With Matt's help fixing the damage to the castle went far quicker than it would have with Allura and Coran alone. It wasn't long until they could pick up distress signals from the black and green lions.
"What about the other three?" Thace asked, looking over Allura's shoulder at the maps she had pulled up of the two locations.
"Well the red Lion is probably too damaged to put out a signal after what Keith did-"
"Wait he's the one who did that?" Matt asked. "Of course he is never mind why did I even bother."
"I'm not sure why we wouldn't be getting a signal from the other two, but the black lion is closer, so we'll go get Shiro first." The Princess stated. Thace was going to comment that either place was nearly the same distance from where they were now, but decided against it. Soon the castle ship had left the moon's atmosphere, and the Alteans opened a wormhole to the Black Lion's location. Thace looked at Matt as they flew towards the blip. His face was a blank slate, the only give away to any tension was the white-knuckled grip he had on the side of the control panel. He had braided his bangs back to either side of his head so that they met into a small ponytail in the back, keeping them out of his eyes while they were working earlier.
"Keith is with him!" Coran exclaimed. His eyes flew to the screen and he sighed in relief. They looked worse for wear, Shiro and the Red Lion especially, but there they were. Alive. The moment the Paladins got into the Black Lion (Red, out of commision, was carried behind her,) Coran was gone to the med bay, and Matt had ran to the Black Lion's hangar at full speed.
"I never realized how fast humans were capable of going before seeing him," Allura told Thace, grinning as she recieved a a beacon from Lance and Hunk, who were on a frozen planet relatively close by.
Elsewhere in the castle Matthew jumped over a bannister, having run halfway down the stairs and deemed it close enough to the ground to just roll through the landing.
"TAKASHI!" he yelled at full airhorn-esque volume when he caught sight of them. Shiro was holding his side, leaning heavily on his little brother. The two stopped walking, looking at him in utter shock as he skid to a stop in front of them.
"M-matt?" Shiro asked, voice strained. Matt wrapped his arms around him, avoiding the injury and taking nearly all his weight off of Keith.
"I'm here babe, I'm here," Matt whispered.
"Babe?" Keith asked quietly.
"Shut up."
"It's about time."
"I said Shut Up. Now come on Coran was getting a pod ready you can run ahead and help I've got him."
"You sure you want to take him by yourself?"
"I can lift more than you Gyeong, run along now." Matt's words made Shiro chuckle a bit before keith took off to help with the pod. Matt readjusted the two of them and followed.
"He's not exactly a kid anymore Matt, you know that right?"
"Ghost Boy will forever be twelve just like Katie and no one will ever convince me otherwise," Matt said stubbornly as they trudged along. Shiro snorted.
"So what's up with the glowy shit? You get stabbed with an open glow stick or something?" Matt asked, knowing full well who such a wound would have come from.
"No, Haggar."
"Figures."
"How'd they find you?"
"That is a long story that I would like not to burden you with while you're dying my friend."
"Well with me as your literal burden here I think it'd set us pretty equal."
"You're barely conscious."
"Oh well."
"I escaped with a resistance fighter while that brother of yours was fighting the sith lord. Ended up on the same planet the Princess and Coran were on, made some friends. Now we're here."
"Wait, what were you doing at Central Control?"
"Nothing you need to worry about right now."
They walked in silence a little longer, and Shiro noticed how Matt hadn't even batted an eye at his arm. If it wasn't for the fact that it was the one slung around his shoulder Shiro would have thought he just hadn't noticed. Matt was just grateful that the pants he was wearing were long, and that what little of his metal foot poked out had escaped Shiro's attention so far.
"Is your dad here too then?" Shiro asked eventually. "You… you didn't mention him."
"He wasn't taken back to Central Command."
"So they did take you somewhere? I don't… I don't remember everything, from then." Matt chuckled darkly.
"Lucky you." They were almost to the medbay.
"You didn't answer my question."
"You need to rest."
"Matt-"
"-We don't need to talk about this now Takashi, just let it go." Matt winced. His tone came out harsher than he wanted it to, but Shiro dropped the subject. "Come on, let's just get you into a pod."
Matt dragged his blanket and pillow from the room he had been given, shuffling sleepily in what castle time considered the dead of night down to where the Black Lion was held. He threw the blanket over himself like a cloak and dropped the pillow down next to one of her massive paws. Then he just flopped over onto it in defeat.
"Hey," he said, rolling over to stare up at her. "Didn't really feel like staying in my room spot they gave me. It's pretty small and sparse. Last time I fell asleep by accident I woke up in there and forgot I wasn't still in prison. Thought they had just changed my cell again or something. Maybe the Hag had gotten tired of the whole purple - grey color scheme. I think it's a bit overdone myself." He rolled over again, facing her paw, eyes half lidded and glazed over with exhaustion.
"I didn't want to sleep in the rec area either since it's so open. You can't see anything from how the couches are sunk in. Doesn't feel safe." He chuckled at himself.
"Nothing feels safe ever but you probably know what I mean. You're old and sentient, I'm sure you've got your fair share of problems if you're even listening. I kind of wanted to sleep where Shiro is, with all the cryopods and stuff but… it's eerie. And Keith's there. I don't want to intrude and stuff, and I don't really want to wake up to seeing Shi injured either if I even sleep. But this place is relatively closed off and you feel like Shiro so I hope you don't mind if I just lay my sleep deprived ass here for a bit while I talk to myself." He rolled over to his other side, now facing the wall, silent for a couple minutes.
"I've had these, like, three specific songs stuck in my head for the past three years and it's really pissing me off because they're from when I was little and two of them are just different versions of the same song and I keep mixing them together and now I can't tell which parts were supposed to go with what versions and it's slowly killing me well a lot of things are slowly killing me but that's another rambling entirely to be honest I should probably be dead by now. I totally would just die right now. But like. Shiro's here. And apparently Katie's in space. And Athridir is up somewhere with my dad. And let's be real Athri'd get real fucking pissed at me if I died on him like I'm alive purely out of obligation at this point." He rolled over to look at the ceiling again.
"I can't even sleep in order for sleeping to be any better than being awake I've gotta wait until the point where I just pass out and don't dream like I know it's not healthy but neither is waking up every hour and having a panic attack so what's really the better option here…."
Then the Black Lion moved, of her own accord, from her regular sitting position to where she was lying down, head resting between her paws.
"Oh boy look at that you are very large this close up Ma'am. I hope the Alteans didn't build you guys to scale to what lions on their planet looked like. I'm not sure how big an earth lion is on all fours it's been too long since I was last at a zoo my special interests don't include zoology but I'd guess like. A yard. A yard and a half tall. Maybe two yards being generous but also… wait nevermind two yards is way too much that's like… I'd hit the classroom ceiling with those rulers I think. Some poor ceiling tile would have just been dislodged in all its dusty, rain leaking, asbestos ridden glory. Yikes. Poor thing." He rolled over to face her paw again, forehead a few inches away from the metal plating.
"You might not even know what I'm talking about I'm just saying words to you probably just tuned me out by now. That okay. That's why I do most of the time when I lose track of what someone's saying. No point in paying attention when you've already lost the plot. Paying attention takes too much energy to waste it like that."
Just then the doors swung wide open, startling him into action. Princess Allura walked in to find the green paladin's older brother lying on the floor propped up by his elbows, half covered by a blanket with messy hair and a glowing pink leg sticking high in the air. She sighed sympathetically, still in her nightgown, mice on her shoulders as usual.
"Princess, why are you here?" Matt asked, lowering his leg in embarrassment.
"I have a connection with each of the Lions, Matthew."
"I woke you up?"
"Well, no, she did. I listened in on some of your conversation, I apologize, but I decided to come down here to see if I could… help in some way." Matt shrugged silently as she walked over. He turned so there would be room for them to both sit with their backs against the Black Lion's paw. "Why did you come to the Black Lion?" She asked after a moment of the two of them sitting in silence.
"I don't know. She just… feels like Shiro? I don't know if that even makes any sense."
"No, it's perfectly understandable. Though I didn't realize Humans were capable of feeling quintessence. That's interesting."
"Is that what that is?"
"I would assume so, it's the feeling I followed to assign each of Paladin to their lion, though I believe there may be another reason you came to her also."
"Hm?" He hummed, resting the back of his head against the paw, eyes mostly closed.
"You and Shiro are very similar people," Allura said simply with a slight smile tugging at her lips.
"Nah," he muttered, "Shiro follows the rules."
"And you don't?"
He turned his head to look at her. "Shiro follows them more." That made her chuckle before they lapsed back into a comfortable silence.
"Would you like me to help you fall asleep?" she asked quietly.
"You're welcome to try," he mumbled.
Allura smiled and began to sing and old Altean Lullaby that she could remember Coran singing to her when she was a little girl. Halfway through the second repeat, she felt Matt's shoulder bump into hers. By the end of the chorus, she could tell he had finally fallen asleep.
Thace and Coran found them a few hours later, woken by the mice. The two leaders were asleep against the Black Lions paw. Matt's head had fallen to her lap, and one of her hands was tangled in his hair. The men looked at each other, unsure whether to wake their kids or not. Coran, coming to the decision himself, knelt down beside Allura and shook her shoulder gently. She hummed, turning her head to look at him blearily.
"What?" she yawned.
"Not that I'm judging or anything, but I believe your bed might be a more comfortable place to sleep." She shifted, rubbing her eyes and waking Matt. He rolled over, looking up at the three of them.
"What's going on? Are we at Ice yet?"
"No. Get up we're going to my room."
"Oh. Why."
"Bed."
"Oh."
"Come on," she said, putting her arms under him and rocking forward into a standing position since he didn't sit up fast enough. Thace snorted at the look of surprise on Matt's face, slightly muted by exhaustion.
"You're… taking hm with you?" Coran asked.
"Mhm."
"...Alright."
"Do I even weigh anything to you?" Matt asked sleepily as Allura made her way back to her room.
"No."
"Wow."
"Shiro was surprised by my strength as well," she chuckled, making Matt giggle softly. She got to her room and flopped down on the bed, still holding Matt. He pressed his cheek against her shoulder.
"You're pretty," he said quietly, closing his eyes. He didn't see how Allura blushed, smiling, or how it made her marking glow ever so slightly.