where's my love?
S6 speculation; Allura doesn't want to believe Lotor's right about Shiro, until he is. / tw: some violence in this one / title from "where's my love?" by SYML
When Lotor draws his sword out and raises it towards Shiro—the witch sees through his eyes, or are you all too blind to see it—all Allura sees is red. Damn Oriande, damn his Altean lineage, and damn his empire, she decides, as she marches forwards the catches the blade before it can come down on Shiro's neck with her bare hands. The blade slices up her palms and while Lotor is strong, she is full Altean and far stronger, and wrenches it out of his grip with a growl. It doesn't take long after that for Lotor to be subdued by the the rest of the team. While Coran leads the way in bringing Lotor back to his prison in the deep recesses of the castle, Allura ignores her bloodied palms and looks at where Shiro had curled up on the ground, shell-shocked.
"Shiro?" she says softly, slowly moving towards him; she doesn't want to startle him. "Shiro, are you alright?"
He presses his palms firmly over his eyes for a long moment, before he moved his hands away and looks up at her with a dulled gaze. His face is stony. "I'm fine."
It's not lost on her that once upon a time, before his disappearance, or hell even before Lotor presented himself as an ally (a backstabber she knows now, just like his father) that his tone wouldn't have been quite as sharp. That Shiro might have even sought comfort in her, or at least reassurance. But now, he pushes himself to his feet and looks at her like he isn't quite sure what to say, like he doesn't even really want to look at her.
"Thank you," he says at last, "for saving my life."
Her throat tightens, but Allura nods. "Of course," she says quietly.
He looks at her hands, and then where the cryopods would rise up from the floor, and does he remember, Allura wonders. Does she remember her distaste for cryopods, after her father locked her away in one for 10,000 years? Why she has Coran clean them every time they need to for maintenance, because she can't not bring herself too close to them or less her hands shake? Does he remember, and will he be gentle with it?
Shiro swallows. "C'mon," he says stepping closer to her. "Let's get your hands bandaged up, before we deal with Lotor."
She blinks, but nods. It's been phoebs (the earthling equivalent being called 'months,' Allura had learned) since he'd patched her up from a mission, which had still only happened sparingly before his disappearance (whenever he'd noticed she was hurt at all). He'd understood what it was like to be terrified in ways that were simultaneously rational and irrational all at once. He'd understood... he had understood so well. It has been so long since he's been gentle with her, she tries not to read too much into his offer. He likely feels obliged to. She did save him, after all.
She wonders if he still knows she'd bleed for him as many times as she had to, even if he didn't say thank you afterwards.
Blue healing paste makes the cuts on her hands glow, and then fade, before she washes them off with Shiro standing over her shoulder in the castle's small med bay. She's drying them off when Shiro speaks into the commlink. "You got him locked up?" he checks, and then a pause as one of the paladins responds. "Okay good, we're on our way."
Allura looks at him as she takes her hands away from the hand drier. "Lotor's secure?" she asks.
Shiro nods. "Figured we have to plan our next steps. I mean, our alliance with him may not be the same, but he's still the ruler of the Galra empire. We can't throw away all the peace he's brought."
She frowns, and she can Shiro holding back a flinch as she slowly raises her hand towards him, but his expression settles willingly and she rests a hand on the side of his neck. "I do not like the idea of working with him any longer," she says, her voice a little tight. She can't believe she had trusted the prince for so long. "Anyone who tries to kill my paladins is not welcome here." She lets her hand drop when Shiro makes no sign he appreciates having it there, and disappointment curdles in her stomach even as she pushes it away. "But you are right," she reluctantly admits, even if it feels good to be agreeing with him again. "We must figure out where we go from here."
"Princess," he says, once he has turned away, and she is torn of whether to look at him or not. His voice is almost gentle. "I'm glad you're alright."
She smiles softly as she looks back at him. "I'm glad you are safe as well, Shiro." She breathes a bit easier when he falls into step with her, like old times, as they make strides out of the med bay to the prison lockdown. "Now come on. Let's see what Lotor has to say for himself."
Not much, it turns out. Lotor has nothing to offer but paranoid babbling and rage at being locked up again, and more accusations towards Shiro, until Allura firmly cuts him off and coldly forces the discussion into the terms upon which he'll be released, and how their alliance may go forward with him as an emperor, but hardly as a friend. Lotor grumbles but agrees, but she won't let her guard down again. He will say and do whatever he has to, to be let out of his cell. Nothing he says can be trusted, much less the wild accusation that Shiro is a spy for Haggar. Lotor's distrust of the alchemist is not lost on her, and she does not whether Lotor is playing a long game, hoping to cozy up to her because he knows her relationship with Shiro is strained, or that he thinks himself as Black Paladin like his father, but whatever the reason, she knows it is nothing but lies.
True, Shiro has not been like himself lately, arguing with her and the team the way he has, but she cannot wholly fault him for it. Who knows what he went through, during his second imprisonment? Sometimes she still feels the cold of Zarkon's central command wrap around her bones when she cannot sleep, and she had only been there for less than a quintant. She can't imagine what it must be like, being a prisoner for a year only to be recaptured for another six months after that. That, and if she cannot trust Shiro, then who can she, when he has always been on her side from the very beginning, extending aid and understanding and faith? Or at least... he used to.
In the days following Lotor's betrayal, things are better between. Shiro joins her on the bridge a little more to discuss plans, stands closer to her, is a little less gruff. She knew Lotor had driven a wedge between them, but now she wonders just how deep the rift caused by him was. Shiro hadn't seemed as different—still distant, but understandable—until he showed up. Whatever happened, Allura is glad that it's in the past now and they can move forward... and if she lets her foolish heart hope again, hopefully together again, too.
So things are going okay, hesitantly so, when Lotor is released from his cell and glares daggers at Shiro as he uses the commlink to bring his central command to the castleship to pick him up. Allura is glad to see him go, relieved when the Galra empire doesn't declare war on them (again) and that it seems like their alliance, despite being shaky, will hold steadfast all the same. It's a worthy trade for Shiro's life and for him coming back to her piece by piece, now.
Until Lotor comes back weeks later, boarding their ship under the guise of a diplomatic conference and a smug look on his face, and shatters it with a single phrase: "Operation Kuron, enact stage five."
Shiro's eyes are full of cold yellow light when he turns and stalks towards her, and her heart fractures. "Shiro?" He looks so much like the nightmare images Haggar had conjured up in the hangars of Zarkon's central command, so long ago. Only this isn't a nightmare. Isn't an illusion.
Her throat tightens when she hears the paladins summon their bayards around her, wondering whether hers will appear without her paladin armour on—if she would be able to raise her whip against him even if it could. She throws a glare at Lotor, as Shiro's moving slowly, prowling like a predator about to pounce.
"What the quiznak have you done to him?" she demands. Magic and rage fizzles under her fingertips. Oh, she will make Lotor regret ever showing her Oriande.
"Nothing the witch hasn't already implemented," Lotor says smoothly. "I managed to hunt her down and after some... negotiating, she surrendered her secrets." His smirk fades. "Since you would not take my word for it, I had to take matters into my own hand, princess. Is this the Black Paladin you want? One who is nothing more than a puppet?"
"Well you've shown us!" she snaps. "Now turn him back!"
Lotor's expression falters. "I, uh..." he stammers for the first time since she met him, and she sees red, practically seething.
"You mean you did not check how to turn him back?!" She wants to throttle him. Shiro has been through so much—how much more must he suffer at the hands of the Galra royal family?
Their shouting makes Shiro's head tilt, and his slowness stops, and he pounces. Allura swivels just in time, glad she had the foresight to have her hair in a bun and her commander outfit on, and Pidge raises their whip, lassoing it around Shiro's legs like a pro. His hand glows purple and swings down, sending shockwaves along the whip-line and picks it apart easily, tossing Pidge off to the side like she weighs nothing.
Lance and Hunk move forward next, hesitantly raising her guns, and she hears them both adjust the settings to stun instead of kill. "Do not harm him," Allura orders, even if she knows she should probably be worrying about the opposite, but she can't help it. There is no human emotion in Shiro's face, smoothed over like stone, his eyes glowing yellow with quintessence, but she knows how human he is underneath. How wonderfully human he was when he used to—
Shiro moves faster than she would have thought possible for someone of his size, going right up to the nozzle of Lance's gun and wrenching it out of the paladin's grip, elbowing him across the face hard enough to crack the face mask of his helmet. Lance stumbles and Shiro dodges Hunk's blast at his back just in time, and Lance crumples to the floor, eyes closed. Pidge comes up from behind and leaps, wrapping her arms over his head, and Hunk readies another blast, but Shiro rips her off him and uses her as a shield from the stun ray and drops her unceremoniously head first on the floor.
Allura can hear Hunk gulp. "Uh, Allura?" he says. "What do we do?"
She turns her steely gaze on Lotor and Coran. Perhaps one of them knows something. Lotor takes out his sword but Coran wrestles it away, thank the Ancients, and kicks him forward and Lotor back-pedals hard when he accidentally bumps into Shiro, before clearing his throat and puffing out his chest importantly. "Android, I command you to stop—"
Shiro swipes him aside with one back hand hit of his hand, like he's nothing. Lotor crashes into one of the bridge's keyboards hard enough that the screens and buttons crack under him. In the time Allura has watched him fall, Shiro and Hunk have started wrestling for the yellow paladin's gun, both of them grunting while Pidge and Lance stir feebly on the floor.
Allura shakes herself straight. She has to do something, no matter how much she doesn't want to. She crashes between the two paladins, taking Shiro by surprise and using her strength to overpower his and shove the gun back into Hunk's hands. Her hands find Shiro's and they grapple, each trying to push back on each other's strength, and she remembers when his hands used to hold hers, gently. Beads of sweat form on her brow, and she wonders if it's the intensity of her muscles that's getting warmer, or that his arm is heating up under her grip and any second now he'll burn her terribly.
"Shiro," she pants, pleads, gritting her teeth and staring into his cold yellow eyes. "Please." She has to get through to him, somehow. Her arms bend under his, slightly. When had he gotten so strong? How long did she have? She can see Coran and Hunk helping Pidge and Lance up from the floor out of the corner of her eye, even Lotor emerging from his cracked panels. "Shiro," she tries again, softer, begging. His hardened expression, face screwed up in anger, softens just a fraction. Allura sucks in a tight breath. It's working.
She musters up her strength and shoves him backwards just as his arm lights up, and he slides across the floor on his feet, before looking up at her. Before his rage can come back, she walks towards him, keeping her arms lowered. "Please, my love," she begs, ignoring the sob that rises in her throat; she hasn't used that nickname for him in so long, hasn't heard it fall from his lips since before his disappearance. "Come back to me."
Shiro's eyes narrow, as though studying her as he lets her approach, his chest rising and falling. It is working, and she's going to—His hands wrap around her throat and the shock overtakes her as he squeezes, and her hands uselessly try to pry his away from her narrow windpipe before there's a beam of light behind him. Shiro's grip loosens and she falls to her feet, gasping, as he lurches onto his knees. Lance and Hunk still both have their smoking guns raised, even after the light of the stun beam has faded.
Allura manages to find her voice and blink back tears, after quickly massaging her throat. "We must get him into a cell," she rasps. Coran's hand is steady on her shoulder as he helps her up.
"Princess," he begins, with that familiar concerned note in her throat, but she brushes him off.
"And Lotor into a cryopod," she continues, straightening up. "Lance, go get cuffs for... for Shiro. Hunk, you can carry him to the cell." She glances at Pidge, who's eyes are glassy. "Is everyone alright?"
"You mean beyond finding out that Shiro is..." Hunk trails off, frowning. "Yeah, everyone's fine."
"Good," she says decidedly. "Now let's go, before he wakes up."
The team asks no questions, afterwards. Lotor is incensed to be a prisoner for the third time, locked away in a cell separate from Shiro's, and Shiro—his yellow eyes still have not faded once he awoke, screaming in rage and pounding at the walls of his cell. Allura forced herself to look at him even as the others turned away, despite how much she wanted to join him. She'd find a way to fix this, but... her stomach twists every time she thinks of what Haggar has done to him, of his hands threatening to burn her, of his hands wrapped around her throat and squeezing squeezing squeezing—
Coran finds her on the bridge that night, long after a half-hearted dinner she had barely touched before retreating, not wanting to see the way the other paladins had looked at her. The glances and whispers they'd exchanged while walking together and she walked silently with Coran. My love—do you think?—what are we going to do?
I don't know, she wants to say. She's not used to this chasm; whenever she hadn't known, Shiro always had, and now he was—
She blinks back tears when she hears Coran walk up beside her. He says nothing, until she turns towards him and opens up his arms. Allura falls into them gratefully, clinging to him like a little girl as gives into the ache inside her, tears blurring her vision. "We—" she starts, still choking back a sob.
Coran shushes her. How much had he suspected, and when? When Shiro had come to save her, when she had blindly trusted him? "I know," Coran says softly. "We'll get him back."
Allura tries to believe him. Tries not to give into the worst thoughts, that what Lotor and Haggar have done is irreversible, that Shiro will never be the same, will never love her again, that he will keep on breaking her heart, once, twice, three times.
She just wants to stop wondering where her love has gone.