**I do not own Voltron: Legendary Defender (duh)
"Welcome back, Number Five! I was just coordinating some new flight formations for our next Voltron show. How was your trip to Palpe?"
Coran stood in the center of the bridge, the holographic images of the five Voltron lions soaring through the air near his head. After searching the Castle for any other signs of life besides herself and the four space mice, Mari was relieved to have finally found someone else who was home.
"It was good," she said, coming to stand beside him. "The chief and her people are happy to be back. They can't wait to start tending to their fields again."
"That's wonderful!" he exclaimed. "Palpeings are some of the universe's best farmers. They can take one seed and create an entire crop in mere quintants! It's a relief the planet is out of Galra hands. It was a great blow to the empire's agricultural supply, as well."
Mari hummed in agreement. "Where are the others?"
"The paladins are escorting a new surge of refugees back here to Olkarion," he explained. "Shiro's in a meeting with Ryner discussing our upcoming mission schedule. Scarlett is still working in her lab with Mitsubishi, and Keith is still out on his mission with Kolivan. I'm not sure when they'll all be back. We might be sitting at a rather empty dinner table again."
"Oh." Mari hoped she didn't sound as disappointed as she felt. It wasn't unusual these days for their team to eat meals separately, they were all so busy. She didn't even know why she had thought today would be any different.
"Well…I brought a gift from Chief Grimhel," she said, producing the fruit she had received to show Coran. "She said you'd know how to prepare them?"
Coran gasped. "Sions! Oh, I haven't had one of these in decaphoebs!" he exclaimed, plucking one up and gawking at it. The white flesh of the fruit shone in the light, and his eyes twinkled with delight. "The sion is as fresh and pure as newly fallen snow, and as sweet as the songs of muses. They were supposedly a cherished delicacy exclusive to the gods until they gifted one to a young Palpeing maiden of indescribable beauty, grace, and innocence."
"Wow. Fancy," Mari noted.
"Incredibly!" he chirped. He promptly chomped into the fruit, the resulting CRUNCH crisp and sure. Beneath the white skin, the juicy meat of the sion was a stark and vibrant red. Coran shivered and cupped a hand to his cheek. "My heavens! It tastes just as delectable as I remember," he smiled, taking another bite. "Oh, I could eat these for quintants."
"It's really that good, huh?" Mari mused. Curious, she picked one up, rolling it in her hand before bringing it to her lips.
Unexpectedly, the flesh of her fruit was soft as she sank her teeth into it. She chewed on the piece of sion, a bitter and rather unpleasant taste coating her tongue. Her face twisted in disgust and she quickly swallowed the yucky mush in her mouth. Did Coran seriously like this stuff? Maybe she'd just gotten a bad one.
"Eck. Tastes gross to me," she admitted, grimacing at the fruit in her hand. Where she'd bitten off a piece, the inside of the sion was a sickly green color rather than a sparkling red. "Do they all come in different colors on the inside?"
"Hm? Different colors?" Coran's gaze locked onto her fruit, only for all the mirth to drain from his eyes in an instant. "Oh, no! Mari, don't eat anymore of that! Spit it out right now, if you can!"
She stared at him, uncomprehending. "What?"
Then, all at once, it hit her. The dizziness. The nausea. The feeling of her throat closing in on itself, cutting off her air. The unbeatable wave of drowsiness that sapped her strength and pulled down on her eyelids. She stumbled, coughing and clumsily grabbing at her throat. The sion slipped from her grip, and the rest of the bunch were quick to follow as she dropped her bag. The white fruit tumbled out, rolling along the floor and entering the hall as the bridge doors opened.
For a moment, Mari's brain seemed to short-circuit and she seized up, her vision turning black and fading around the edges. Her knees buckled, her legs turned to jelly, and Coran swiftly caught her before she could crash to the floor. He hovered over her, face full of panic. His mouth was moving, but his words were muffled and becoming more and more indistinct. It was like she was quickly being swallowed by a sticky and cold and inky sludge, unable to move, unable to think, unable to feel as she teetered on the verge of unconsciousness.
Through a thin haze, more colors entered her narrowing vision. Pink and blue and green and yellow and white. The black and blue of a Blade outfit. More garbled voices filled her ears, each one becoming more distant as she sank deeper and deeper. Someone moved her, large and gentle and familiar. A comforting whiff of cinnamon tickled her nostrils. Then she was flying, weightless and free.
The constant thrumming inside of her was slowing, flickering out like a flame in the wind. It didn't bother her though. She felt oddly at peace as she let her eyes slide shut.
"Come on, come on…Stay with us!"
Keith was back from his training. He was leaning over her, his eyes wide with panic. She wanted to reach up and flick his nose, to tell him not to be sad. She didn't like seeing him sad. It hurt her when she did.
"Her vitals are dropping fast." Pidge sounded so scared. Mari tried to turn and look for her, but she couldn't move. "My systems are barely picking up a heartbeat!"
"Coran, do something!" Lance was holding her hand. Her fingers were so cold, she couldn't feel the heat of the death grip he had on her.
"Just a few more ticks! I'm looking as fast as I quiznaking can!" Coran was zipping to and fro, throwing open medicine cabinets in the med-bay and rummaging through bottles and vials of strange liquids and pills.
"She might not have a few more ticks!" Hunk was hovering just out of her sight, fretting and wringing his hands. His eyes were already shimmering with unshed tears.
"Coran, I've found it!" Allura had pulled out a vial of red liquid from the cabinet she had been searching. She rushed over to her advisor, showing him her find. "It's this one, right?"
"That is correct, princess!" Coran scurried to grab a syringe, filling it with the red stuff. He tapped the air bubbles out, a nervous fear tugging down the corners of his mouth. "Oh, I hope this works…It is over ten thousand years old. We'll need to update and restock our medicine supplies as soon as – "
"CORAN!"
"Oh, what the heck! Everybody stand back!" Coran approached, the syringe full of the translucent red liquid held tight in his grip. "I'm injecting it now!"
There was a sharp prick in her arm. The liquid rushed into her veins, spreading to every inch of her, engulfing her heart. Like a match being lit, a burning pain laced up her body, scorching her from the inside out. She convulsed. She screamed. She felt her back arch off the table, her fingers clawing wildly at her flaming throat and melting stomach. Keith, Lance, and Hunk held her down, forcing her to stay still against the med-bay bed. She writhed in their iron grips, crying and thrashing and cursing against them. But no matter what, they didn't let her go. They wouldn't set her free from this blistering pain.
It seemed to last an eternity.
Mari didn't know when it had all stopped. She didn't know when or why she had gone so still. Her body was heavy, her bones and blood and muscles and organs replaced with lead. An IV drip had been stuck in her arm, the site of the injection throbbing dully. It hurt to breathe, every inhale and exhale thin and hot against her raw throat and throbbing lungs.
She was tired.
She wished it would end.
"It's been hours," Lance huffed. He'd pulled up a chair next to her and was leaning heavily against the bed railing. "I don't understand why she's not waking up."
"It must be the fever. The antidote is burning away the toxin in her system," Coran provided, his brow furrowed with worry as he looked over her vitals on a tablet. "She's not in a critical state anymore, but she's not quite in the clear yet. It's up to her now to get through this."
"Why can't we just put her in a healing pod?" Scarlett wondered. She was here now, having returned from her lab for the evening.
"The healing pods are tricky when it comes to dealing with poisons. That's why we keep a surplus of antidotes in the Castle's stocks. Certain poisons simply work too fast for the pods to save the patient in time. The deadly toxin within a sion seed is one of them," Coran explained, restlessly pinching his mustache. "Sometimes the seed implodes under the pressure caused by its final growth and ripening stage, thus contaminating the rest of the fruit. It's a rare occurrence, but not unheard of. Unfortunately, it seems the one Mari ate had such a seed."
Keith's gaze was hard and narrowed as he stared at Mari, his anger boiling below the surface. "Do you think the Palpeings did this on purpose?" he asked. "To poison the paladins?"
"No way!" Lance exclaimed, quickly shooting down that paranoid train of thought. "Did you see the look on their chief's face when we called? She was a sobbing mess, apologizing over and over again."
"Not even the Palpeings can identify a bad sion from the good unless they cut it open," Allura said, coming to the chief's defense. "A bad sion shows no signs of its dangers on the outside. In this way, it can be sweetly deceitful."
"Indeed. Most who regularly consume it are cautious and knowledgeable enough to check their fruit beforehand anyhow," Coran added. Then he wilted, guilt tugging at his features. "But Mari couldn't have possibly known. None of you could have. That's why the Palpeing chief asked me to prepare them. …I should've been more careful and checked the fruit before she tried one."
No one said anything, unable to disagree with him, yet unable to fully blame him either.
"She's so pale now. So still," Hunk murmured after a moment. His hands were clasped so tightly in his lap, they were starting to tremble. "She looks…dead."
"If her brain wave activity wasn't so high, I'd think she was," Pidge said, grimacing as she peeked at Coran's tablet. "What exactly is happening to her?"
"Vivid hallucinations and fever dreams are side effects of the sion seed's poison…" Coran said slowly, unsurely. "Perhaps she's experiencing something rather unpleasant."
"What do you think she's seeing?" Lance wondered to no one in particular, his gaze returning to Mari's lifeless face.
Keith grimaced. "Probably nothing good."
This wasn't real.
This place, this whole fairy tale world, the seven paladins…none of it was real.
Mari remembered now. The higher she climbed along the mountain path, the more she recalled how she'd landed in this situation. She'd unwittingly eaten a bad alien fruit. Coran had given her the antidote. And now she laid in the med-bay, trapped in a comatose state.
What an idiot she'd been.
Eating a foreign food. Conjuring up this stupid dream world that was deeply rooted in her own insecurities and current worries. Believing it was real. And worst of all, not knowing how to wake up. There was no apparent exit in this realm. There was no prince who'd come along to kiss her, saving her from this storm. For all she knew, she was stuck here. The sleeping princess would never wake. And then…
…And then nothing.
She supposed in the grand scheme of things, it was better for this to have happened to her rather than any of the paladins. Or Coran. Or Scarlett. Or Shiro. The coalition needed them to defeat the Galra. The universe needed the paladins and Voltron to bring peace and prosperity. It didn't need her, an essential nobody. She'd been able to transport supplies and refugees to help their cause, but in truth, anyone could do that. What she did was nothing in comparison to what the others could do – saving worlds, wiping out massive armies, inspiring entire populations, and making real progress in freeing the universe from Galra rule. What she did…it was never enough.
The real paladins were no different from the ones in this dream.
They didn't need her.
"Mari…"
Mari came to a stop in her hike, panting heavily. She was drenched head to toe, the rain steadily coming down on her while lightning flashes illuminated her path. Before her lay a deep ravine, and as she peered over the cliff edge, it was pitch black, seemingly bottomless with no end in sight. It was where the voice was coming from, where she'd been drawn to.
"They don't need you."
"I already know that," she whispered into the darkness. "You've told me many times, Takashi."
The closer she had gotten, the more distinct his voice had become. It wasn't this world's sweet and naive Crown Prince Takashi. It wasn't this world's harsh and short-tempered Shiro. It belonged to her brother. The real Takashi Shirogane, gentle and kind and endlessly patient.
…Or so she believed. Maybe it was simply her inner voice talking to her, fabricated to sound like him. After all, there was no way the real Shiro could be speaking to her in her dreams from the real world. He hadn't even been in any of her visions of her lying in a coma. He just…wasn't there, no doubt busying himself with coalition work. There was no use waiting by her side for her to wake, not when he could use the precious time to address more important things.
Nevertheless, the Shiro speaking to her now continued. As if sensing her troubled heart, realizing he'd hurt her, he fumbled to correct himself. "No…I-I didn't mean it like that. The people here aren't real. They don't need you."
"Is there really any difference?" she wondered. "Real or not, Team Voltron doesn't need me. It never has."
"That's not true. There are only certain things that you can do for the team. There's only one you, and no one can ever replace her. …We need you more than you think." He sounded so adamant, so certain of himself. "Everyone's waiting for you, right now in real life."
Mari let out a bitter and humorless chuckle, the sting of fresh tears returning. "You're not even there in the med-bay. It's like you don't even…" She stopped herself, unable to go on as her throat threatened to close. She took a shaky breath, staring numbly into the abyss at her feet. Her toes were dangerously close to the edge. One wrong step and she would fall.
"Is there really any point to waking up?" she asked, her question coming out hollow and thin. "If I do, it'll only hurt more. Nothing will go back to the way it was before. No one will keep waiting for me. I'll be alone, just like always."
Shiro was quiet for a long moment. Then he sighed. A warm whisper of air seemed to rise up from the darkness, enveloping her and warding off the chill of the rain. Maybe it was her imagination, but for a brief moment, it felt like she was being drawn into a hug, a pair of tender and familiar arms holding her close. She wished there was something physically there for her to embrace back, but her hands grabbed nothing but air.
"Mari…" When he spoke again, his voice was soft and sad. It sounded right in her ear, clear and plain as day, as if he was standing right there next to her. "The one thing that life guarantees is change. Things will and are changing. And it's scary. It hurts."
He paused, waiting for her response. When she didn't react, merely gazing despondently into the pit, he continued. "You may be lonely now. You may be lost and unsure. But I promise you that you will never be alone," he said, gentle and sure as he infused every ounce of honest encouragement he could muster into his words. "Even if I can't be there physically, I will always be here for you."
Mari wanted to call him a liar. She hardly saw him these days, unaware or perhaps uncaring of her pain and the distance growing between them. Before, Shiro had always been so quick to notice when she was truly feeling troubled, and he did everything in his power to bring her peace of heart and mind. But now, even when she tried reaching out to close the gap separating them, he showed no interest in indulging her and having a serious conversation.
The universe didn't revolve around her, Mari knew. She knew priorities shifted in war and change was inevitable, especially for busy leaders like him. But his change in attitude, his avoidance of her…she couldn't stop it from hurting.
She wanted to believe in this Shiro and his promise, she really did. But was there really any point if he wasn't the real thing? Was there any point in taking his words to heart if this whole time she was merely talking to herself? After all, this Shiro was most likely a manifestation of her inner voice, the small and confident part of herself that remained that didn't hate her. The part of herself that spewed sweet words to make herself temporarily feel better and force her to keep going.
Was there any point in any of this? Why was she even still here?
Her irritation and impatience sparked anew inside her, and she sniffled before brushing the rain and the lingering tears from her face. "Why did you call me here?" she asked finally.
The warmth engulfing her receded, and Mari immediately wished it hadn't. As soon as it was gone, she shivered, and she hugged her arms to her chest in a vain attempt to conserve heat.
"I'm trying to help you," Shiro said. His voice had been drawn back into the abyss, calling up to her. "I don't want you to stay trapped here forever. No one deserves an eternity of torment. …You need to leave this place."
"And how exactly do I do that?"
There was a pause. "You need to jump."
Mari lifted a brow. "Jump?" she repeated, and her mouth went dry as she gazed into the inky blackness at her feet. "What, like…kill myself?"
If she died in the dream, would she wake up? Is that really how this would work? Or perhaps it would just be the sensation of falling that would throw her back into the realm of consciousness?
"No. I won't let you die," Shiro quickly assured her, as if sensing her unease. "I promise I'll catch you. I can guide you back."
"And how exactly is a disembodied voice gonna catch me?"
"Trust me. I'm more physical in this realm than you think."
Mari gnawed on her lower lip, her heart racing with indecision. She rubbed her arms, the air growing icier by the second. Glancing behind her, the mountain path had disappeared, the world around her beginning to fade to nothingness. It was only a matter of time before the encroaching shadows swallowed her too. Then she really would never wake up.
She turned back to the abyss. "You really won't drop me?" she asked, her voice tight with fear.
"I've never dropped you before, have I?" When she couldn't dispute him, Shiro gently pressed, "I swear I've got you. I won't let you fall."
Mari grit her teeth. With the world rapidly dissolving around her, she had nowhere else to go but down. Her hands dropped to her sides and curled into rigid fists, her nails digging into her palms. She took a deep and steadying breath, steeling herself as much as she could. Then, lifting her feet off the ground, she leapt into the unknown.
Her vision was flooded by darkness in a terrifying instant, quickly depriving her of any sense of direction except down. Down towards what or whom, she didn't know. All she knew was that her body was heavy and falling fast and could go splat against the earth at any moment.
But it never did. The blackness gave way to a soft purple glow, and her descent slowed as the light reached for her with open arms. They wrapped around her, flooding her chilled body with a loving warmth and comfort that made her heart clench longingly. She clung to the solidifying, familiar human form, her only lifeline in a sea of dark uncertainty.
"I've got you, Mariko," Shiro murmured, unable to hide the relief in his voice. "You're safe now. You're okay."
For the first time since this nightmare had begun, Mari let herself relax. She sunk into his hold, even as the gloom surrounding them started to lighten to gray. Purple. White. Shiro's form was thinning, on the verge of vanishing with the rest of the dream realm. Her vision blurred as that same wave of drowsiness washed over her, draining her strength and tugging at her eyelids. They were both fading fast, and she could feel him trembling as he held her tighter, afraid and reluctant to let her go.
"The others are waiting for you. It's time for you to wake up now," he whispered. He sounded so far away, his touch becoming less and less real. "Wake up, Mari."
Unable to fight it anymore, Mari's eyes slid shut. And in a quiet burst of softly glowing sparkles, she and Shiro disappeared.
"Brain wave activity is stable. Her heartbeat is picking up," Pidge reported, her voice rising in excitement. "Guys, I think she's waking up!"
"She's moving! I just saw her arm move!" Lance squealed.
"Lance, shut up!" Scarlett hissed. "Stop shouting, you'll freak her out."
Dragged into the realm of consciousness, Mari groaned. Her cotton-filled head throbbed dully and her tongue felt like sandpaper in her mouth. She could feel several intense stares locked onto her, and the heat rose to her cheeks in a rush. Self-conscious and nervous, she pressed her lips into a tight line, keeping her eyes screwed shut. She was vaguely aware of someone holding her hand, gingerly clasped between the smooth coolness of a metal palm and the comforting warmth of flesh and blood fingers.
"Mari? Can you hear me?"
She stiffened at the sound of Shiro's voice. Her guard was quick to shoot up, and she was tempted to slip out of his hold. She didn't respond for a long moment, her heart racing with apprehension as she scrambled to form an appropriate reply.
"...I can," she said finally, her voice sounding raw and scratchy in her ears.
The others shifted, sighs of relief escaping their lips. Shiro's grip tightened slightly, a gentle and encouraging squeeze.
"Can you open your eyes for me?" he asked next, and she could hear the small smile in his request.
"I…" She hesitated. "...I don't want to."
There was an awkward pause.
"But you've been asleep for a whole three quintants!" Coran exclaimed, shattering the quiet atmosphere that had begun settling over them. "How could you possibly want to stay in bed any longer?"
"I-I don't know! I'm just scared, okay?" Mari stammered through her irritation, her face growing hotter.
"Scared?" Hunk repeated, surely frowning in confusion.
"Of what?" Keith wondered, and she could practically see his brow arching with doubt.
Mari swallowed thickly, unsure of how to answer that. She was scared she'd find herself in that fairy tale cottage again when she opened her eyes, right back where she'd started. She was scared she'd be met with two Takashi Shiroganes, one kind and called Takashi, and the other indifferent and called Shiro. She was scared she'd wake to the Seven Paladins of the Kingdom of Voltron hovering over her, possibly ready to kill her.
The others are waiting for you. It's time for you to wake up now.
Mari grimaced. There was no way for her to get out of this. Real world or not, she had to open her eyes and face whatever lay in front of her. Letting out a shaky sigh, her small burst of courage already quickly waning, she pried open her heavy eyelids.
She winced as the med-bay's bright bluish-white lighting flooded her vision. She blinked several times, the blurry forms crowded around her sickbed gradually coming into focus. Coran, Allura, Scarlett, Keith, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, and Shiro, each of them wearing their casual clothes and concerned frowns. There was only one Shiro, his hair back to its black and white normal, and his nose scar and Galra prosthetic returned. Someone had changed her into her pajamas, no weird hair bows and gaudy outfits to be found.
She really was back.
"Oh, thank god," Mari gasped, sitting back against her pillows in relief. "None of you are weird."
That elicited a fresh round of confused glances. "Thanks…?" Lance managed, and the corners of Shiro's mouth quirked up.
"How do you feel?" Allura wondered, worriedly inching closer. "Any discomfort? Lingering nausea?"
"How many fingers am I holding up?" Hunk asked.
"Four." Mari scowled and pushed his hand away from her face. "I'm fine, Allura. …I think."
Coran hummed in approval as he checked his tablet scans. "I'm not detecting any more of the sion seed's poison in your system," he reported. "And your vitals are back to normal."
"By the way, you almost died," Scarlett provided, flat and unamused. "Again."
"Yeah. You ate some wacky bad fruit and keeled over just like that," Lance added with a crisp snap of his fingers. "Scared the quiznak outta us."
"Tell me something I don't know," Mari muttered.
Keith crossed his arms over his chest, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Chief Grimhel sends her apologies," he said slowly, carefully. "We called her to see if there was any way to help with your recovery. There, uh…wasn't."
"Couldn't tell Shiro that, though," Pidge said, and their leader's shoulders hunched beneath her knowing look.
"Yeah, he was all over the place looking for doctors and medics on Olkarion," Hunk pitched in. "None of them had any good solutions besides lots of rest and plenty of fluids."
"He was so frustrated, I thought he was gonna steal a ship and barge in on the Palpeings to get some answers," Lance said, only half-joking as he placed a hand on his hip.
Shiro frowned, looking anywhere but at Mari. "I-I wasn't that upset," he said, but the slight stumbling of his words gave him away.
"You almost made us cancel yesterday's Voltron show cuz you heard her say your name in her sleep," Pidge deadpanned. Her glasses glinted as she pushed them further up the bridge of her nose. "I'd call that pretty upset."
"OKAY, guys! I think that's enough reminiscing," Shiro quickly insisted, scrambling to change the subject, and the others shared tiny grins.
Mari stared at him in surprise, the truth slowly dawning on her. He hadn't been avoiding her in the med-bay. He'd been out searching for solutions, restless and desperate to ensure her survival and safety. He'd been worried and scared, just like the others. This whole time, he'd been trying to wake her up.
He still cared. They all did.
Someone had always been by her side, watching over her in case she regained consciousness. They'd almost canceled a Voltron show just to be with her. And when she'd finally woken up, they had all been here, welcoming her back to the world of the living after she'd been stuck in a nightmarish sleep for three days.
We need you more than you think. Everyone's waiting for you, right now in real life.
Mari sighed, some of the tension leaving her shoulders. She stared at each of her friends, at a loss for words. Her heart still ached, but not quite in the same way as before. It had felt so long since she'd seen them all together: just her, unroyal and normal Mariko Shirogane, Coran, the Altean advisor to Princess Allura, Scarlett, the Utearen inventor, unroyal but no less brave and noble Takashi Shirogane, and the five Paladins of Voltron, the universe's heroes.
The sudden rumbling of her stomach startled her from her thoughts, and she embarrassedly rested a hand over her tummy. Coran smiled, his eyes crinkling with a soft amusement.
"I think that's our cue to begin dinner preparations," he decided. He set down his tablet and began to remove her IV drip. "All of your schedules are open for the evening. It will be the first time in a while since we've eaten as a whole team."
Hunk's eyes lit up at the proposal of dinner. "Aww, yeah! I'm cooking up three days worth of missed deliciousness for you!" he promised, casting Mari a brilliant grin. He tapped his chin, already racking his brain for meal possibilities. "I'm thinking a warm and hearty meat and veggie stew with biscuits and salad on the side. And for dessert, maybeeee…cake? Oh! Or a pie!"
Mari's mouth was already watering at the prospect of Hunk's cooking. Her growing hunger gnawed at her empty stomach, eager to be filled with yummy things that weren't Dream Coran's awful cooking, or Crown Prince Takashi's burnt eggs.
"Can I make a request, Hunk?" she asked, briefly interrupting his brainstorming.
"Absolutely!"
"If you make the pie, don't make it apple."
"Ha ha! Like we have apples up here," he laughed, wiping away the tears. "Aw, man…now I kinda miss Earth fruits. And my mom's banana cake. I wonder if I can recreate the recipe…"
"Well, we still have plenty of good sions to eat," Coran chirped. When the others gave him appalled looks, he assured them, "Don't worry, I've carefully checked each of them. None of them are bad. They're all perfectly safe to eat!"
A beat of silence passed. Then two.
"Yeah, no."
"No thanks."
"Hard pass."
"I'm not risking dying, man."
Thus, Coran was fated to eat the remaining sions himself.
And so, after her brush with death and a three-day-long sleep, the very un-princess-like fighter pilot of Team Voltron cherished the warmth of a meal with her closest companions. Casual conversations flowed between them. Everyone was extra careful not to talk about work, whether it be about the Blade of Marmora, the rebels, Lotor, the coalition, or Voltron, lest they start an argument and rile up their recovering teammate. Smiles graced features, but it was never for long as their minds naturally wandered, moving on to the next worry now that the last had passed.
Such peaceful moments of camaraderie could only last so long nowadays. Why had it taken a near tragedy to bring them all together like this for such a fleeting instant? What would it take to mend the growing rifts between them? Something catastrophic? Something that absolutely broke them before they could be repaired? Hopefully, by some miracle, their fraying bond would magically heal itself all on its own…
How silly was such wishful thinking.
Snow White had gotten her happy ending when she'd woken up. But for those in the real world, life went on for them in all its painful truths and harsh realities. Changes were rippling through their space family, an ever building storm approaching on the horizon. And no one could do anything to stop it.
This wasn't a fairy tale, after all.
A/N: This concludes Mariko Shirogane and the Seven Paladins. I enjoy writing fairy talish things, so this was very fun (although it ended a bit sadder than I had originally planned. But considering where this takes place in the series, I think the somber mood works better – not everything can always be sunshine and happy endings, after all). Perhaps one day I'll make a longer AU version of this. Anyway, the next side story will be coming out soon, so be on the lookout for it. As always, stay safe and read and re-read some good fics in the meantime!
**Check out my tumblr to see some cool art: pufftheninja