Shiro groaned as he flopped down onto a pile of pillows in the observation lounge, his joints cracking softly as he stretched. "Once, just once, it would be nice if a mission went according to plan."
"Didn't you know, Shiro? That one mission last week was our non-fucked-up mission quota for the period." Kurogane shot back, prompting a chorus of laughter from the rest of the team as they settled in for the evening, sprawling across cushions or curling up in blankets according to their preferences. Even the laughter carried a slight weariness to it, however. The day's mission had been exhausting for all involved. Their target had been another border fleet, slightly larger than the ones they'd fought before. Unfortunately, this one had apparently recently stumbled across a world whose inhabitants had abilities of potential interest to the Empire, and not only had the battlecruiser been carrying far more prisoners than the resistance had expected, but there were also two additional Druids to be dealt with on top of the one that the vessel normally carried. The resultant fight had been long and brutal, requiring all five paladins, Alejandro, Kurogane, and Allura, the latter three of whom had arrived with Icebringer reinforcements to help keep the soldiers off their backs and evacuate the prisoners.
The black paladin grimaced, chuckling tiredly. "It sure seems that way sometimes, I have to admit." He lifted his head as Matt approached, the younger male settling down beside him with two mugs of what had been dubbed 'space hot cocoa', another product of Hunk's endless efforts to give the team a taste of home when home was so far away. "And you, what were you doing going in on that ship? It was an active combat zone!" He'd nearly had a heart attack when they finally finished off the last Druid and went to help with the prisoners, only to see his boyfriend working on one of the badly abused prisoners in the cells. There hadn't been time to confront him about it earlier, not with the battle raging both inside the ship and out.
"My job." Matt stated blandly, calmly disregarding the paladin's dismay as he took a sip from his mug, winced at the heat, and set the other down in front of Shiro. "Quite a few prisoners needed to be stabilized before they could be moved, they needed as many medics as they could to go over and help."
"But your leg-"
"I wasn't walking on it, 'kashi, relax. I'm partnered with Hwrek'shaa'kel for ground missions for exactly that reason."
"You've done this before?" Shiro couldn't quite keep the note of dismay out of his voice at the thought of Matt going into the middle of a battlefield, even partnered with a H'ress for mobility and protection.
Matt chuckled, rubbing Shiro's shoulder calmingly and setting aside his mug. "Yes, lots of times. I know what I'm doing. Now lay flat, you look like you could use a massage after all that fighting."
Abused muscles protesting the change in position, the black paladin obediently stretched himself out on the soft carpet, folding his arms under his chin as Matt straddled his hips and dug gentle thumbs into his shoulder blades. "I just worry." He said softly, grunting as the other prodded a particularly sore spot. "I don't know what I would do if anything happened to you now that I've found you again. I just want you safe."
The younger man's hands stilled for a moment before resuming their steady smoothing of the knots in his muscles. "I know. But we're fighting a war, Takashi. There's no such thing as safe out here." His voice was quiet and regretful. "I want you to be safe too. But until this war is over, that just isn't going to happen for any of us no matter how much we want it." He dug his knuckles in on either side of Shiro's spine, prompting a groan. "I promise, though, that I'm being careful. I'm not the same person I was that day in the arena. I know how to protect myself now."
Neither of them were the same as they had been two years ago. Shiro knew that. You couldn't go through the things they had and come out unchanged. Matt may have been spared the arena, but he'd suffered all the same, been cruelly maimed and forced to watch his father murdered in cold blood, been isolated and unable to communicate, and eventually ended up on another front line of this ancient war. He carried most of his scars on the inside, but that didn't mean they weren't there.
"Alright. I trust you." Shiro said softly. He let his eyes slip half-closed, enjoying the magic Matt's fingers were working across the tense muscles. Most of the rest of the team seemed to have decided Matt's idea was a good one, and had paired up to work the aches of battle out of each other's bodies and patch up the thankfully minor injuries left from the fight. He could see Kurogane working his hands over Alejandro's shoulders, and a blushing Lance doing the same for a red-faced Keith. Shiro chuckled and shook his head. Those two were absolutely hopeless.
Out of the corner of his eye he could see Pidge smearing some kind of ointment on Allura's arms while Hunk hovered close by with bandages. The Altean Princess had taken the brunt of a thankfully-weak lightning blast from one of the Druids towards the end of the fight, and the three were engaged in quiet conversation, battle tactics from the sound of it. The sight of the youngest paladin reminded him. "Did you ever figure out what Pidge was being so huffy about last night?"
"Sort of? Something about time-travelling weirdness that should be going both ways and wasn't. Apparently Alejandro can feel Blue but Kurogane can't feel Red?" Strong hands kneaded Shiro's back and he let out a soft moan as he melted under his boyfriend's hands. "There was something about Lance and nightmares in there too, but I didn't quite follow. It's been a long time since I had to keep up with a Katie-rant and I'm really out of practice."
Shiro hummed thoughtfully. "Well, if anyone can figure out whatever's bugging her, she can." He shifted, popping a few joints in his spine, and grunted. "You better stop, Matt, or I'm going to fall asleep on you."
Matt laughed but did as he was told, sliding off the paladin's back to sit beside him."Is that a bad thing?" He grabbed his mug, tasting it cautiously for temperature, then took a longer drink with a satisfied sigh.
"It is when I haven't had a chance to return the favour." He levered himself upright and moved to sit behind his boyfriend, who straightened obligingly before arching with a pleased sound as Shiro pressed careful fingers into his shoulders.
"Any problems with your new prosthetic?" Matt asked as he crossed his legs in front of himself, shifting this way and that to guide the other's hands to the sorest spots. "You don't seem to be having any issues with fine motor control."
Shiro shook his head, glancing down at the smooth blue-white metal of the limb as it moved smoothly alongside his natural one. "No. It's fantastic. No discomfort, and if anything I think it's even more responsive than the old one." To demonstrate, he dug the knuckles of the artificial hand into Matt's shoulder blades, an area he knew from years of experience tended to knot up when the younger man had been working hard. He was rewarded with a soft groan of delight as the ginger nearly melted under his touch and grinned. "See? Works perfectly."
He quickly settled into a rhythm, working his way slowly down the length of Matt's back. Despite the fact that Shiro was the one who had been fighting today, it was the other man's muscles that carried more accumulated tension since the black paladin had at least had other Humans around him for the last year and Lance had a sharp eye for whenever his teammates were in need of a massage, and he was determined to remedy that neglect now that he had the chance. Slowly smoothing away the knots, he worked his way back up to the base of the neck, pleased to feel Matt slowly going boneless and relaxed under the attention.
As he pushed the messy ginger hair out of the way for better access to the neck muscles, however, he was startled by vibrant orange-yellow colouration on the skin underneath. There was no difference to the texture of the skin as he ran his fingers over it, but the colour remained. "Matt? What's this on the back of your neck?" He asked uncertainly.
"Hm?" Matt blinked sleepily, having seemingly fallen into a slight doze in his relaxed state. "My neck?" He reached back to where Shiro's fingers still rested on the strip of yellow between the base of his hair and the collar of his shirt. "Oh." He laughed. "Right, I didn't show you that, did I?"
"Show him what?" Allura asked curiously from the other side of the room, immediately catching the attention of the rest of the group. Her sharp hearing had apparently picked up their conversation despite the low tones of voice they'd been using. Matt flushed under the curious gazes, rubbing at the back of his neck.
"My H'ress'kaayan. I never showed it to you guys." He explained awkwardly, suddenly shy under so many eyes.
Alejandro stiffened and Kurogane's eyes went wide. "I'm sorry, did you say you have a H'ress'kaayan?" The former blue paladin asked slowly. Shiro could see the other paladins exchanging confused looks and a couple of shrugs. Allura, however, seemed as startled as the two time travellers and Coran had a frankly impressed expression on his face as he twisted his moustache between his fingers, looking at Matt intently.
Matt nodded, a small smile on his face. "Yeah. And yes, I understand what it means, even if I was still working on my language skills when they gave it to me." He reassured the pair.
"Great, now how about you fill in the rest of us?" Pidge complained loudly. The others nodded in agreement, and Shiro felt a surge of curiosity as well. He and Matt had slowly been learning bits and pieces of each other's years apart, but with everything going on there was only so much time to talk in a day and there was still many gaps to be filled in the two years that had brought Matt to where and who he was now.
It was Allura who spoke up to explain, brows furrowed in the frown of concentration of someone trying to remember something learned years earlier. "The closest literal translation would be 'Hunter's honour.' A H'ress'kaayan is a ritual tattoo, a symbol of immense honour among the H'ress people, awarded to those of the pack who live up to their highest moral ideals."
"Specifically, H'ressyan kaa, H'ress sh'ra." Alejandro put in, blue eyes fixed on Matt as he spoke. "'Pack first, Hunter second.' It's exactly what it sounds like. Placing the needs and wellbeing of your pack above your own. The H'ress'kaayan is only given for major feats of valour, though. What exactly did you do to earn one, Matt?" He tilted his head to the side curiously.
Matt huffed out a sigh. "I still think they made too big a deal out of the whole thing, giving me that. I was just doing what made sense and needed to be done."
Hunk narrowed his eyes. "Come on, just tell us, man. If the Icebringers thought it was a big deal, then maybe it was."
Throwing up his hands, the medic let out an exasperated noise. "Fine, fine! I led the rearguard effort during the evacuation of the Boiling Rock, okay? That's all!"
"That was you?!" Kurogane burst out, startling everyone. "The Icebringers have been using your strategy for the evacuation of boarded ships ever since! It saved, or at least extended, hundreds of thousands of lives over the course of the war! Holt and I rearguarded the Heavy Storm's evacuation using that strategy, it was brilliant!" Looking around at the baffled expressions on the faces of the others, he elaborated. "The strategy involves venting sections of the boarded ship to vacuum, creating a bottleneck as the boarders advance through the ship. We were told that when it was first used on the Boiling Rock, the Hunter who came up with the strategy, who was apparently Matt, led a dozen other Hunters in holding the bottleneck against the advancing soldiers while the rest of the ship was evacuated behind them via wormhole. It cut the death toll by more than two-thirds."
"Like I said, I was just doing what needed doing." Matt insisted quietly as Shiro regarded his boyfriend in shock. "The Icebringers rescued me, took me in, and made me part of their family even before I knew how to say more than a handful of words they could understand. They were in trouble, and I could help." Matt's calm expression as he talked about holding off an army with a handful of other fighters clashed in his mind with the terrified face that had been the last thing he saw of the other in the arena two years earlier, the difference almost overwhelming in its drasticness. What he couldn't do for himself back then, he'd been able to do for those he cared about since, forged himself into a warrior in an instant to protect the new family he'd found.
"Regardless, from the sound of it, you have more than earned your H'ress'kaayan." Allura stated firmly. "It certainly explains why the others were so quick to listen to you at the strategy session when you suggested focusing our efforts on eliminating the Druids. Not only had you already proved yourself a capable strategist, but you were also someone who had proven their devotion to the ideals of the pack and earned their respect."
Hunk tilted his head thoughtfully. "You said it was a ritual tattoo. Is that why Shiiar'keh has those colourful dyed patches of fur on their back?"
Alejandro nodded. "Yes, that's what a H'ress'kaayan looks like on a H'ress. Tattoos dye their fur for some reason. When you meet other Icebringer ships you'll find that the pack leaders almost always have them, since the kind of beings who earn them usually also exhibit behaviours that make the rest of the pack look to them as leaders. On other species, though, it's usually a tattoo just like on Humans."
"...Matt has a tattoo." The green paladin looked baffled by this revelation, staring at her brother with wide eyes. "An alien ritual tattoo of badassness, but still. My dorky nerd brother has a tattoo." Shiro snorted in spite of himself as he glanced over at Matt. Pidge made a very good point, the ginger was one of the last people he would have ever expected to do something like that. The snort turned into a burst of laughter at the teen's next comment. "Mom is going to kill you."
Matt snorted himself, shaking his head. "Would it help if I said that the tattoo design is nerdy as hell? No skulls or blood or anything like that. H'ress'kaayan are supposed to be something that is meaningful to the person wearing them, and mine is exactly that."
"I dunno if I believe you." Pidge fired back, propping her chin in her hand. "I think you better show us so I can make sure you're not an evil clone masquerading as my brother after all."
"Fine, fine. I figured you'd want to see it as soon as this conversation started anyway." The older Holt sibling huffed, pushing himself to his feet. He tugged off his shirt, and Shiro had a moment to be relieved that aside from a few rows of small claw punctures in his upper arms Matt didn't seem to have any obvious scars on his upper body before the younger man turned around and the black paladin's breath caught in his throat. He was distantly aware of the sharp inhalations and startled exclamations from the others, but all his attention was locked on the intricate tattoo on his boyfriend's back.
The yellow he had seen was part of a golden sun that peeked out from under his hair, yellow-white corona flaring outwards across Matt's shoulders and down over the bump at the base of his neck. The detail was incredible, right down to a scattering of sunspots over the surface.
Below that, running the length of Matt's spine, were the planets. Tiny Mercury, golden Venus, the familiar blue-brown-green marble of Earth, complete with clouds, and the rusty red of Mars. The large banded globe of Jupiter with its red spot, and pale Saturn with its extensive rings. The more simply banded blue spheres of Uranus and Neptune. And small rocky Pluto with her icy heart-shaped plain. All nine planets were rendered so faithfully they might as well have been pulled directly from any science poster at the Garrison, and Shiro couldn't begin to imagine how long they must have taken to do.
It wasn't just the planets, either. A wide band of tiny asteroids wove across the shoulder blades between Mars and Jupiter, and a dusting of comets, half-hidden by the waist of his pants, sat below Pluto with their tails fanning away from the sun. And every planet was accompanied by its moons, fanning out on either side in graceful layered curves. Earth's Luna and Mars's Phobos and Deimos. Shiro could easily identify the larger globes of Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto among Jupiter's sixty-nine attendants, and massive Titan among Saturn's sixty-two. Uranus was flanked by her twenty-seven small moons, and Neptune's Triton stood out amongst her fourteen. And Pluto was encircled by her five moons, enormous Charon and the much smaller Nyx, Hydra, Kerberos, and Styx, all so accurately detailed he could almost imagine he could look closely and see the Persephone perched on tiny Kerberos's icy curve.
The entirety of the Sol system was painted permanently into Matt's skin, with Earth nestled high between his shoulder blades, directly over his heart.
Maybe I would never see home again-Earth wasn't in the Icebringer charts, so they couldn't take me home even though they wanted to. Matt's words from the night they talked about the past and the present and their feelings for each other came unbidden back into Shiro's mind. At the time the tattoo had been done, Matt had believed he would likely never see Earth again. All he had left of his home was his memories. And when he had had to choose something meaningful to him to ink onto his body in honour of his actions, he had chosen something he didn't want to ever forget.
Shiro was on his feet before he'd even realized he'd moved, pulling the man he loved into his arms and holding him tightly. "You'll see Earth again, Matt." He promised fervently. "I swear I'll make sure of it. Once this war is over, we'll all see it again together."
"I hope you're right, Takashi." Matt whispered into his collarbone, so softly he almost couldn't hear it. "I really, really do."
000000000
Everything is chaos around him, a twisting whirlwind of dark metal and brighter lasers and the on-and-off flashes of stars between the Empire fighters. Red is diving, striking, roaring fury to the distant nebulas, but for every ship that flashes to flame under her claws there are more, always more, a thousand for every kill.
He fights, because that's all he can do. Fights for his life, fights for Alejandro's life, fights for the lives of those on the Long Wind, Roaring Mountain, and Cracking Glacier that are all the family he has now.
Light blazes brilliant purple through the darkness, the too-familiar glare of an ion cannon. Fighters part from its path, and for a moment, he can see all too clearly. The Cracking Glacier hangs in space, lights dead and guns silent and he can see the white mist of atmosphere dissipating into vacuum around the rents in her star-spotted hull. Further away, the Roaring Mountain has been torn nearly in two, the edges of the fatal blow still glowing red from the heat of the cannon blast that ripped its deadly path through the ship. He can't see the Long Wind at all.
Where is Blue? Where is Alejandro? He can't see them anywhere no matter what direction Red turns. Fear stabs through him, like knives tearing at his insides, terror twisting him into knots. Please no, he can't lose Alejandro too, he's all he has left. You've won, he screams fruitlessly to the Empire ships, please, please just leave us alone, it's over, we give up, please just don't take him from me, just stop-
Red.
Everything is red, a haze of heat sensed rather than felt that seems to cover the universe. The Red Lion is screaming, a desperate cry of anger/determination/pain/fear as red surges outwards and wrongness crackles over the broken ends where her bonds to Black and Green and Yellow are supposed to be, but it's too late, they can't stop what they've started, he feels a last brush over his mind of sorrow and love-
The world outside turns from purple darkness to searing white, like the flash of nuclear bombs in those old videos from history class, then everything goes still.
The piercing shriek of an alarm overhead had Kurogane on his feet and his bayard in hand in an instant. He could feel Alejandro's back pressed against his, the heaving of his own chest, the unstable surface of pillows and blankets underfoot, see other figures scrambling to their feet in the dim light of the stars through the observation lounge's wide glass wall. He raised his sword in automatic defense before he fully registered the faces around him, put them together with his surroundings and remembered where he was.
The Castle of Lions. The lounge. This timeline's versions of his team around him, not enemies. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, lowering his bayard as he felt the familiar touch of Alejandro's hand against his shoulder in unspoken reassurance, and tried to shake off the old memory.
Kurogane opened his eyes again and allowed Alejandro to tug him toward the door in the wake of the other paladins, the alarm still wailing around them. There was no frantic rush to grab their armor and bayards, so they weren't under attack, nor was it the familiar proximity alarm that would warn them of an approaching hazard. It took him several seconds to sort through his memory and identify the siren as the one Allura used for emergency meetings, whenever they received critical intelligence that she didn't feel should wait until morning.
The clock of war and death hanging over all their heads seemed to tick louder in time with the klaxon. Could the others hear it too? Or was he the only one who could feel it counting down to defeat?
They emerged onto the bridge and stopped short behind the rest of the group. Allura and Coran were standing by the main communications console, conversing in low tones with unmistakably grim expressions on their faces. The main screen showed a frozen recording, Kolivan's face staring out at them with an even deeper frown than the old Galra usually wore. Alejandro grimaced as he studied the scene, rising up on tiptoe to peer over Shiro's shoulder. "This can't be good." He muttered quietly. Kurogane nodded his agreement with that assessment as Allura waved the team closer. They fell into line between Keith and Shiro in a loose semicircle around the two Alteans at the console.
Allura gestured to the screen behind her, expression troubled in a way that only deepened the feeling of dread in the pit of Kurogane's stomach. "As you can see, we've received a recorded message from the Blade of Marmora. I apologize for disturbing your rest, paladins, but given what Kolivan had to say I thought it best to share this information with you as soon as possible so we can begin to make plans. Time is of the essence." The clock seemed to tick louder in the former red paladin's head as the Altean Princess touched a button on the console and the screen flickered to play the message over again from the beginning.
"Greetings, Paladins." The head Blade's voice was a low growl, steady as always, but Kurogane thought he heard a note of exhaustion in it. "I have news. I wish I could say it was good."
"Since we last spoke," Kolivan continued, "the Empire has been very active, with many changes taking place under Lotor's command. He appears to have diverted his attention away from his efforts to consolidate control. Likely he is relying on the loyalty of the stronger commanders to keep their weaker counterparts in line."
"At his direction there has also been widespread reshuffling of skilled personnel and general manpower, with many of his father's projects being downsized or abandoned altogether. Until now, I was unable to determine exactly where those resources were being diverted to, since Lotor has many projects of his own." Galran faces did not show stress in the same ways Human ones did, with bags under the eyes and lines of exhaustion. To the former red paladin, though, the signs were obvious in patches of matted fur and twitching ears that spoke of too long in front of the console correlating reports and piecing together a hundred sources of patchwork information. "I now have reason to believe the world-breaker weapon of which you spoke is already under construction."
The chorus of horrified exclamations from the cluster of Humans nearly drowned out Kolivan's next words. "In the last two rotations there has been a sudden further increase in the absorption of specific resources by an unknown project. They had been taking pains to disguise where the manpower and materials were being sent-I believe the spy in our ranks has already compromised many of my undercover operatives, allowing Lotor and Haggar to control what they see. False courses, multiple destinations, all designed to prevent us from knowing exactly where things are going. But the reassignment of the best engineers in the Empire, and the seeming disappearance of huge quantities of slave labour, ship metal, and especially almathium, when there has been only minor increases in activity at the shipyards, all point to one thing and one thing only."
The old Galra sighed, leaning his hands on the console in front of him as his head hung low. "I wish I had more information for you. But the Blade who should have been able to provide more insight than any other into the machinations of the current leadership, Lieutenant Kovirak, currently resides at the top of the list of those who I suspect in the role of traitor, and has yet to tell me anything the others have not."
"The weapon is being built, and at speed judging by the increase in diverted materiel. I do not know where, or how soon it will be complete." He huffed out a low breath, and a small square opened in the lower right corner of the image, an attached data file making its presence known. "But I do know where you can find out. The file I have sent with this message contains everything we know about the Trepan Kev administrative complex. Trepan Kev is a heavily-fortified facility that serves as a back-up for the Empire's administrative data in the event of a major systems failure at Central Command or one of the other major bases. When the Green Paladin devastated their computers during the battle with Zarkon, the database was restored from the computers at Trepan Kev. It should contain the genuine disposition of materials and personnel within the Empire's territory."
"Gaining access will not be easy-my Blades have been trying and failing for centacycles, both covertly and overtly. It is heavily defended and the digital security is some of the best in the Empire. But I believe it is your best chance at locating and stopping the weapon before it can be deployed. Start by tracing the almathium shipments. Of the quantities mined in the last few decarotations, only a fraction has gone into the ion cannons of new cruisers and dreadnoughts while the rest has disappeared where my Blades cannot find it."
Kolivan straightened, his expression grim. "Good luck, Paladins. May Marmora guide your search." The image froze as the recording ended, the file opening automatically and the data within scrolling across the screen.
A stunned silence followed the end of the playback for several seconds before Lance, hands clenched into shaking fists at his sides, abruptly whirled on Alejandro. "I thought you said we had longer before they built the Weblum's Breath?!" He demanded, a frantic light in his eyes.
Alejandro took a step back and held up his hands defensively. He looked every bit as shaken as his younger counterpart, tanned skin ashen. "We should have! They weren't supposed to deploy the prototype for another year!" The former blue paladin drew in a shaky breath, running a hand through his hair as he began to pace, taking a few steps at a time this way and that. "This isn't how it was supposed to play out, Lotor was supposed to finish consolidating control and start sending the fleets after us long before the Weblum's Breath came into play!" Kurogane tried to put a calming hand on his partner's shoulder in an effort to forestall the panic attack he could see building, but the other shrugged it off and continued his agitated movements. "I don't understand, why did it change?"
"Chaos!" Pidge cut in furiously. "Blue's aspect was chaos, it's the butterfly effect. Reality is a chaotic system and a highly sensitive one at that, you've been introducing changes from the moment you arrived, of course things aren't playing out the same way, we're not doing what we did before, the Icebringers aren't doing what they did before, the Blade aren't doing what they did before, you've changed the actions of hundreds of thousands of people directly let alone the indirect!" Her words were delivered rapidly as she pushed her glasses up on her face with a deep scowl. "You didn't seriously expect everything to play out the same, did you, that's not how time travel works when you have an alterable future, we're not going to be able to predict anything beyond the likely targets based on what you went through!"
Lance threw up his hands, rocking on his heels on the spot. "Obviously that's exactly what they expected, and now-"
"Alright, that's enough!" Shiro's voice cut across Lance's, the unmistakable command in his tone silencing them and making Pidge and Lance reflexively snap to attention. He quickly stepped into the middle of the three, hands up in a peacemaking gesture. "All of you, take a deep breath. Hunk, Keith, Kurogane, you too." He ordered firmly, and suited actions to words by inhaling deeply and holding for a moment before letting it out slowly.
Kurogane followed the black paladin's order automatically, sucking in a slow breath. Only then did he become aware of the ringing in his ears and his own racing heartbeat. As he started to calm under the head of Voltron's gentle coaching he realized that the shock of the terrifying news had brought most of the team to the verge of their own anxious meltdowns. Besides Lance and Alejandro's jitteriness and Pidge's wild ranting, Keith had curled in on himself in a visibly defensive posture, likely in response to the yelling, and Hunk looked as though he was going to be sick. Even Matt was pale as he rubbed the Yellow Paladin's back soothingly.
Shiro surveyed his team and sighed. "There we go. Now, yelling at each other is not going to help anything. Yes, we should have realized that we'd changed the course of events outside of our direct actions," Pidge snorted and crossed her arms, "but, I do think this is a more dramatic change than we might have reasonably expected. Not to mention none of us thought of it." The subtle reprimand, aimed directly at her, quickly settled the green paladin.
"What we need to focus on," Shiro continued firmly as he looked around at all of them, "is what we do now. Kolivan's information gives us a good place to start. Matt, Pidge, I want you to start looking it over immediately. Figure out what defenses we're dealing with and what sort of resources we're going to need for an attack on it to get the information we need." The two Holts nodded firmly, heading over to Pidge's station to call up the file, the elder dropping into the seat while his sister draped herself over the back of the chair to look over his shoulder. "Kurogane, contact the Long Wind. Update them on the situation and tell them we need to call an emergency strategic session as soon as possible."
Kurogane gave a single sharp nod as he headed for the communications console, dismissing the image of Kolivan's grim countenance and tuning out the sound of Shiro assigning tasks to the rest of the team-rest was out of the question right now, with this hanging over their heads, and having something to do would keep them focused and their fear under control.
Pidge was wrong, he knew, once they'd realized they'd travelled through time it hadn't taken them long to realize that they could make changes with impunity and that those changes would beget other, unanticipated changes. They recognized the significance of the word chaos too, after all. But they hadn't expected such a drastic difference so soon. Which of the alterations they'd made had led to this, to a complete reversal of Lotor's focus from controlling the army to promoting the construction of the Weblum's Breath? The Druids they'd killed? The prisoners they'd freed? Their warning to the Blade? The other paladins learning the aspects? There was no way to know, no way to look into the past and trace the path that had led them here. All they could do was exactly what Shiro had said and focus on what to do now.
Kurogane touched the console, opening a connection to the Long Wind and the surprised on-duty communications specialist. "Avenol, we have a problem. I need to speak to Shiiar'keh immediately."