Chapter 10: Trying to Keep My Distance
Surrender, Walk the Moon.
What was that I said about not waiting a month to update? Jesus lol.
Galra Headquarters. May 12th, 2016. 9:37 pm.
"You're certain?"
Keith ducked his head and nodded once, staring hard at his feet while he waited for Zarkon to finish reviewing the security footage from Varkon's. "Yes, sir," he said softly.
When he glanced up, Zarkon was scowling at the screen, at Allura and Coran, specifically, and then he turned his gaze on Keith. "Do you know where they are staying?"
"No, sir."
"But you are friends with the group they came with? One of them is an employee, if I recall."
Keith nodded. "Yes, sir."
Zarkon snapped his fingers and an aid, dressed in a police officer's uniform, rushed to his side. "Find them," he snapped. "We have the big one on file. You will bring him to me, and so help me, I will get their location out of him if it is the last thing I-"
"Sir!"
The man snapped his mouth shut so fast that his teeth clacked, and his eyes nearly burned Keith on the spot. His voice was tight when he spoke. "What, Kogane?"
Keith swallowed. People didn't usually interrupt Zarkon and live. "I…I can get close to them," he offered, brain running a mile a minute. "Infiltrate their ranks, find out if…if Voltron is-"
"Do NOT."
He swallowed hard and straightened his shoulders. "Sorry, sir. But if they have started the gang once more…perhaps I can obtain intel? Gain their trust, and determine their end goals? If we end them now, we'll have no way of knowing if they have allies that will come for us."
Zarkon ran a hand over his chin, dark eyes glinting as he pondered Keith's words. "Fine. Dismissed, Officer Pongpatipat."
The man saluted and left without commenting, leaving Zarkon to eyeball Keith. "If you betray me, Kogane, you and your mother will regret it immensely. Find information on them, people we can use against them. Dismissed."
Keith bowed and exited the room as quickly as he physically could, hightailing it back to his and his mother's quarters. He tiptoed past her room, knowing that she pulled early mornings and so she fell asleep early at night.
His room was small in the grand scheme of things, with only a bed against the back wall and a dresser and desk set into the adjoining one. The whole space was lit by warm purple lighting in the floors and ceilings, activated by a switch next to the bed. All in all, it was barely ten square feet.
Keith sighed and shut his door, leaning his head back against the wood and taking a moment to breathe.
He didn't want to give Zarkon leverage on his friends. He could honestly never recall a time when he had friends, but now that he had them, he didn't want them in danger. If that meant getting rid of Allura and Coran, so be it.
He shed his jacket and tossed it onto the back of his chair, swiveling it out with one hand and sinking into the worn leather. He flipped the lid of his laptop up and squinted against the brightness of the screen as he opened his web browser and got onto Facebook.
Because of his affiliations with the Galra, the majority of Keith's page was barren. He had his basic information, a selfie of him at the Grand Canyon as his photo, and a couple of photos of himself and his mother throughout the years on his page. He used it mainly to research potential Galra targets. None of the older members had quite figured out how he managed to find people so quickly, and he wasn't about to tell them and lose part of his value to Zarkon.
He searched for Hunk first, unsure as to whether or not that was the name he used on social media. But after two clicks, he found him easily, his profile picture featuring him, Pidge, and Lance at a water park wearing goofy sunglasses. He scrolled through, pulling out a piece of paper to jot down the information he found.
Two moms. No siblings. One blood related uncle and aunt, one on each side of the family. Three cousins from his aunt, all younger. She lived in California, he lived in Nebraska. Other than that, Hunk had no immediate family members that he spoke to regularly.
Aside from Pidge and Lance, Hunk's main friends appeared to be a group from his engineering class, Nyma and Rolo, and some girl that he had way too many cutesy selfies with for her to just be a friend, Shayla.
Keith scratched all of this information down and then clicked the "Friend" button before switching over to Lance's page.
Lance had significantly more relatives. Mother, father, four older siblings, six young nieces and nephews, seven aunts and uncles, sixteen cousins, three grandparents-Keith's hand cramped writing it all down.
The vast majority of Lance's friend pictures involved Hunk and Pidge, unsurprisingly, and Keith was startled when he came across one taken at Varkon's that featured him very prominently in the background, sticking his tongue out at the group. He couldn't help but smile a little, despite the guilt coiling in his gut.
Hunk's acceptance of his friend request came right as he sent one out for Lance. He switched to Pidge's page, noting briefly that her full name read as "Pidge Katherine Holt." He didn't question it, but when he got to her page, he was startled to see how barren it was. Save for tagged photos, Pidge rarely posted anything herself. Considering how tech savvy she seemed, Keith was surprised at the lack of content.
He clicked around her page for a second before finding her "about."
Mother. Colleen Holt. Father and brother. Samuel and Matthew.
Keith frowned, staring at the names. Something about them rang a bell. He jotted the names down, sent Pidge a friend request, and then shut his laptop and headed out, page clutched in his hands.
His feet carried him down the hall and to Commander Thace's room, where he knocked tentatively.
Thace was in charge of communications and outposts of Galra members that were stationed in other gangs around the city. They had one in every spot save for Voltron, which was no longer in existence, and the Olkari gang, which ran the parks system. Because they were so far on the outskirts, and incredibly intelligent and deadly, Zarkon had declared them untouchable by the Galra.
Thace had also been with the Galra since Keith was a child and had acted like the father Keith had never known. He had been in his late teens when Keith was born, and aside from Lotor and Acxa was the closest to Keith in age. That, however, was shrouded by his dad-ness. He had babysat Keith as a child when his mother was on runs and missions, had taught him how to fight, how to steal, how to survive if necessary.
Keith went to Thace with most of his problems to begin with, but this particular inquiry was right up Thace's alley.
"Come in!"
The doorknob twisted easily in his hand and Keith stepped inside, glancing up from his notes to find Thace kicked back in his desk chair with his feet on the desk and an embroidery wheel in his hands. He was teased mercilessly for the hobby, but Keith understood; with all the drama and the violence that he had to deal with on a daily basis, it was nice to have a quiet and more mundane activity when you came back to base.
Thace himself was incredibly tall, nearly seven feet, with soft brown skin and hair that was styled in what Keith liked to call "The Wolverine Look." He was notorious for being soft spoken but deadly. He dressed like a middle aged father working at Target, in various colored polos and khakis, but he knew how to kill someone seventeen different ways with just a spoon. Sitting in a chair with a needle in one hand and a half-finished pillow case decorated with intricate, tiny flowers in the other, however, he didn't appear that way at all.
Upon seeing Keith, Thace set down his work and sat up straight. "Keith! Good to see you. What can I do for you?"
Keith lifted the paper, suddenly feeling a little stupid. "Uh…I was working on the…the case, that Zarkon wants me to look into."
"Ah yes. The Voltron one, I take it?"
Keith glanced up, eyebrows lifting. "You've heard?"
"I'm in charge of communications, Keith," Thace said with a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.
Keith flushed and bobbed his head. "Right, right. Um…so I was looking through the profiles for the three young adults, one of them who works for Varkon's? And he's fine, and the other guy is chill, but the girl, she goes by Pidge…her father and brother are on her page, but not recently. Their names sound familiar, but I can't place them."
He handed over the paper, pointing at the names, and the moment that Thace took them in his face tightened. "Oh. Oh, this isn't good, Keith."
Keith's stomach plummeted. "Why?"
"Katie Holt," Thace read off, slamming his feet to the floor and spinning in his chair to open his laptop. He pulled up the surveillance feed from the headquarters, filtering through various images while he talked. "Daughter of Sam and Colleen Holt. One older brother, Matthew. Both Matt and Sam were cops, Sam a detective and Matt on his way to becoming one, with the Altean Police force. Both graduated from the Garrison Police Academy. Went missing while undercover, searching for leads on Zarkon. Presumed dead as of late 2015."
"Oh," Keith said in a small voice. He ducked his head, fidgeting with the tail of his shirt.
"They're not."
Keith's head shot back up and he stared, mouth dropping, as Thace pulled up the security feed of the holding cells in the very basement of the Galra headquarters. Keith had never had reason to go to them, having never dealt with the criminal division, but he knew what they were for: rogue Galra, which were rare, or prisoners from other gangs, which were usually used to trade for their own prisoners.
In the particular cell that Thace had stopped on sat two men. One was clearly younger than the other, but it was obvious that they were related. The younger of the two was fiddling with something in his hands, a Rubik's cube, Keith realized, and the older one was laying back in his bed reading a book. That was unusual; usually prisoners didn't get amenities beyond meals.
As if Thace was reading his mind, he answered. "They both receive mild activities, nothing that can allow them to fight back or escape, for their cooperation. They've been here for over a year. Matt is well trained in combat, and we have him train some of the younger members of the group. His father is intelligent, and is used to figure out police routes, timings, the like. If they refuse…Katie and Colleen are threatened."
Keith felt the blood drain from his face. "Zarkon knows they exist."
"Yes," Thace answered, his voice grim. "However, the file photos we have of her and Colleen are fairly outdated. No one knows the name she goes by that you have uncovered, and as of this moment, only two people know that she may be involved with Voltron: you and I."
Keith's heart thudded. "You're-"
"Telling you not to say anything about her being related to two of Zarkon's most valuable prisoners, yes."
At Keith's incredulous look, Thace tisked and turned back to his laptop, shutting it and slumping at the desk. "Keith, I don't recommend that you make outside friends."
"I haven't-"
Thace shot him a look and Keith shut his mouth, looking away. "It is clear to me that you care about these three, even with the brief things you've said to me about them all. It is…impossible to maintain relationships, platonic or otherwise, if they are outside of the Galra. Especially once Zarkon is aware of them."
His tone had lowered, and Keith glanced up to see the man glaring down at his desk. A realization slammed him in the face. "Who were they?"
Thace lifted his eyes to look at him, the anger and depression in them warring with each other. "He…it doesn't matter. He's dead now."
His breath hitched and Thace pursed his lips, looking away once more. "What I'm saying, Keith…is that if you want them, that is fine with me. I will not stop you. Nor will your mother. But Zarkon will. He must think that this is purely professional for you. Otherwise…"
Thace sighed and picked up his embroidery again, thumbing the hanging thread. Keith watched silently, digging his fingers into the fabric of his jeans. "Otherwise?"
The man glanced back up, gaze heavy. "They will die, Keith."
When he returned to his room that night, Keith found fifteen new Facebook messages waiting for him on his computer.
Group Chat: OMG Keith Isn't a Recluse
Lance (Ladies Man): DUDE
Lance (Ladies Man): YOU EXIST OUTSIDE OF VARKONS?
Lance (Ladies Man): !
Pidge (Neeerrrd): why is this so surprising to you?
Lance (Ladies Man): Cause I stg the only time we ever see him is when we go bug him and Hunk at work
Hunk (Golden Boi): Yeah can you stop that btw there are STILL people whining about your impromptu karaoke session
Lance (Ladies Man): Not my fault they don't recognize talent
Pidge (Neeerrrd): it's a café, Lance, not a bar.
Lance (Ladies Man): Everything is a bar if you bring drinks
Pidge (Neeerrrd) has changed Lance's name to 'The Drunk'
Lance (The Drunk): rude
Hunk (Golden Boi): To be fair you do drink the most out of all of us
Lance (The Drunk): um excuse we don't know how much Keith drinks
Lance (The Drunk): so you could be very wrong
Pidge (Neeerrrd): come on, man, Keith is literally the quietest person I know
Keith (MIA): Actually I'm quite evil when you get down to my roots.
Lance (The Drunk): HE LIVES
Lance (The Drunk): WHAT uP
Keith (MIA): What the heck happened while I was gone?
Lance (The Drunk): Um you literally friended all of us at once and then LEFT? Jerk
Hunk (Golden Boi): He means that in the nicest way possible
Lance (The Drunk): no I don't
Lance (The Drunk): Keeeeeiiiiiitttthhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Keith (MIA): Yes?
Pidge (Neeerrrd): do you want to go get food with us later this week? we're going to a carnival at the pier on Saturday
Keith sat back from his computer, eyeing the words and pulling his fingers away from his keyboard. The pier was probably safe, seeing as their running gang, the Nalquad's, usually avoided the Galra at all costs. They didn't know what Keith looked like, and they wouldn't be policing a public fair very heavily.
His stomach coiled in pleasure at the idea of going somewhere with people he genuinely liked, and then clenched in fear when he remembered what Thace had said. Still, this could be a good opportunity to get close to Voltron, to Coran and Allura especially. His laptop dinged and Keth glanced back up.
Lance (The Drunk): Keeeeiiiiittthhhh did you die?
Keith (MIA): Not yet, unfortunately
Pidge (Neeerrrd): asdfjklsaldhakjdda amazing
Hunk (Golden Boi): Yeesh
Lance (The Drunk): What is your answerrrrrrrrrr stop being emooooo
Keith found himself chuckling, cheeks warm as he typed out an answer, pleasure curling in his gut that he promptly forced down.
Keith (MIA): I'm down with going to a fair. Just so you know, I don't do spinning rides. I have a weak stomach for flying in circles.
Hunk (Golden Boi): Me too! We can be designated bag holder buddies together.
Keith (MIA): Lol works for me. What time and where should I meet you guys?
Pidge (Neeerrrd): We'll meet you in the parking lot near Klyzap's Pier. The one with the stairs leading down to the water front.
Keith (MIA): Sounds good.
Lance (The Drunk) has changed Keith's name to 'Emo Mess'
Keith (Emo Mess): You say that like you're kidding
Pidge (Neeerrrd): omfg
Hunk (Golden Boi): You're all the worst
Hunk (Golden Boi) has changed the chat name to 'Pier Buddies'
Lance (The Drunk): Hunk that's such a boring name
Hunk (Golden Boi): Let me live, Lance.