Chapter Text
A Blade sits on a bench along a wall, legs set firmly as a brace against the motion of the ship. He is lithe, yet muscular, and grimaces with his hand pressed into a wound in his side. It is not the only one.
Across from him are two others, both clad in the shadowed uniform of the Blade of Marmora. They too are littered with small cuts. Blood dries on matted purple fur. It is not all theirs.
A rumble through the ship jostles the three Blades. They feel, more than hear, the landing props extend from within the hull. The lone Blade’s hand slips and smears blood below the wound. He casts a one-eyed glance at his gloved palm, slick with the dark fluid that reflects the dim purple lights, and clicks his tongue in a self-chastising manner. One of the others, Nyvok, grunts in discomfort as the ship touches down.
A door opens and the three turn their heads towards a broad figure silhouetted by light from the cockpit. He fills the doorway, yellow eyes scanning them for a beat.
“We’ve landed,” he says flatly, gesturing toward the rear door as it opens slowly. It forms a ramp, leading out into the bright white hangars of the Castle of Lions. Kolivan turns his attention to his left, “Keith, can you walk?”
The lone Blade pushes himself to his feet and nods, “I’m fine, Kolivan.”
“Good.”
Using his free hand, Keith makes a pass across his face with the side of his palm in an attempt to clean himself up. He knows he only managed to smear soot up into his bangs, and the blood from his split lip will look like an odd stain, but it’s the least he can do to appear presentable. Kolivan steps past him, overlooking the Altean hangar from the end of the Marmoran craft’s rear hatch.
“Disembark.”
Nyvok and the third Blade, Jalla, rise and start down the ramp to be welcomed by Coran, Hunk, and Lance. Keith follows behind Kolivan, stepping carefully. His limbs feel sore and heavy, and he lets out a quiet sigh as his feet make contact with the silvery floor of the hangar. The sound of a door hissing open grabs his attention, and he looks at the source to see Shiro and Allura enter the room in stride, cheerful greetings falling from their lips. Keith returns the sentiment as they draw near and hugs his side tighter, as inconspicuous as he can.
“It’s good to see you again,” Shiro smiles at him, and his eyes crinkle at the corners.
“Yeah, you too,” Keith says, forcing the corners of his lips up despite the pain in his side. “You’ve greyed out more since last time,” he teases.
Shiro rolls his eyes, “I think you’re seeing things.”
Keith manages to crack a strained smile at that, careful not to make his lip bleed, and shakes his head. They’ve taken to poking fun at each other by way of greeting ever since the rest of Shiro’s hair started greying. Keith lets the smile fade, gaze roving the room and skimming over the others. Hunk offers water to Nyvok and Jalla as they listen to Lance’s excited chatter. Kolivan hovers on the edge of his vision, and irritably, Keith compares the Blade leader to a mother hen. Allura stands to the left of Shiro, who casts a knowing look at the Red Paladin. She stifles a laugh with her hand and turns to Keith, short, white hair swaying as it frames her face.
“Katie will be here soon. She was neck-deep in Yellow’s defense systems when Kolivan hailed us.”
Keith nods and puffs a strand of dark hair away from his eye. He can feel Allura turn a critical gaze over his form, lingering for a moment on the obscured right side of his face. On his eyepatch, hidden behind his grown-out bangs.
A small part of him shrinks away inside, uneasy with the concern the Red Paladin not-so-subtly shows. Panning the room instead, Keith shifts his attention to Hunk and the others. The sight of the water pouches draws him over, a welcome reprieve from Allura’s sharp crystalline eyes. He’s lucky the Blade uniform is dark enough to hide the blood.
Hunk smiles as he approaches and presses a water pouch into Keith’s free hand, “Glad you’re back in one piece, man. Katie’ll be happy to see you.”
“I hear she’s been doing repairs on Yellow. You take a bad hit?” Keith asks, taking a long sip from his water.
Hunk nods, “Yeah. We had a run in with one of Lotor’s squadrons about a week ago. Not a long battle, but a hard one.”
Keith frowns, “Lotor’s fleet? Where?”
“Out in the Gildarian sector. We were helping to evacuate the old Balmera there since it was starting its death cycle.”
“There haven’t been reports of Galra activity in the Gildarian sector since the Coalition formed.”
“They caught us by surprise,” Lance butts in as he draws near and stoops to grab a water pouch from the cooler by Hunk’s feet. “Allura believes the squadron was looking for a flagship class crystal, larger even than the one in the Castle of Lions.”
Hunk hums in solemn confirmation, “We were able to evacuate all the Balmerans, but the Balmera itself was hit by the squadron destroyer’s ion cannon toward the end of the battle.”
“We’ve been keeping an eye on the other Balmera lately, just in case,” Lance adds.
“That’s right,” Hunk says, eyes widening, “and Allura’s actually been wanting to talk to Kolivan about it, so you came at the right time.”
Lance drains his water pouch and points a finger at Keith, “Yeah. Why are you guys here, by the way? We don’t have another Coalition meeting for a few phoebs.”
“We just finished a mission and happened to be in the neighborhood,” Keith shrugs slightly. It’s only half a lie.
Lance claps a hand to Keith’s back and grins, “Glad to see you then, neighbor.”
Keith quells the hiss of pain rising in his throat with an awkward, toothy grin of his own, “It’s good to see you guys too.” He tries to ignore the way his side feels wet underneath his hand again.
Hunk’s face suddenly lights up with a wide smile, “We’re not the only ones glad to see you, though.”
Keith blinks and follows the Yellow Paladin’s gaze with his eye to a point somewhere behind him.
“Keith!” a voice calls.
He instantly locks onto the source. Katie. He musters up a soft smile as she runs toward him from the far end of the room and sends her a two-fingered wave with the hand holding his water.
The Green Paladin slows as she draws near and takes the water from his hand, sliding her fingers between his to replace it. Keith watches her golden-amber eyes scan him critically before she looks up at his face and beams.
“I missed you,” she says.
Keith tightens his grip on her hand, “Me too.”
Nodding to herself, Katie spins on her heels and leads him away, shouting quick greetings to the others as they pass them by. She moves at a comfortable pace for him, Keith notes. Fast enough to read as excitement, slow enough that he can keep up without agitating his injuries, and all together saying I’m worried about you. As they slip out the door Allura’s voice can be heard suggesting that the other Blades take this stopover as an opportunity go get themselves cleaned up and rested.
Katie continues to lead Keith through the ship’s corridors, maintaining her pace with ease. He still holds her hand firmly in his, tight grip the unspoken signal between them that he does, in fact, need help.
The pair slows as Katie stops to open a door, and leads Keith into an elevator, which he is silently grateful for. Taking the stairs in his condition would have been less than favorable. The elevator ride is short, as the med bay is only two floors above them, but Keith takes the opportunity to rest for a moment and leans back against the wall. He can only think of how exhausted his body feels. The sharp pain in his side he attributes to the primary source of his wakefulness.
Katie half turns to look at Keith, his figure dark against the silver of the castle’s wall. His right arm is still held in place just above his hip, she notes, questions forming in her mind. She pushes them aside in favor of comforting the Blade. Humming, she steps back and sidles up against Keith’s good side, gently pulling his free arm around her shoulders with a smile.
“I’m fine,” Keith’s voice is soft, lips curling slightly.
Katie hums conspiratorially, “I’m not so sure that’s one-hundred percent true, mister.”
Keith pushes himself off the wall as the elevator comes to a stop, leaning against Katie for support, “You may be right.”
“I’d like to think so,” she says, then steps out of the elevator and hurries down the hall toward the med bay with Keith in tow.
Once inside the brightly lit med bay she steers Keith towards one of the medical beds, knowing his distaste for the healing pods (and frankly, he doesn’t look like he needs one). Katie hurries to wash her hands before she fetches one of the medical supply carts and hauls it over. She pulls up a stool from the nearest station and tugs on a pair of medical gloves while she sits facing Keith, who is now seated on the edge of the bed. His Marmoran knife lays beside him, unclipped from his belt.
“So,” she starts, pouring some antiseptic onto a clean washcloth, “what happened this time?”
Keith watches her movements as she brings the cloth to his face, dabbing at the cut on his lip. The solution stings a little, but he doesn’t wince. The throbbing in his side is more than enough of a distraction. He waits until she moves on to the rest of his face before speaking.
“Rough mission… we had to fight our way out. Jalla narrowly avoided an explosion.”
Katie nods, wiping off the soot from under his bangs, an action that he feels more than sees. Keith turns his gaze away from her hands, noting how her hair is pulled back into a ponytail. She’d been growing it out for the better part of their time in space, with further encouragement from Matt once they’d found him, and it now falls well past her shoulders. It brings a ghost of a smile to Keith’s face, but then he remembers he hasn’t finished answering her question.
Lifting his arm away from his side, Keith holds out his hand for her to inspect. She takes it in her own with a frown. “I took a pretty bad hit to the side. I’ve been trying to stem the flow of blood but my gloves are soaked through,” Keith explains. Only in the clinically white lights of the med bay can the crimson hue be seen staining the dark materials of his Marmoran suit.
At his words, the Green Paladin’s eyebrows dive down and she focuses her sharp eyes on the torn fabric previously covered by his arm. Keith doesn’t miss the split-second glance she spares for his eyepatch.
Katie returns his hand, resting it on his knee as she scoots her stool around to his right for a better look. Keith rests his right hand in his left and exhales slowly, listening to Katie click her tongue in mild annoyance.
“You came this close to busting that panel by your ribs, you know,” she chastised, standing up from her stool. “It’ll need some minor repairs. Nothing I can’t handle on my own.”
Keith nods, issuing a passive grunt of acknowledgement.
Katie steps around him to swap out the washcloth in her hands for a fresh one that she soaks with water. She steps in front of him, grabbing the stool and lowering herself onto it.
“Was it the sentries?” she asks, wiping the edge of the wound with the damp cloth.
“Yeah. We got swarmed.” He can feel the cool, gentle pressure she applies, and the fabric of the suit begins to feel less glued to his skin as some of the dried and semi-dried blood soaks out.
She bobs her head, getting up to switch out the soiled rag for another new one, once again dousing it with water. “Unzip the top of your suit, please,” she instructs, squeezing the excess water from the cloth.
“Are you sure you want that?” Keith asks playfully, catching her gaze as she turns around.
Katie feels her face flush and she scowls lightheartedly at him. “That’s awful bold, mister. Are you sure you don’t want an infection?” she quips, swatting him on the back of the head.
Keith chuckles, undoing the clasp at his neck, “Alright, I yield.” He unzips and shrugs off the upper portion of his suit, carefully peeling the material away from his skin near the wound. Grimacing a little as the suit tugs at a tender spot, he turns his head to assess the damage while he pulls his hands from the sleeves. They’re stained through the fabric.
A fist-sized area just under his ribs is torn and bloody, and the prosthetic patch above it is heavily scratched and dented, its flexible tiered plates pressed tight against each other. That explains why bending over had been such a chore.
Katie drops the cloth in her hands into his before fetching a replacement, “Looks like they did a number on you.”
“Yeah,” he says quietly. He turns his head away as she moves in with her damp cloth, gentle on his exposed skin. She soon swaps it out for another clean rag, this time with antiseptic. Keith grits his teeth and focuses on occupying himself with the task of scrubbing his hands while Katie applies her ginger touch to the wound. When he’s finished cleaning his hands, Katie takes both cloths and dumps them in the pile with the rest on the supply cart, then grabs a spray bottle of an Altean ointment. A few quick squirts and she returns the bottle to its place in the cart, filling her hands instead with a roll of gauze and a odd, gel-like pad the Alteans preferred over fiber pads for its healing properties.
“Hold this,” Katie instructs, guiding his left hand to hold the pad in place over the wound. Keith nods, folding his other arm across his chest to keep it out of the way as she starts to wrap the gauze around his abdomen. The gel pad is soothing and cool to the touch, and he finds that the rent flesh underneath it begins to numb slightly. It’s a welcome relief.
“You can let go now,” Katie taps the back of his hand, and he slides it away as she continues to wrap the gauze, hands quickly passing the roll back and forth. She’s close enough that he can smell the remnants of mechanical grease on her from working in the Yellow Lion earlier. It’s a familiar smell, and one he finds comforting.
Tying off the gauze, Katie tears the end and leans back from her perch on the stool, sharp eyes evaluating her handiwork. Satisfied, she nods and cracks a smile, “You should be all set. You’re pretty resilient, it’ll heal up quickly.”
“I should like to think it takes more than a mere flesh wound to kill me,” Keith replies. For some reason, however, that seems to darken Katie’s mood, the smile falling from her face.
She stands up slowly and sets the roll of gauze in her hands aside gently, eyes searching the floor by her feet for the right words. She takes a breath and turns her gaze to Keith’s face, lips twisted in a thoughtful pout. Keith watches as Katie lowers herself onto the stool behind her with her hands on her knees, and softly, says “There was a time when I wasn’t sure you’d make it.”
Keith’s brows furrow and he reaches out a hand to cover hers lightly. There is a sadness in her eyes as she looks from his hand to his face, and the corners of her mouth turn up ever so slightly in a sad sort of smile.
“You lost so much blood that day.”