anger in the assholes face. Then allowed herself a little grin. Shiro couldn't stop her from cursing in her mind. Then again Shiro couldn't stop her from cursing out loud right now. And this was a highly curse worthy day.

"Damnit." She muttered. Shiro should be out in another few hours. Coran had told Hunk less than a day. Shiro had almost died. Pidge remembered the terror that nearly choked her when Coran had announced they had only dobashes. She had sat with him that whole time. Just wrapped a bandage around his head and watched him while the whole time he had been dying. He could have died in that room and she wouldn't have even known it until she came back to check on him. It was wrong. He didn't look like he was dying. He got hit in the head. She hadn't even thought about the possibility that whole time. She hadn't even considered it and now it was all hitting her.

"Shit. Stupid." She needed to be better. She had gotten taken by the aliens with hardly a fight. They'd snuck up on her with their guns and threats and she had just gone down. One swing of her bayard, which was deflected into a door and got stuck. Then they'd just grabbed her and no matter how much she struggled or swung or twisted or hit or tried to bite, nothing loosened that grip. And then Lance had been there, and he looked freaked out and wet. And then they shot him and she thought they were going to kill him. Another one almost gone and she just stood there and watched, unable to lift a finger.

"Fuck. Fuck. Fuckity Fuck." And it was all her fault. She had overheard enough to realize that there was a traitor in the Nitomian delegation. A traitor she had told all about the trials she was running. Because of course they needed permission to run that sort of thing on the planet and - Stop. Stop making excuses. Pidge had told them the plan an they had told the Galran sympathizers and they had used her plan to sneak into the castle. Her experiment had nearly killed Lance, nearly killed Keith, nearly killed Shiro, could have killed them all. Her experiment could have been the end of Voltron. The end of any chance of fighting Zarkon, any chance for the universe to be free, and the end of any chance to save her family. All, everything, nothing left and it was all because she had messed up.

So maybe she was crying, or sobbing, or at least had snot running down her face. Lance would tell her she was ugly crying she was sure. She bowed her head into her hands and didn't see Hunk wake up and walk over. She did hear him sit down beside her. She felt his hand on her back.

"Hey, it's going to be okay. Everyone is going to be okay you know," he whispered as he rubbed circles on her back.

"No thanks to me." she muttered.

"Oh hey, what do you mean?

"I did this. This is all my fault." she wailed and threw herself into Hunk's arms.

"How do you figure that?" He stroked the back of her head.

"This whole thing would never have happened if I hadn't told the Nitomians about my experiment," she murmured from his shoulder.

"I think it was our experiment and you had to tell them. I didn't want them shooting at me while I was flying around mostly invisible." Hunk comforted.

"But I didn't have to tell them I was giving you a head start or that to make it fair we were shutting down the defenses and then powering up." Pidge pulled back angrily her face red.

"No, I guess you didn't, and I guess we won't next time. But honestly Pidge, I didn't think anything about it either. We wanted our new allies - the one's we'd just freed - to understand how we were working to better rescue prisoners. If I recall they had several people taken from their planet and they were eager to hear about what we were doing to get them back." Hunk gave her a sad half smile, "I guess we are going to have to get more used to people lying to us. Most of the Nitomians wouldn't have done this and I can tell you their military was really angry that those Galra sympathizers," he practically spat the words, "were even still running loose. I guess they thought the one's they didn't catch had been off world and maybe gotten taken out with one of the cruisers we took down."

"It's still my fault Hunk. Not knowing that one of the guys was a spy wouldn't have made me feel any better if Shiro had died, or Keith, or Lance." She shook her head in denial of even thinking about it. "I messed up."

"Pidge, I know that you took care of Keith and Shiro when they were hurt. Coran told me that if you hadn't bandaged up Keith's leg as well as you did that he could have bleed to death. You saved him. And how to shut down the particle barrier without blowing up the ship was your idea. I wouldn't have been able to get in and the military wouldn't have gotten in. And if that had happened then you all would have been dead or turned over to the Galra. And you did all of that being half blind out of one eye, which you should have told someone about," he admonished, "and with a broken face. I think that's pretty impressive, doesn't sound like someone who messed up."

"I watched Lance get shot and I couldn't stop it. I couldn't get away from them."

"Pidge, if you are trying to blame yourself you are going to find some reason no matter what I say. I had to listen to all kinds of terrible things, including Lance getting hurt, and Keith almost getting choked to death, and then there was the time I was stuck out there and I had no idea what was going on and Yellow and I couldn't get to any of you. I was just as much a part of this experiment as you, in case you forgot, is it just as much my fault then? Allura's the one that invited them into the castle is it her fault?"

"No."

"Right, either it's our fault, or it's not, doesn't get to be just you. I'm not saying we shouldn't learn from this and make some changes. We are going to have to, but this isn't anyone's fault other than those stupid evil galra butt kissing sympathizers!"

"Ass-kissers." Pidge giggled.

"Language, Pidge!" Hunk laughed.

He wrapped his arms around her and they laughed until they cried.