Sorry for the long wait. A little fixated with my other fanfic, so here is my new year present for you guys. Enjoy!


—castle lounge—

His head was pounding as he awoke slowly, hearing the team arguing nearby about something.

"I leave you guys less than 5 minutes for a bathroom break," Pidge's voice exclaimed, "and you just let this happen?"

"We didn't let it happen!" Lance's voice snapped back. "It just happened! I don't even know what's going on anymore."

Shiro groaned as he tried to move from the couch, touching his head from the splitting headache. That memory…

"Shiro!" He snapped his head to his team as they approached him with wary looks. Lance said, "What happened, man? You fainted. We didn't know what—"

"Keith," He rasped. The black paladin scanned their faces, then the room. "Don't tell me K—"

"Gone," There was a bitter tone from the way he said it. "Right when you fainted, Keith sold himself to Cain." Lance looked over his shoulder, staring at Hunk who had guilt written all over his face.

She had done it again, he thought in horror. "Wait," Shiro scanned the room again. "Where's the Princess?"

They went silent.

Shiro turned pale bone. He didn't. Cain couldn't possibly—

"Cain double crossed us," Hunk finally spoke. "He-He may have returned me, but he took Allura before any of us could react."

No...no, no, no—Shit!

The black paladin shot to his feet, moving to leave the room. The black lion… he needed it right now.

"Shiro?" Pidge called.

Cain double crossed us…

"You're not thinking straight." Pidge rushed and blocked his path. "You are not thinking straight!"

"Pidge—"

"This isn't you!" She insisted. "You wouldn't just go to a galra ship with your lion with no plan. You wouldn't do this." She shook her head. "Don't tell me now that it's guilt pushing you to save 'her'!"

Her...she meant Keith, not Allura. And she was right. The rush he felt was caused by his guilt . That memory… He saw everything from her view, her perspective. He heard her thoughts, even felt it. And that cold whispering...

No wonder Keith was convinced it was her fault. That voice in her head brainwashed her, making her do such reckless things to protect the team.

Shiro clenched his fist before looking back to the others. "Where's Antok?"

"He went back to the blade of marmora base to inform Kolivan of the situation," Coran explained, stroking his mustache. But the old altein looked wary. "However, we still haven't heard a word from them yet."

What? "Contact the base," Shiro ordered as sweat dripped from his chin. "We need to discuss how to save Keith and Allura."

"Or maybe if you get your shit together, and think about this more carefully… you wouldn't have to do anything at all."

They all flinched by the new voice. Behind them was someone new leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. He wore black pants, a white T-shirt with a heavy black hooded jacket over him. The hood he wore concealed his face, sans his chin and lips.

Lance gawked. "What— who are you?"

"Names are not important now." He said, his deep voice sounded like he was bored. Tall, broad shouldered, he probably wasn't as muscular as Shiro was, but he had a good build. An ideal body for a soldier, perhaps.

"How did you get into this castle?" Coran demanded.

"Let's say a certain immortal seer dropped me off here," he replied, like this was a game.

Chaos. Shiro didn't have time for this. "I don't know who you are," he told him, "but I can't waste time—"

"if you set foot in your lion, you'll ruin all of her plans."

The black paladin stopped, and looked back to the stranger. "How can you be so sure?" And what plans was he talking about?

As if he read his thoughts, the stranger walked to him, then stopped close enough for the stranger to just stretch his arm and pat his shoulder without bending it, if he wanted to, that is. Shiro didn't realize he was just as tall as he was. "For now do nothing. You underestimate her too much. She will come back, alive, along with that princess and Victor." The way he said princess seemed harsh and biting. He looked at the rest of them with possible contempt. "You've all been fooled this whole year. The red paladin isn't someone you think 'he' is. Your friend kept secrets."

"We know that," Lance stepped forward. "Keith wasn't a sharer."

Shiro nodded his head. " He knew he was Galra. He'd been doing some things without our knowledge—" he received surprised looks from the others . Shiro gave an apologetic expression, "—and was in contact—"

Alex said abruptly, "yet none of you were close to figuring out that she's actually a female?" they stared at him with wide eyes. Both Shiro and Pidge looked away uncomfortably. "Or that her name was never 'Keith' to begin with?"

"Wait, what!?" Lance demanded, confused.

The stranger side heavily. "I hate to break this to you, but you don't know her." He turned his head to the smaller girl. "Well, maybe except you."

Everyone whipped their heads to her. "What is he talking about?" Hunk asked, brows furrowed.

Pidge hesitated. "I've… Known the truth this whole time," she confessed.

"You've known?" Something like hurt and betrayal flickered in lance's eyes. "And you didn't tell us about it?"

She snapped her eyes at him. "Look, it's not my place to tell you, OK?"

The black Paladin now found Lance looking at him. "You've known Keith— or whatever her name is, much longer than any of us. Did you know?"

For a few heartbeats, their leader didn't say a word. "Until a few days ago, otherwise before that… I had no idea."

"I wish you hadn't learned this the hard way" the stranger said. "Must be difficult to believe that she wasn't the person who you thought she was… I know you feel betrayed. But there's a good reason why she fed you a web of lies."

"And you do?" Coran asked. "Earlier you asked us to do nothing. How can you be so sure she'll return with the Princess and Victor? Cain took her as a prisoner. It's one girl against an army of soldiers."

He gave them a wolfish smile. "Follow me."


—Kate's room—

Shiro watched when the stranger lifted the mattress of Kate's bed. Underneath it was… a map of some kind, it looked just like the board that was in her shack about the blue lion. Different kinds of strings were pinned here and there, along with pictures. One particular picture was Matthew Holt, posing in a funny way behind the Kerberos ship. Above that was a piece of paper written 'slave camps? Where?'

On the cot of the bed were… documents all written in a galra language. They looked pretty important. Beside it were maps of a couple of planets, and blueprints of galra ships.

They stared, and stared at the board, wordless.

Where did she—?

" Victor supplied her the blueprints of Zarkon's mainships last week," the stranger said. "Along with other ships that carried assets in stocks of weaponry. But the planning was all done weeks before that. She knew she'd have to do something on her own one day, not wanting any of you to get involved. She'd been preparing herself."

The black paladin stared at the board with amazement and her. She'd been doing this, bearing the burden alone and the pressure that… But—

"But Cain took her, " Shiro forced himself to look at him. "She didn't even wear her Paladin armor when he took her. She's probably stuck in a cell somewhere."

"Yeah, Cain even gave a blow to knock her out." Lance added.

The man went still. " is that what you think happened?" He shared confused looks like each other. "You still don't get it, do you?"

"Why don't you just spill it already?" Lance growled

"the situation made it look like she sold herself. I mean, yes, she did willingly want you back safe," he looked at Hunk, "but she also used Cain as her transport to get to Victor faster."

They stared. Speechless.

"And as for the cell," he chuckled, "there isn't a single prison in the world that can contain her for long. I'll remind you, she's been to Zarkon's Mainship when she was first held captive. Going there again willingly would mean she knows her way. If you ask me," he walked past them to the door, "she had this all planned out. That's why I'm not worried. Kate can survive well enough on her own if given the proper materials."

Kate… Shiro frowned. Was is that her real name?

"But Cain—"

"Broke the deal," he finished the sentence and halted. "I know. But that jackass has no idea who he's dealing with. What he's done. Kate doesn't play "nice" with promise breakers."

Coran still looked unconvinced. "Are you sure Keith, or Kate… Would bring the princess back?"

"From the way I see it, I'm absolutely sure about three things. One: they will be back alive. Two: Zarkon's men are going to see hell. Three: Cain's not going to survive her wrath tonight."

The room was quiet as they stared at him, not sure how to react.

Pidge spoke. "Who are you? What, what are you to her?"

The stranger replied by taking his hood off, revealing Keith's face…


(Lance's perspective)

"My name is Alex Kogane Morkcoff," his silver eyes were bright. "I'm Kates cousin."

A blink and a steer with all their response. Lance noticed the green paladin's face went red. Was she… Blushing? Then Lance noticed how handsome with breathtaking the guy was, it was enough for women to turn Scarlet and faint.

He had the same raven black hair, same delicate pale skin. Keith and him could have been twins, if the male hadn't had those sharp silver eyes. He didn't have a mullet hairstyle, it was shorter. "I take it Kate hadn't mentioned me this whole year," he said.

"No," she breathed, still red. "Not even once."

Lance frowned at the thought. No, Keith or Kate, Kate did mention him once last night when—

Lance felt his face heat up when a thought hit him. Two nights in a row, Kate slept in his room, on his bed, with him. God, he'd pinned her to the wall and the floor, he fought and argued with her almost everyday despite actually caring for him. He'd—he'd even hugged her and held her close as they slept.

Pidge's shocked flushed face… explained a lot.

Just don't tell Shiro about this, she told him and he obeyed. She'd saved his neck more than he realized. The fight their leader and Kate had—Lance didn't know the details, but it put a noticeable distance between them. And if Shiro found out Kate slept in his room… His leader may get the wrong idea.

Lance made a mental note to thank the smaller girl profusely later.

"She did tell me," he said, they all looked at him. "I mean we… Talked. She told me she had no plans to return to earth because she wanted to avoid certain people. And you're the first on her list because she said, "I'm dead to him.""

The raven haired boy said nothing for a few heartbeats. "I wouldn't say she lied to you. But I wouldn't say she'd been truthful, either. You must have noticed by now she is a terrible liar. But at the same time, she's pretty good at being decisive. The best lies were always mixed with the truth."

"What did she mean, then?"

"Yes, she's considered "dead" to me, but that's because she made me think she committed sucide a year ago to severe ties."

"What!?" Shiro finally spoke, his face now pale bone.

"She'd placed that hypnosis on me, but I broke out of it a week later. However, Chas warned me not to come after her. Ever. That Seer told me if I did, I'd make things worse." He looked at Shiro with those silver eyes. "The announcement about your "death" made her unstable. It's why she left the Garrison. I just prayed she didn't break again, and that she could piece herself back together while being in that shack a load for a whole year."

His face was still pale and his lips thinned. Lance doubted he saw his leader this quiet, with guilt written all over his face.

Alex crossed his arms, leaning against the door, "I was wary letting her go to fight in this war. I mean, she has PTSD for one thing—" his eyes widened, "—and I know living with you must have been killing her every day due to the guilt."

"No, that can't be," Hunk stepped forward. "Everything couldn't have been a lie… I mean, I've seen her laugh and smile from time to time."

"Has it ever crossed your mind she could have been faking it?" The words hit home, and that shut his mouth completely. "She's pretty good at pretending, you know. " The boy sighed heavily. Shaking his head with this belief. "Either her acting skills are getting better, or your observation skills are terrible. Haven't you noticed anything off in what she says? How she reacts to things?"

All of their eyes widened when they recalled all the times she acted weird or said something off. There are even moments where she was terrified about small things.

They didn't know anything. This whole year…

"You said she has PTSD?" He forced the words out.

"Yeah. Repeated flashbacks and nightmares, self-blame, countless of regrets, isolation from a group, fear—" Alex narrowed his eyes contemplatively. "You didn't know?"

It was like someone had thrown a bucket of water to his face. Lance stepped back, then took another step, then another, until his back hit the wall.

Everything made sense.

Kate never got along with her peers back in the Garrison.

She even cried in her sleep. Lance heard her whimpering and whisper, I'm sorry. It's my fault. He thought it was her nightmare making her say such things, but… She had PTSD.

Every night I have nightmares and I find myself surrounded by blood and corpses, and there are so, so many of them around me.

She had screamed those words at Allura.

This whole year she cried in her sleep, alone, awoke with tears in her eyes… And no one was there for her. Kate thought none of them would understand.

I have no one left. No one.

"Are you going to tell us why she did all of this?" The tanned boy asked. That was the question he did want to ask as the answer to it was the cord to all of this. Why she lied. Why she pretended... Her past and her secrets, all of it.

"Not now," Alex said strongly, closing his silver eyes. "I want that princess here to listen to what I've got to say."

Allura had taken all her anger against the galra to Kate. Lance wasn't sure if the princess was going to live after meeting with Alex.


—later, blade of Marmora base, after Kate save Allura—

(Allura's perspective)

They had told her everything, and Allura still needed more time believing all of this, accepting for the fact that… That Kate was her real name. Allura could have gone furious, she could have demanded more answers, but she held her tongue. The princess could not unleash her rage like she did before, not when Kate had risked her neck rescuing her…

The black paladin started, " can we please have an explanation about everything?"

Alex gave them all a hard stare, then at the princess, before nodding. "You have some questions?"

"How did Kate know Victor was captured? She was asleep, and out of nowhere she screamed, "they have him.""

Someone spoke behind them, "that would have been a gift she inherited from her mother," they turned to find Kolivan standing there, followed by Antok and Roland.

"Where have you been this whole time, man?" Lance demanded

"My apologies," he said, "I was ordered not to get involved."

The black paladins brows raised. "Ordered by whom?"

"Chaos,"

Allura scoffed "And you listened to her?"

"that immortal seer has been in the blade of Marmora since the fall of your planet , princess. " He replied calmly. "She knows more about our future and fates. She personally instructed me not to take any actions as, "Leana will take care of the rest"."

"Chaos?!" Coran looked flabbergasted. "She's still alive?"

She turned to the old man. "You know of her?" The princess noticed he went very still.

"I do," he admitted, "but… I suppose now is not the time to share that truth yet. It's just another.… Complication as it is involves your father and th lions."

The princess stared at him. Coran, out of all people, kept secrets from her. The person she most trusted and thought of him like another father… He kept something from her.

Kolivan nodded. "He's right. Anyway, as I said, she inherited the gift of 'clairvoyance'. Only this kind of ability was not to foresee future events, but rather see current events happening somewhere else. Her mother did not have this gift, but it seems that the red paladin had inherited it from her late grandfather."

"Kate Possessed gifts?" Allura questioned.

"It's rare for us to possess gifts now as I myself am not gifted. But there are few exceptions for a full blooded galra to possess at least one or two, like Roland and Victor. But hybrids, on the other hand, are a completely different story. It is inevitable for them to escape their fate and be born with more than two gifts, and most of them are in hiding as Zarkon would hunt them down, forcing them to serve him, or be killed and experimented on. It seems we later got intel that Cain is a hybrid possessing 3 gifts."

Alex furrowed his brow, looking down on the floor, contemplating. ""Yes… Except clairvoyance isn't exactly her main ability."

Kolivan snapped his head to him. "What?"

"Kate may have inherited it, but it wasn't useful at times since she didn't have much of it. What's more, she couldn't control it as it occurred twice a year in her dreams as warnings.

"And her mother's actual ability was metal making, right?" He asked him.

He nodded. "Krolia usually used her gift to produce more metal blades of any kind."

Alex nodded. "Kate didn't have much of that, either. The extent of it was to her claws."

Lance blinked. "What?" He questioned. "Her nails are made of metal?"

The raven haired boy looked at him. "I want to say "made", more like she could change them to metal, making them more jagged and hard. Did you even look at the floor of the bridge back at the castle the night she attacked Sendak? She merely grazed the surface. Human nails wouldn't be able to even make those marks."

The princess was wordless as she contemplated. She didn't call her monster, but she mentioned 'feral beast' … and though she apologized, she wondered if Kate still took it personally.

"If you include Clairvoyance and metal making, She has 6 gifts in total," Alex stated.

"Impossible," Antok murmured. "Even for a hybrid, for a child to be born with that many gifts, … How is she alive?"

"It's because of chaos. But she wasn't born with some of them. Some were… Forced out of her." She didn't like the sound of it. Not even for a moment. Alex turned to her, and her body stiffed when his cold ice eyes met her. "Chaos told me if she never faced the horrors 12 years ago, she would have only three abilities: clairyovance , metal making and command ability, all of them to the full extent. But the psychological torture she endured forced three more other abilities when she broke: empath, memory manipulation, and Shapeshifting."

She lied again. Allura had her mouth slightly ajar. Kate told them she was born an empath, but she lied. How many times has she lied? And Shapeshifting? She could change into a galra willingly? Or…

"H-hold on," Shiro stammered with wide eyes. "What do you mean by psychological torture? She was abused?"

Her eyes widened as she recalled what Kate screamed at her.

You never got the taste of true agony and despair. You hear me? Never! Have you ever been someone to slave?

Slave…

Alex breathed out heavily. "Yes, both physically and emotionally," He began removing his jacket, "you might have seen this right?" He revealed his bandaged left arm. Alex began unwrapping it…

...

It was a joke . A cruel joke the ancients were playing it's her. There were streaks of scars all around that left arm, old and worn, but very visible. She covered her mouth in horror while the rest gasped.

"Kate, has the exact same thing, and more of these across her back and left shoulder. I understand if you haven't seen these wounds on her… she's good hiding it."


(Shiro's perspective)

Everything about her, he had utterly overlooked. She lied, pretended, kept secrets from him, and this whole time he thought she was…

He listened to every damn word that fell from Alex's lips, about chaos, about her powers and gifts, discovering more secrets and lies. Alex asked them how many times she dug her nails specifically on her left side of her arm, silencing them again. Kate had done it countless times while she bit her lips. She dug her nails so hard, Shiro sometimes thought it would go through her skin—

His breath hitched when a thought hit him. No… It had gone through her skin, and with those nails—claws… Kate had bandages on her left arm. He'd seen it when he ejected Sendak out of the ship. The bucket of bandages he found in her bathroom, some of them were bloody and worn.

Kate wasn't injured, they were all from self harm. Whether she'd done it willingly or out of habit, she'd been harming herself right in front of their faces.

And Shiro hadn't stopped her.

"it's time I tell you about her past," Alex declared. "Kate's past, my past, and about our beloved dead friends." He turned to the window, facing the stars and the black boy before him. "The truth our family had buried from the world for 12 years. But I'm warning you, once you know, and if you do return to earth anytime soon, you will not tell anyone or the public about this. Getting the authorities and press involved will be another raging pain in the ass for our family."

"You have my word," the black Paladin said firmly. The rest nodded in agreement.

Alex looked over his shoulder and side heavily. "I was hardly 2 years old when my parents divorced, I can't remember how my father was other than being a drunken jackass. And when my mother remarried a year later, we moved to live in Russia. My stepfather is the Russian general in the army, a very powerful man and very influential… And a public enemy to a dangerous mafia organization that ever existed in Russia… Or had been… They're dead now.

"But when they were still alive, my stepfather hunted for them day and night, until one day they had enough. To stop him from catching them… They kidnapped me, and warned him I'll die if he didn't stop. But that's not even the worst of it. To make sure my stepfather wouldn't double cross them, or use tricks… They kidnapped Kate, too. We were captured and held captive for a year."

The raven haired boy turned to them , facing them fully as what he said next stopped everything.

Shiro's heart sank.

"The mafia turned us into killers. Assassins."