It was almost like that first early morning nine rotations ago all over again, Allura mused as she surveyed the small common room they had commandeered for their meeting. Nearly everyone present, waiting impatiently for the last two arrivals so they could learn what exactly was going on. But this time it was Kurogane and Alejandro they were waiting for, and Pidge was the one pacing in agitation between the couches, and there was one more person present than before, the long lost Matthew Holt seated on one of the couches, Shiro on one side and a space for his sister on the other.

When Shiro had collected her from a training session with Malrento, wearing an unaccountably serious expression on his face as he told her he was calling an emergency team meeting, the last thing she had expected to see was the previously-missing Holt sibling sitting with the other paladins and being given a hasty briefing on the situation prior to the impending discussion. And when she learned he'd apparently been on this ship the entire time they'd been here, well...she was beginning to understand the reason for the meeting. The time-travellers' evasiveness had well and truly crossed a line. Had they somehow not known? Or had they known and deliberately failed to mention the fact that they knew the fate of their teammate's family?

Her ears twitched at the sound of footsteps in the hallway, startling Allura out of her musings. Her head snapped up toward the doorway, drawing the attention of everyone else in the room and stilling all conversation into a tense silence. Kurogane and Alejandro stepped into the room and immediately stopped dead at the emotionally charged atmosphere, their posture shifting subtly to a defensive stance. While their expressions didn't change, still showing confusion and uncertainty, Allura could see the wariness in the way they carried themselves in the face of the group staring them down.

"Sit." Pidge snapped, pointing at the third, empty couch across from Hunk, Shiro, Matt, and Lance. "We need to have a talk."

The two exchanged glances, a silent conversation, before moving to sit where the green paladin had indicated. As they did so, Alejandro caught sight of Matt. He blinked, looking between the two Holts rapidly before his mouth dropped open in shock. Pidge stepped in front of him, interrupting his line of sight, before he could speak.

"Would you care to explain to me," She began with a tone as cold as Blue's ice blast, "why, in the nine days since you got here, neither of you thought to mention 'oh, by the way, Pidge! You know that brother of yours that you've been searching all of space for? He's on the Long Wind! The ship we've been visiting every single day for the last eight!'" If looks could kill, both time travellers would have burst into flame then and there. "Not to mention fucking Chalthus! My Dad is dead and you knew and you didn't fucking tell me!"

Allura's eyes widened. Pidge's father was dead? Judging by the shock on Keith and Lance's faces, they hadn't been told either, and Coran's face was a mask of sorrow beside her as he put an arm around Allura's waist in silent comfort. She swallowed hard, resisting the urge to leap off the couch and wrap the youngest paladin in her arms in solidarity. Sympathy and comfort would have to wait. Right now they needed answers. With such painful revelations fresh in her mind, Pidge deserved that much. She refocused her attention on the target of the green paladin's furious interrogation.

To their credit, both wore expression of guilty shame and sadness. But there was an oddly shocked component on Alejandro's face as he peered around Pidge at her brother, and Kurogane seemed to have undergone a horrified realization. Alejandro ran a hand through his hair, looking over at his partner for a long moment before he spoke.

"Pidge, I...we...first. We owe you an apology. You're right, we knew about Chalthus, about your Dad." The green paladin nodded stiffly, gesturing for them to continue. "We just...didn't know how to tell you. I mean, how do you tell someone something like that? Hey, we're from a future where everything went to hell in a fucking handbasket and we're trying to prevent a whole lot of death, but sorry, Pidge, your dad is already dead and there's not a damn thing you can do about it?" His tone was bitterly sad as he spoke, regarding her with pained understanding, and he sighed. "For what it's worth, I really am sorry. We should have told you sooner."

She waved off the apology angrily. "Damn right you should have. And my brother? Why didn't you tell me was here?"

"We forgot he would be here." It was Kurogane who spoke this time, staring down at his hands and refusing to meet the green paladin's gaze.

"You forgot?" Pidge snapped, whirling toward the future red paladin. "You know how important my family is to me. You know how hard I've been trying to find them. And you just forgot where one of them was?"

"Because he wasn't for us!" Kurogane cried, head snapping up. His expression was pained, with tears in his eyes and guilt and sorrow raw in his face. He drew in a shuddering breath, closing his eyes for a moment as everyone stared at him in shock and confusion. "He wasn't here, not for us."

There was a heavy pause before he opened his eyes again, looking Pidge right in the eyes. "H-Pidge, our Pidge, she...she never got any of her family back, understand? The last time she saw any of them was her mother, before she went to the Garrison, before Voltron, before anything. And then she went to space, and we liberated Chalthus, and she found a record for a terminated prisoner and that was how she found out her Dad was dead. And then the war went bad and Earth was destroyed and her Mom was gone too. And then we met the Icebringers."

The silence was so thick you could have cut it with a knife, the paladins staring wide-eyed at Kurogane as he told the painful story. "We missed him by two months, Pidge. Everyone knew that the Galra Empire had destroyed a life-bearing world, but no one knew the significance of the target. Matt was the only one who recognized the system they'd attacked. Sol. Earth." He took a deep breath, looking over at a stunned and horrified Matt before looking to Pidge again. "He thought he was the only Human left. The last one in the entire universe. And he couldn't take it."

Pidge looked ashen, glancing over her shoulder at her brother, who was wide-eyed in shock. "You're not saying he…"

Kurogane shook his head quickly. "No, of course not. He's a Holt." He said firmly, as though that explained something, and maybe it did because the green paladin nodded slowly and so did Shiro, tightening his arm around Matt's shoulders. "He wanted to make it count." There was a humorless, lopsided smile on his face as he looked over at the elder Holt. "And it did. We don't know exactly what he did, and neither did Shiiar'keh-the Matt of that timeline never told them-but the Druids were decimated and even Haggar was out of action for months afterward."

Allura couldn't help but shoot the ginger an impressed look. Taking out even one druid was no mean feat, and while he obviously hadn't been fighting one-on-one, the amount of damage he'd apparently managed to do would have been a substantial blow to the Empire.

"Two months after that, we met the Icebringers, Pidge. You took your helmet off, Shiiar'keh called you Matt, and that was how you found out your brother was gone too. You grieved, and we grieved with you, but with everything else that happened...we forgot, when we came back here, because there was so much else to worry about. I'm sorry."

Stepping back, Pidge slowly sank into her spot on the couch beside her brother, who was quick to put an arm around her and pull her close. "I was just one death of many for you, huh." He stated quietly, oddly sympathetic. "And not even one you were there for. No wonder it slipped your mind."

Kurogane nodded, seemingly grateful for Matt's understanding. "An important one, but still one of many. It's...there are others that hit harder, for most of us. Ones that we never forgot."

Shiro inclined his head, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. "We're sorry for everything you've suffered, and I'm sorry to have to ask this. We need to know more about what happened in your timeline, so we can try to avoid making similar mistakes. Obviously things aren't going to play out the same way, not with the changes you've already made. But if we know more about what the Empire did in your history, we might be better able to predict the sort of things they'll do now." He regarded the two time-travellers with gentle determination. "I'm not asking for all the little details of everything you've been through. But the more you can tell us, the better chance we stand of making it through this war victorious and in one piece."

Despite the distance from the hangar, Allura swore she could hear the Black Lion roaring in support of her paladin. It was times like these she could easily see why Black had chosen him to lead Voltron-not everyone with pure black quintessence was suited to be the Black Paladin, after all, Zarkon was proof enough of that. But Shiro was everything a good leader should be, strong, compassionate, and willing to do what was necessary. She couldn't help but be grateful to fate for leading these five Humans to the Blue Lion that day.

Alejandro sighed, straightening his shoulders. "You're right. We wanted to spare you the details of everything that happened. Didn't think you needed that weight on your shoulders. But you're right about predicting them, and fresh eyes may find ways out that we missed. We'll give you the basics, the major incidents, and after that, if there's anything more you want to know about…all you have to do is ask."

Shiro's eyes softened. "Thank you. I know this is hard for you. Whenever you're ready."

The scarred man nodded stiffly, taking a deep breath. "Guess I'll start at the beginning, then. I gotta warn you, though, it's not a pretty story. You already knew that, though."

0000000000

"After we took out Zarkon and got Shiro back, we thought the war was just about over. Cut off the head of the snake, right? We were working on bringing down the rest of the Empire, one world at a time, with barely any resistance. Easy peasy. Chalthus was during that time, but that was the worst of it. Figured we'd be home by Christmas, metaphorically speaking. But we didn't count on Lotor."

"Although we didn't realize it at the time, the day everything turned and started downhill came a bit less than a year after we took down Zarkon. We were liberating another planet, some unpronounceable binary star system, when a massive fleet came out of nowhere. Battlecruisers, dreadnoughts, and at least half a dozen command ships. Way, way too much for us to take out on our own, Voltron or no Voltron. And one of them sent us a message, some guy we'd never seen before. He introduced himself as Prince Lotor of the Galra Empire, and told us that as amusing as our defiance had been, playtime was over. That was it. No 'hand over the Lions', no 'join us if you want to live', just that warning and then they opened fire. We had to run for it, and that world stayed conquered."

"None of us were sure what to make of this Lotor guy, so for the time being we kept on as we were, trying to free worlds one by one. Sometimes we succeeded, sometimes Lotor showed up with his armada and drove us off. And sometimes we'd get word from our allies that a world we'd already saved had fallen again, recaptured by the Empire. That went on for quite a while. Then...then Arus happened."

Alejandro faltered, and Kurogane took up the recounting, shifting closer to put an arm around his partner while he spoke. "At the time, we had no idea what happened there. We got a transmission from their emergency beacon that cut off almost as soon as it started, so naturally, we went to check things out. What we found...the planet had been razed. There were massive canyons torn in the charred surface, the atmosphere was ionized, and there was nothing living left. No plants, no animals, no people. Just dead, damaged stone."

"The Weblum's Breath." Keith whispered, eyes wide.

Kurogane nodded grimly. "A prototype, anyway. Not that we knew it at the time. And there wasn't time for us to give it much thought. We were losing ground. Fewer and fewer battles were going our way, and the Galra Empire was becoming increasingly brutal toward the worlds they retook. Punishing them for their defiance, and for allying with us. Some worlds were turning off distress beacons that had been active for centuries, not wanting us to help them in case the Empire turned its eyes to them. We kept fighting, though. Kept trying. We thought if we just kept pushing...then the scanners detected a fleet heading straight for Earth."

Kurogane fell silent for a moment, marshalling his thoughts. "We went, of course. It was Earth. Home, for most of us, we don't know how they figured that out but they did. We knew we were outmatched, that it was probably a trap, but we had to try. Afterward, we wished that was all it was."

"They were waiting for us. Lotor's fleet, and some new ship we'd never seen before, like a dreadnought with a cannon barrel run through it, hanging in space over Earth. It was like they were toying with us, that fight. Didn't let us hurt them, but they didn't seem to be trying to hurt us either. Turns out they were just buying time. When that thing fired…" He paused, lacing his fingers with Alejandro's trembling ones, before continuing.

"The Earth shattered. One moment it was there, then it was burning, then it was gone. Just like that, and the Human race with it, except for us. And the Galra left without firing another shot, even though they could've wiped us out then and there and we were too in shock to defend ourselves. Lotor's a sadistic bastard, he wanted us to have to live with the fact that we'd failed to protect Earth, at least for the time being. The Empire had done what they set out to do, sent a message to us and to the rest of the universe that anyone who defied them risked losing everything. Just like that, any allies we had left turned tail and ran. And while we were busy trying to process that loss, the Blade were wiped out as well. When we went to the headquarters to find out why the hell they hadn't warned us, all we found were bodies. Slaughtered by Empire rifles."

"They didn't even give us a chance to grieve for Earth, either." Alejandro said, voice tight. "Just kept hounding us every chance they got. We were running scared, fighting our way out every time, and they were wearing us down. During one especially bad fight, though, we finally found what looked like a glimmer of hope. The Icebringers."

"Honestly, we thought we were done for before they showed up." Kurogane laughed weakly. "Blue was totally wrecked, crashed on some uninhabited planet, Alejandro was in really bad shape, and the Castle'd been damaged too so we couldn't even run. Then out of nowhere, a wormhole opened up and spat out ships that we later found out were the Long Wind, the Roaring Mountain, and the Cracking Glacier. They started giving the Empire ships hell and we managed to drive them off together. They put their best doctors to work helping Alejandro while the Castle was being repaired, and started talking alliance with us. Turned out the Weblum's Breath wasn't much of a threat to people who didn't have worlds left to lose, and they were more than ready to work with us now that they'd managed to track us down."

"With the Icebringers on our side, things got better for a while. We had a fleet of our own now, and it took the Empire off guard. We started going after them directly, trying to thin out their ranks, and attacking critical resources like the Almathium mines and the ration-factory worlds. We started winning again, gaining ground, turning the tide. Things were looking up again."

Alejandro twiddled his fingers, staring down at them expressionlessly. "Then Haggar showed up again, for the first time in over half a year. It had been so long, we had almost hoped Matt had gotten her, too, but we should have known better. By that time the Empire knew Voltron had found Allies, and they used that. Baited us into a trap. They captured a ship, the Falling Tree, and lured us in to try to rescue the people who'd been aboard. Noncombatants. Children. Innocent lives. Haggar played us like a fiddle, right into her hands, and she was waiting when we got there."

"One minute we're staring her down inside a Galra cruiser, the next Shiro's eyes are glowing purple and he's attacking us and that bitch is just laughing her damn head off, egging him on and calling him her Champion." Shiro inhaled sharply, face pale, and Hunk put a comforting arm around the black paladin's shoulders. "He had Pidge and Allura down before we could even react, and Hunk was hurt trying to protect them, which just left me trying to protect them and Keith going one-on-one against him."

"She fucked up, though." Alejandro's face split in a humorless parody of a grin. "She tried to make him kill Keith. Shiro managed to partially fight off her control in order to keep from following through. He told us to run, then turned on Haggar. And we followed orders." His face dropped, and he scrubbed the back of his hand across his face, pressing closer to Kurogane, whose face was a mask of pain. "We got out. And we never saw him again."

There was a strained silence at the implications, the other paladins subtly shifting closer to their leader. Keith rose from his spot beside Coran and moved to sit on the floor in front of Shiro, pressing his back against the older man's legs as though that would keep him from vanishing.

"It was awful, losing Shiro. And with the war going the way it was, we didn't have time to mourn. Allura took over as Black Paladin-turns out, having someone bonded to Voltron's energies like that is meant as an emergency feature, someone to be a spare pilot if a back-up paladin isn't available for that particular Lion, as well as a way to track the Lions at a distance. Normally there'd be apprentice paladins, at least according to Coran, but taking time to search for candidates wasn't an option so it had to be Allura. We managed well enough like that, for a while, kept fighting, sometimes winning."

"The Empire was still taking out our allies, though, past and present. And their next target was the Balmera. Remember that Druid weapon, the one that could drain entire worlds of their quintessence? They weren't about to waste the energy of an entire healthy Balmera by shattering it with the Weblum's Breath." Hunk inhaled sharply, his normally dark complexion pale, and Lance leaned across the back of the couch to grip his friend's shoulder silently.

"We had some warning this time, thanks to the scouts, but it wasn't enough, even though they couldn't work as quickly with their reduced numbers. The Druids were guarded by an entire fleet, too many ships for us to get past before it was too late. A decision was made to engage the fleet and keep them busy while we tried to save as many lives as we could by evacuation."

He swallowed hard, and Kurogane took up the narration once more. "We saved a lot of lives. But it cost us. Badly. Hunk and Yellow were deep inside the Balmera, trying to reach a group that the scanners had missed but he'd managed to spot, when the drain became too much and the planet went into its death throes. Yellow's armor never stood a chance against a Balmera collapsing in on itself. We lost them both." Now Lance was equally pale, he and Hunk gripping each other's hands tightly and the latter looking nauseous at the thought of losing Yellow.

"They weren't the only casualties, either. We were in too deep in the battle above, couldn't withdraw once there was no one on the ground left to save, and they'd called in reinforcements to corner the Icebringer ships and the Castle. They were too close for wormholes, and too numerous for us to break and run. So Coran...He told the ships to divert to shields. And self-destructed the Castle of Lions."

Allura made a strangled noise, head turning quickly to regard her old friend. The orange-haired Altean looked oddly unbothered by the idea, and simply gave a nod to the two time-travellers, as though standing by the decisions of his counterpart. Kurogane gave the other a respectful nod in return, gratitude written plainly across his face. "It did enough damage to enough Empire ships that our fleet was able to escape via wormhole. Otherwise, I don't think anyone would have made it out."

"With the Castle gone, the four of us that were left moved into the Long Wind permanently. We finally learned about the aspects, and started training in them when we could spare the time." Alejandro explained. "It was also at that time that we did something else. Lance," the blue paladin's head snapped up at his name. "Why did you chose those nicknames for us?"

"Huh?" Lance's mouth fell open in confusion at the unexpected question. "Um, I chose Alejandro for you because you remind me of him. Our oldest brother." He clarified, glancing at his teammates. "Serious a lot of the time, but you can be playful and you obviously care a lot." His gaze flicked over to Kurogane. "And I chose Kurogane because he's like a darker version of Shiro, and I read somewhere that Shiro means white and kuro means black, so…" He scratched his cheek awkwardly, looking uncertain, as if he was worried he might have crossed a line.

Alejandro laughed softly. "I see. Did you notice we didn't have any trouble answering to those names, and even using them for each other?" Lance nodded slowly, and the others looked surprised and curious as well. "It's because we were already going by those names for years before we came back. When we moved into the Long Wind, the four of us changed our names, to honour those we'd lost. I became Alejandro, to represent the family I lost when Earth was destroyed. Keith became Kurogane, the shadow of the closest thing he'd ever had to a brother. Pidge became Holt, for the family she'd searched the stars for and only found their ghosts. And Allura became Altea, for her planet and her people."

"We kept fighting, of course, but with Yellow destroyed Voltron was no longer an option. Battles were a lot harder, and even the fact that we had the entire Icebringer fleet on our side wasn't enough anymore. We were less of an actual threat and more of a minor thorn in the Empire's side. One that had seriously pissed off the people in charge, as it turns out. It had been almost five years since we'd seen any sign of Zarkon at this point. We thought he was dead. We were wrong. Very wrong. He came back with a vengeance, gathered a huge portion of the Empire fleet, and descended on us hell-bent on making us pay with blood for every time we'd dared stand up to him and his soldiers."

"That battle was...the beginning of the end, I think. The point when we realized there was absolutely no coming back, no chance of victory, no more hope. The devastation among our ships...And we lost Black and Altea. She was never supposed to be permanent pilot, that's not what her connection was intended for. Her quintessence wasn't a match for the Black Lion's, so she couldn't form a bond strong enough to shield them both against Zarkon the way Shiro had. Altea stopped screaming right before Zarkon tore Black to pieces for rejecting him."

Allura and Shiro both went ashen at the description, the Altean leaning into Coran's arms as though it would protect her and the Human closing his eyes, obviously reaching for his mental link with Black to reassure himself of the Lion's continued presence. Alejandro waited until he'd opened his eyes once more before continuing.

"What was left of the fleet was now on the run, a couple dozen ships with three Lions trying to protect them. The Empire was still punishing every world that had ever worked with us, trying to make sure that no one would ever defy them again. They must have decided that the Olkari were more dangerous than useful as a species, because Olkarion went the way of Earth, Altea, and H'ressnol, along with a couple other worlds we didn't recognize, potential threats stamped out before they could become actual ones. We were mostly focused on staying alive at that point, although we still helped people when we could. It wasn't often."

"Eventually, the remaining packs split. Some stayed where they were, helping refugees and sabotaging the Empire as best they could, a last act of defiance. And the majority went back to Sh'ra H'ressnol, to keep it safe. Kurogane and I stayed with the former. Holt took Green and went with the latter. She thought maybe talking to the Alteans there would turn up some option that we'd missed, some secret weapon of Altean technology that might still turn things around. A vain hope, but we were beyond desperate."

He glanced at Pidge, eyes sad. "A few weeks later, the Empire found Sh'ra H'ressnol. We don't know how. All we know is we got a transmission from Holt, with the sounds of Empire weapons in the background. She told us there was one more aspect, the metaphysical element, and that we needed to use Blue's. 'Blue is chaos, Yellow is law, Green is creation, Red is destruction.' It cut off there, mid-sentence, before she could tell us anything else. Nothing about how to connect to the aspect, nothing about what it was supposed to achieve. Just 'Blue's last aspect is chaos. Use it.' and the knowledge that there was just two of us left now." Across the room, Lance and Matt both wrapped their arms around the smallest paladin, who swallowed anxiously.

"What was left of the resistance kept running, for a long while after that. The Long Wind, the Roaring Mountain, the Cracking Glacier, and the two of us, with the Red and Blue Lions. No more fighting, no more defiance. Just trying to stay alive as best we could for as long as we could. They found us, though. Took them a while, but they tracked us down. Zarkon, Lotor, and Haggar were determined to stamp us out once and for all."

"They caught us just at the edge of the Helant Verus system, three refugee ships and two Voltron lions up against an armada." Kurogane said softly, gaze fixed on some invisible point beyond the walls of the room. "Alejandro and I were fighting hard, trying to cover the ships long enough for them to escape. We saw the Roaring Mountain ripped open by a dreadnought's ion cannon, heard the Cracking Glacier's coms go dead and her lights go dark. These were beings who'd become like family to me, and I was losing family all over again. I...I remember just wanting it all to stop."

"There was a pulse, a massive pulse of red quintessence." Alejandro said softly, pulling his partner closer against his side. "And everything it touched, every Empire ship, lit up like a star going nova. One moment there was a fleet, the next..nothing. Not even shreds of metal to tell you anything at all had ever been there. Just the Red Lion, hanging dead in the middle of open space. No sign of the Long Wind. We don't know if she was destroyed too, either by the enemy or the blasts, or if she escaped somehow. As much as I'd like to, though, I doubt she made it out."

"When I pulled Kurogane out of the Red Lion, there was...she was dead. I could just tell. She might as well have been any primitive old spacecraft from Earth from all the life there was in her. He'd tapped into the aspect of destruction, but it came at immense cost. Used every scrap of red quintessence that made up her core, and it killed her. After that, it was just the two of us and Blue, doing our best to stay alive even though at times we wondered if just laying down to die wouldn't be easier."

"We talked a lot, about Blue's aspect. Chaos. We still didn't know what it meant. Destruction was fairly obvious, the most obvious of the four we knew. Chaos not so much. Eventually, though, we agreed that no matter what ended up happening, we had nothing left to lose by trying. Stay and die sooner or later, either under Empire's guns or from Blue's failing systems or lack of supplies; or try, and gamble an unknown death versus an unknown gain. We would make the attempt."

"At the end, we were hiding in the last place we thought the Empire would look. The Sol system. On Kerberos, actually. It seemed fitting, I guess, that if-no, when-we died it would be back in the place it all started for the five of us, even if we didn't know it at the time. The Persephone was still sitting there, untouched, like an abandoned monument. We parked Blue right next to her, but we left the Persephone be. We just stayed there, in Blue, trying to activate her metaphysical aspect. When I did manage it, it wasn't even on purpose. We were sitting in the cockpit, looking out at the asteroid belt that used to be Earth, and I remember wishing, so fucking desperately, that everything could have been different."

He gave a small, shaky laugh. "One second, there's nothing but stars on the screen in front of us, and Charon off to one side. The next, the view's a hangar that we hadn't seen in two and a half years and I can't fully feel Blue anymore even though we're standing right inside her. We were so damn confused, let me tell you that. But we didn't survive as long as we did by not keeping our heads in strange situations. When Allura and Keith showed up, it was a shock, to say the least. But it told us what had to have happened."

"Somehow, the last aspect of blue quintessence manifests as manipulation of time. I think Holt knew that, and it's why she told us to use it. Chaos. Change. A chance to make things turn out differently. And that's how and why we're here now, to try to make sure none of the story we just told you ever comes true."