Keith’s had the little cluster of stars on the inside of his wrist for as long as he can remember. He didn’t know if it was a human thing or just a him thing, but it was one more thing that made him different from everybody else. He ignores it most of the time. It’s not hard. There are more obvious things that make him stand out amidst the rest of the Blades of Marmora. Like the fact that he was smaller than most Galra. Oh, and the fact that he wasn’t purple.
But Keith tried not to think about that. Not too much at least. Not since he had awakened his blade and proved that he belonged here. Not since Kolivan started giving him missions that were more than just analyzing data. So far they had been mostly simply supply runs, but it was still proof that they saw him as something more than the kit they had adopted. And it gave him something to keep his mind occupied with rather than worrying about Thace and Ulaz who were both out on long term assignments.
Still, he wasn’t expecting Kolivan to call him in with a new long term assignment. Though the Blade’s leader doesn’t look to happy about it.
“You know that Ulaz managed to free the Champion.”
“That’s payed off well for us so far. There are even rumors that he has returned along with the Lions of Voltron. We’ve also located the others who were captured with the Champion. You’ll be inserted as a fellow prisoner. We don’t have enough information to know what sort of rescue will work. Do you think you can do this?”
Keith held his breath for a long moment. This was the first time they’d assigned him to anything major. And he knew it was mostly because he looked like the Champion and the rest of his species, but still, it would prove to everyone else that he was a real contributing part of the Blade of the Marmora.
“Good. Get packed. There will be a briefing waiting for you in your quarters.”
Keith took that as the dismissal it was. It wasn’t like he had much to pack or anyone except Kolivan to say goodbye to. Both Ulaz and Thace were on assignment, and other than the bonded pair, he wasn’t close to any of the other Blades. The mission briefing, however, he devoured.
They really didn’t have a lot of information. It was a fairly typical Galra labor camp, though with a little more security than usual. Most of the information was about said security. They knew very little about the prisoners they were rescuing. What they did know was that the pair appeared to be a family unit, they’d been captured with the Champion, and they were most likely the same species as Keith’s father.
Which was in part why Keith was being sent. The prisoners were far more likely to trust someone who looked like them than a Galra. Hopefully that would be enough. While he knew that this was a long term mission, Keith had no desire to be in a labor camp any longer than absolutely necessary. Still, the fact that Kolivan thought he could do made Keith feel a little proud.
He wasn’t feeling nearly so proud when he was in the midst of mining ore in the labor camp, but at least he had finally made contact with one of his targets. Well, sort of. For the first time in the week that he’d been here, Keith had caught sight of the younger of the two humans, but he hadn’t had a chance to talk with him yet.
To be completely honest, Keith wasn’t been sure what to expect. He’d seen pictures of other humans before, mostly the Champion and the other two prisoners, but he’d never met one. Neither had most of the Blades, and the little information that his mother had provided about the humans and their home planet wasn’t exactly useful in a situation like this.
Still, Keith would do his best. And thankfully, his subject made it easy for him. When they were all lined up to receive their daily slop that was meant to be a meal, the younger one sidled up to him.
“What mission were you assigned? Or have they gotten to Earth already?”
Keith blinked. He hadn’t expected that. “As far as I know, no. But I’ve never been to Earth. Well, not that I remember. I’m pretty sure that I was born there. But my mom pretty much abandoned me after that, so I don’t have a lot of details. I’m only half anyway.”
The human blinked at him. “Really?”
Keith nodded. “Yeah. You’re actually the first human I’ve met.”
The other man held out a hand. “Matt Holt.”
Keith stared at his hand. “What am I supposed to do?”
“You introduce yourself and shake it.”
Keith shrugged but did as instructed. “I’m Keith.”
Matt did a slight double take but shook his hand with a smile. “I’d say nice to meet you, but I’m pretty sure that neither of us want to be here.”
Keith grinned at that. And after that, it didn’t take him long to integrate himself with the Holts. Matt’s father Sam was just as friendly, though he was also clearly in much worse shape than his son. Sam was going to be the limiting factor in their escape. He was just too frail for certain things. He was also the reason they would need to act sooner rather than later. Keith honestly didn’t know how much longer the man would last. Sam Holt might have been in good health when he was captured by the Galra Empire, but captivity had not been good for him, and the back breaking labor was definitely taking a toll.
The good news was that Matt was sure to be a help with their escape. The human was quite clever, and Keith had found that Matt had already made not of a number of things like guard numbers and rotations. Keith would admit that he was a little surprised at how easily Matt and Sam had trusted him, but he wasn’t going to complain. Not having to waste time earning their trust was a good thing in this case.
Even so, it took far longer than Keith liked to make all the arrangements than he liked. Matt used measurements he wasn’t used to for time, but by the human’s estimate, he and his father had been prisoners of the Galra for a little over a year and it had been a few months since Keith had arrived. But at least it was coming to an end now. Everything was in place. Now he just had to convince Sam and Matt come with him.
“I was wondering when you might try something,” Matt smirked at him. “You’ve been casing the joint since you got here.”
“Well, I have a way out. Are you coming or not?”
The escape went much better than expected which made Keith more than a little suspicious. He kept waiting for something to go wrong, and when it didn’t, it just made Keith a little paranoid. Missions that went extremely well at the beginning so often had disastrous ends. And there was also the fact that he was going to have to tell his new friends that they were being rescued from the Galra Empire by Galrans. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be too upset about that.
Once he had set their little craft on course to the rendezvous coordinates, Keith turned his attention to his two companions.
“So, we’ll have some time before we reach our pick up. There are facilities for you to clean up, though the spare clothes might not fit perfectly. Why don’t you make yourselves at home and then we can talk.”
It might just be putting off the inevitable, but at least it gave Keith a chance to clean up himself, and he had to admit he felt much more comfortable in his Blade of Marmora suit and with his own blade back at his side. Time to get this over with.
“So, we’ll be meeting up with other members of my group. They have some sort of plan for getting you home. The thing is we’re a Galra resistance group. So, it’s going to be Galra who are meeting us.”
He bit his lip, waiting for a reaction. The one he got wasn’t exactly what he expected.
“That makes a surprising amount of sense,” Sam said. At Keith’s surprised look, he continued, “At least in our planet’s history, you don’t often have a tyrant without at least someone from the inside trying to overthrow them. It doesn’t always work, but someone almost always tries to do something.”
That was far from the reaction that Keith had been bracing for. He had expected yelling and feelings of betrayal. Not acceptance. And certainly not a sudden barrage of questions from Matt.
“So does that mean you’re half Galra? That’s interesting. I would have expected you to look a little more like them rather than mostly human. Do you have another form or something? Or does you Galra heritage come into play other ways with enhanced senses or other abilities--”
“Why are you trusting me? There’s no way you could have known that my job was to rescue you from the beginning. I don’t understand.”
Matt laughed and reached for his hand, tapping the spot on Keith’s wrist where the three little stars lay. “This told us. We know your soulmate, and no one that matched Shiro could be all that bad.”
Keith blinked at him. “What?”
“Sorry, I forget you didn’t grow up on Earth sometimes. So, most humans have a mark on them some where that matches another person’s mark. We call them soulmates. They’re not always romantic, though that is the most common type. Our pilot has the same mark as you.”
Keith didn’t know what to do with that. So he ignored it for now.
“We should be all set until we meet up with my group. There’s info in the computers if you wanted to read up on the Galra Empire or have more questions. It should be smooth sailing from here.”
They’d had to fight Allura on it, but eventually he and Pidge convinced her to let them go back up Ulaz. It helped that he was meeting up with rescued prisoners who might have information on Pidge’s family. Shiro knew that while she hadn’t struck out on her own to find them, finding her father and her brother were still a major driving force for Pidge, and she devoted a lot of her free time to searching for any trace of them.
Besides, they still needed a pilot for the Red Lion if they were going to form Voltron. They had managed to survive so far without that transformation, but ever battle seemed closer and closer to failure in their mission. Shiro was hoping that sooner or later they would run into or rescue someone who would be the right fit for the Red Paladin.
Ulaz had seemed a little bit antsy about the whole thing. There had been an increase in Galra activity in the sector where they were supposed to rendezvous with the rescue party, and Ulaz had let slip that this was the agent’s first serious mission, so that could explain some of it. Still, it wouldn’t hurt for them to be on the alert as they headed for the moon where they were supposed to meet.
“Do you think this will be another dead end?” Pidge asked over the coms.
“Hopefully not. Ulaz hasn’t led us wrong yet.”
As they entered the system, it didn’t take them long to spot Ulaz. Shiro opened up their communications.
“Everything okay on your end?”
The Galra nodded. “Yes. They’re ready and waiting. I haven’t seen any sign of trouble so far.”
“Let’s go pick them up then.”
It was easy enough to recognize the little pod that was waiting for them, and Pidge’s shriek of delight as figures appeared out of it left no doubt in Shiro’s mind that her family was amongst the group. It was a little had to make out people from the whirlwind that was Pidge at the moment. Ulaz’s attention was focused the third member of the group, a young man dressed in a Blade of Marmora suit and looking the epitome of a surly teenager at the moment and not at all Galran.
Ulaz seemed to notice Shiro’s attention and chivvied the young man in Shiro’s direction.
“Shiro, this is my kit, Keith. Keith, this is the Champion and Black Paladin, Shiro.”
Keith blinked at him as if startled. Shiro grinned at him.
“It’s good to meet you. Thanks for getting them out of there.”
He was almost immediately glomped Matt. Shiro returned the hug. His friend was looking well, if thinner and a little shaggy with longer hair. Matt beamed at him before turning back to Keith.
Keith carefully peeled off his glove and rolled back his sleeve enough that Shiro could see a cluster of three stars (one black, one red, and one purple) on the inside of the young man’s wrist. Shiro blinked even as Matt’s grin widened.
“That’s what I’ve been told.” Keith shrugged. “I hope you don’t mind.”
And while Shiro had to admit, he wouldn’t exactly recommend his experiences to anyone, here was one more silver lining for being kidnapped by aliens and locked up for a year.
Matt slung an arm around his sister’s shoulders. “Well, my work here is done.”
Shiro just laughed. This was not the mission he’d expected. It was better.
