As brave as Keith felt the night before, actually holding the helmet in his hands was starting to make him feel dizzy. Around him, his family sat in a tight circle, each with a helmet of their own. It was Allura's idea; the helmets would help everyone understand what Keith felt in that instant. Fear, rage, pain they would feel it all. Maybe that was what was causing Keith to reconsider his choice. They'd feel the hopelessness, his limitless resolve crumbling into nothing.
Shiro opened his mouth and then closed it again, pursing his lips. He reached out, setting a hand on Keith's shoulder in a silent show of support. Keith was grateful.
"We don't have to do this, you know," Shiro said softly. "We can wait."
Keith brushed his thumb over the Altean technology. "I know." With a rush of courage, he lifted the helmet and put it over his head. It flattened his hair to his forehead. He wasn't going to back down. Not now. His family deserved answers. He deserved some sort of closure.
"Okay, Paladins," Coran said. He was sitting to the left of Lance, directly opposite Keith. "This is going to be a... new experience for all of you. As the helmets amplify the Voltron bond, any emotion Keith feels while reliving this will be transferred to all of us."
"Including you?" Hunk asked.
"Yes," Coran said grimly. "The helmets will give me a temporary look into the bond all of you share. I would like to see...and experience what Keith has along with the rest of you."
"I believe this will help," Allura said confidently. "It will be hard. Harder than any mission we have been given thus far but...I believe we will be able to persevere."
"Take your time, Keith," Shiro said. He reached over to put his hand on Keith's knee. "No one is forcing you to do anything. If you need a break or to stop for any reason, do it." Keith nodded slowly. His throat felt dry. Everyone was looking at him with a mixture of apprehension and resolve. Keith wished he could mirror it.
"Ready?" He asked quietly. There was a flurry of movement around him; six people nodding in tandem. Keith reached out on either side of him, to grasp both Shiro and Pidge's hands in his own, and shut his eyes. He felt them squeeze back with equal force.
And Keith lost himself to the memories.
The first thing that came up was the adrenaline. Keith knew what image had appeared without needing to open his eyes. He was already reliving it, running with his arm gouged by claws and a foot aching with every step. His grip on Shiro's hand tightened, though he couldn't feel it. He feared the metal of his arm would bend and break with the force.
A ghostly familiar pain shot through him. A bullet sinking into his shoulder. Keith stumbling, reaching for the nearest door and near toppling inside. Taking his quilt-bandages and wrapping them as best he could around the wounds. Fabric wet with red blood.
Beside him, Pidge gave a little intake of air. "It wasn't Laynek that did that to you."
Keith shook his head, finally slowly opening his eyes. He didn't dare look up at the image floating in front of him. "I shot the Galran that did it," he said hoarsely. Immediately, the image flickered and changed to a new memory. Of Keith pressing the barrel of a blaster into the guard's gut and firing. "And...I killed the other one." A bullet straight through the forehead of a terrified-looking Galran was next. Keith's throat felt tight.
As one, the Paladins shuddered. He'd unwittingly sent a wave of emotion down the bond that had been amplified by the helmets. Guilt, fear, regret. All of it at once.
Lance's hands were shaking.
Keith reeled back the emotions as quickly as he'd released them. "Sorry."
Shiro reached around awkwardly to grasp Keith's shoulder with his free hand. "Don't apologize. We all knew what we were signing up for." But as Keith looked around at his teammates, he wasn't sure they were ready for the sheer amount of loss that radiated off of every memory.
"Sorry," he said again, despite himself. Pidge squeezed his hand.
"So that's how you got out of your cell," Lance spoke. His voice was thick.
"Mhm…" Keith nodded. He shut his eyes. "I tried to go for my bayard...I thought I knew where it was but…" He remembered pushing past brittle handles, smearing blood over rusting swords. He was hunting for something that wasn't there to begin with.
"It was gone," Hunk supplied.
"Yeah," Keith whispered. "It was. So I kept running."
He remembered the dizzying amounts of blood, the world spinning from pain. Staggering into a room to escape a troop of sentries on the prowl for him. Ripping apart a quilt with his injured arm and a knife. He remembered looking at the claw shape wounds and reaching for them and-
All at once, something changed. Shifted. No longer was Keith fighting for his life in a deadly escape, he was pinned to a table. A flash of colors behind Keith's eyelids - red, purple, yellow - had him reeling and the whole team sucked in a loud gasp as one. Instantly, Keith's fingers curled around the helmet and yanked it off of his head. His hands were trembling.
"Were you proud of this wound, Prisoner?"
Keith's throat felt tight. His head spun. Everything felt disconnected, like he was just observing something horrible from afar. His arm pulsed with a long-forgotten pain. He gripped it, feeling the raised scars through the bandages and his sleeve. Keith choked on nothing, panic gripping his head. He couldn't think straight. All he could feel was that inescapable urge to run run run before they caught him before they took something else of his-
"Breathe."
The command did not come as a comforting voice. Rather, it came out deep and menacing. A rasp of a voice. One reminiscent of the harsh desert winters back home.
"No…" Keith squeezed his eyes shut. His flesh fell from bloodied claws like horrible fleshy streamers. "No!"
"Keith!"
All at once, there was an explosion of feeling. Something warm, with a steady beat, was pressing against his face. Something reassuring was wrapped around his back. Something secure.
"Sh...iro?" Keith rasped. His vision cleared. His cheek was rubbing against Shiro's chest. He could hear his surrogate brother's heartbeat pounding. Around him, his family had gathered, expressions taught with worry. Hunk was half-reaching toward him, looking both hurt and afraid all at once. "Guys…"
Allura's expression sank into relief. Lance released a breath he'd been holding.
"Are you okay?" Hunk whispered.
"You...flipped after Hunk told you to breathe," Lance added.
Keith swallowed heavily. He felt sweaty and gross. Guilt crawled up his stomach. "Sorry...I thought...I thought…" He choked on nothing and stopped talking. It hurt to breathe.
"What...was that?" Pidge asked. "We saw Laynek, your arm, and then just felt so much at once. Then...you freaked out."
Keith dry-sobbed, closing his eyes. He hadn't realized the reminder of his makeshift bandages would have thrown him into one of his worst flashbacks yet. He wasn't as prepared to face Laynek's torment as he thought he was.
"Keith?" Shiro pressed. His voice was reassuring. Grounding. Keith could have burst into tears just from that alone.
"I'm sorry," Keith shut his eyes. "That memory...it's…" He paused. His metal arm felt heavier upon his shoulders. His scars still pulsed with pain that had yet to be forgotten. "It's a bad one," he finished lamely.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Coran scooted in a bit closer. He reached out hesitantly and when Keith didn't flinch away, placed his hand on his knee.
On the contrary, Keith did not want to talk about it. He would have liked to forget it even happened. But after last night, with that rush of courage to tell the others just what he had endured, to show the universe just what a Red Paladin could be…he didn't feel like he had much of a choice in the matter. His teammates deserved to know. And the burden of that experience would no longer rest on his shoulders alone. If there was one thing his father taught him, it was that internalizing things would only make the memories worse. The only way to truly be free of something haunting was to open up about it.
With that thought in mind, Keith raised his gaze to meet Coran's. He gave one short nod.
"No helmets," he said quietly. "Not this time."
"No helmets," Coran agreed.
Keith licked his lips. He snuggled into Shiro's side (Pidge pressed herself into him as he did so. Whether she knew she did or not was completely up for debate) and geared himself up to speak. "After Lotor...caught me, he...put me back into the experimentation room th-that Haggar used to try and get information out of my head from." He felt Shiro stiffen underneath him. "When I woke up...Laynek...he…" Keith broke off, shuddering violently.
Shiro rubbed circles into Keith's back.
"Don't...push too hard," Lance said anxiously.
"Yeah, we can wait as long as you need," Hunk agreed. Keith nodded but didn't back down.
"He was angry…" Keith said. "He was always angry, but this time he was...scary. I was so tired and defeated - I guess - from failing to escape that I...I didn't fight back or anything. He took my arm - the one that has already been ripped up - and...and…"
Keith shut his eyes. The image of bloody skin, strips falling to the floor and crimson splattering all over Laynek's hands and the table came to mind. There was so much blood. So much pain.
"And?" Pidge prompted gently. She was pressing him for more, but it gave the impression of being swept along rather than pushed.
"And he tore it open," Keith whispered. "Over and over again. He just...destroyed my arm..."
"The scar," Hunk breathed. He looked like he was about to be sick. Keith nodded, gripping his wrist with his prosthetic hand.
"I-It probably would have scarred either way but…" Keith shuddered.
"There is something far worse about it being a sign of torture rather than a sign of defiance," Allura supplied. Her face was twisted into an expression unknown for her. Sympathy, perhaps? Rage?
"Yeah," Keith whispered.
"That bastard," Lance growled. His tone was venomous. "When I find him, I'm going to rip him limb from fucking limb."
Ice flooded Keith's veins.
There was something very, very wrong with what Lance had just said.
"...when?" He repeated hoarsely. All at once, Lance's expression melted into horror. Shiro stiffened underneath him.
"Um…" Lance panicked, scrambling for a new answer. "If! Yeah, I meant if! Like 'if he was still alive I'd tear him limb from limb'. Yeah." He laughed nervously. It did nothing to sedate the horrible feeling that had settled like cement in Keith's stomach.
"What do you mean 'when'?" He asked. He was afraid he already knew the answer.
Gazes turned to Shiro and then to each other. It did not bode well.
"Keith," Allura was the one to speak. "There is...something you must know. Something we have been...keeping from you."
"No," Keith said hoarsely. Horror clogged his airway. "No."
"Allura," Shiro said gently. "Let me."
"Shiro-" Pidge weakly protested but Shiro silenced her with a single look.
"Keith," Shiro looked down at him. "About what Lance said-"
"No," Keith was near hysterical. "He's dead I saw Matt stab him, he's dead!"
"Keith, listen to me," Shiro said. "There were some... complications with the way Matt stabbed him. Under normal circumstances, he should have died but-"
"No!" Keith's throat was rubbed raw from the force of his scream. "No, you're lying!"
"Keith, he's not lying," Hunk said. He reached out but Keith violently flinched away. Ripping himself from Shiro's grip, he hit the ground back first ( Lotor moved so fast Keith could hardly keep up, his legs swiping out Keith's own from under him. The world turned upside down, the burns on his back screamed-) and cried out. The helmet toppled from his lap with a loud clatter.
The world seemed too small. The training deck's walls were too close and too far, all at once. His head pounded, his hands were clammy and cold. An invisible weight was settling down on his chest.
"No," he said again. His voice was raspier than usual.
"There is no nice way of saying it," Pidge whispered. There could be no beating around the bush. Not with Keith staring at them, panic and betrayal in his eyes. He looked so, so scared. Lance bit his lip, shifting awkwardly.
"Keith," Shiro spoke. "Laynek is alive."
"No!" Keith screamed again and somehow, it was the worst sound any of them had ever heard.
"Keith, I'm sorry-" Lance tried to speak.
"You're lying!" Keith shouted. He felt so betrayed. These were the people he was supposed to trust. To love unconditionally and receive their love in return. They didn't keep secrets. That wasn't how they worked.
So how did it come to Keith being on the receiving end of one of their biggest secrets of all?
Lance moved forward. "You weren't supposed to figure it out…not until you were a bit better."
Somehow, the fact that he wasn't even supposed to know felt worse.
"Why?" Keith poured every ounce of emotion into his voice as possible. "Why?!"
Shiro chewed his lip. A habit of his when he felt guilty. At this point, Keith did not feel any pity for him. He had kept something so damaging from him. They all had. They had all agreed to it.
"We thought it would be best for your recovery," Allura said.
"Bullshit!" Keith yelled. His throat ached.
"It's true," Lance said anxiously. "We all decided that it'd be better for you to recover and then find out-"
"Lance," Shiro set a hand on his shoulder. Lance seemed to shrink under it, looking up at Shiro meekly. "Don't say it like that. It was...my idea after all."
The chorus of Shiro's name called by the other Paladins solidified something in Keith. All the walls he'd allowed to come down around these people had all been built up in half a second. They'd kept this a secret from him. Deliberately. Good-intentioned or not, they did not trust him enough to let him know that this monster from his past had lived. That he still roamed the stars, probably in search for his favorite prisoner.
Keith felt sick to his stomach. "How could you do this to me?!"
The whole team felt the weight of the words, but Keith directed them solely at Shiro. His older brother. The only person who had promised to never, ever give up on him. And now, he'd hidden such a monumental secret from him. Had decided that he would let a threat to the universe - a threat to Keith - walk free without even telling the person it most concerned until he deemed it time.
Keith had never been more hurt.
Shiro said nothing, but the look in his eyes said it all. I'm sorry, it seemed to say, but it felt empty. The apology held no weight. Hollow words from a hollow secret.
Keith felt tears prick at his eyes, but he held them back. Biting down hard on his lip, he pulled himself to his feet. Shiro watched him. Pidge made a move to stand up too, but both Hunk and Lance stopped her. Allura and Coran did nothing. They just looked so remorseful.
Keith couldn't stay here anymore. He felt panic tugging him every which way, a feeling of betrayal only amplified the longer everyone stared at him. He had to go. Had to escape.
That feeling of run run run grew with every passing second.
The Castle was huge. If Keith ran far enough - ran fast enough - nobody would be able to find him until he decided to show himself. He wouldn't have to face their stares anymore. He wouldn't have to look into the eyes of the older brother who didn't trust him enough.
Keith never thought such an enormous fallout between him and Shiro was possible. Their relationship was always steady. Sturdy and filled with mutual respect and love. Keith was starting to think the same of the others until this. Their relationships had been shattered. Destroyed. Keith couldn't stay here with them any longer.
So, he turned on his heel, tears pricking at his eyes and rolling over the swell of his cheeks.
And he ran.
Man, I wish I could say I'm sorry, but I'm not.
Poor Keith doesn't get a break. First he finds out that his torturer is still alive then he damages his most important relationship to him all in one go. This poor kid just needs a nap. This chapter was honestly so hard to write because I knew what was coming. Don't worry, the bond will be mended, but not at the moment. Keith needs time to himself and the team needs to make amends first. They'll come out of this stronger than ever.
I'll see you next Saturday!
Puja723: Thank you for the congratulations! :D Cleaning is good, unless you have to do it daily. I'm so sorry D: Honestly! I needed so much more out of that relationship then Keith just yelling at Pidge once and then after that they exchanged awkward hellos throughout the rest of the series. But, unfortunately, that's not what we got. So, if I have to give more Keith/Pidge interactions then so be it xD Trash floofs are so fucking cute I love them jjkas. I love Red so much, and I love writing Red so much. Their bonds were never expanded upon besides 'oh, yeah, they're really close bonds' which makes me so sad, but thank god for fanfiction that actually expands on those bonds a little bit more. Angry Keith is best Keith :D use that rage Keith! Kick ass with that rage!
Esellyn: Yes yes! I don't like the idea of 'accepting and moving on' with memories that are that traumatic. It doesn't feel right and it's not in Keith's character to accept them and try to move on with his life. He strikes me as more of the type of person to battle those memories and refuse to let them control him.
