Together We Heard Him Cry
Part 2 of ‘Alone I heard their voices’ @lazyfox411
Together We Heard Him Cry
Lance wasn’t crying. He wasn’t screaming. He wasn’t doing anything, and it worried Shiro. The blue paladin wasn’t a quiet kid. Shiro needed him to scream, so yell, or cry, or laugh, or something.
Lance just stared into the pit.
He’s been silent since Shiro dragged him out of the cavern, not understanding why the kid was so frantic to stay.
Hunk was pacing back a forth a few feet away, yelping when he thought he had put his feet down too hard. His hands were running anxiously through his hair and he kept glancing back at the pit like it was going to widen suddenly and devour them.
“Anything yet, Pidge?” He asked for the tenth time in the past ten minutes.
She glared up at Hunk, and Shiro could have sworn her eyes were wet with tears. “If I’d found something, I would have told you!” She snapped.
Hunk nodded, ignoring her harsh tone, and went back to pacing.
Only half an hour had passed. 30 minutes. Yet to Shiro, it felt like 30 years. One of their own was gone. Keith could be hurt… or worse.
It was Shiro’s fault; the team hadn’t wanted to come to this planet. Allura had even given them the option to stay on the castle since the scans from the planet were so barren. But no, Shiro thought it could be a bonding experience, and there was always the chance at finding anything to help their fight against the Galra.
Now they were here, on a planet that could not be more empty, and a team member, a family member, was in danger.
It’s my fault. All Lance could think was that it was his fault. It was his fault all the rocks collapsed, his fault for not seeing the rock coming towards him, his fault for not grabbing Keith and pulling him out of danger.
It was Lance’s fault Keith could be dead.
All Lance could hear was the CRACK the boulder had made when it crashed into Keith. It was deafening. If he’d only been a little faster, only been a little more thoughtful.
Hunk turned to Pidge as a string of curse words he didn’t even know she knew came out of her mouth.
“What? Is that good? No, those words never mean anything good. Is he dead? Oh God, or is he alive and-”
“His armor is trashed.” Pidge huffed. “I can’t get any of it to come online.”
Shiro crossed his arms. “Maybe you’re too far away to-”
“I’M NOT-” She took a deep breath. “I’m not out of range. I don’t think it’s possible to be out of range.”
“Maybe the single receiver is out on his end?” Hunk suggested hopefully. Pidge shook her head. “Okay, but that means his armor could have saved him, right? He could be fine!”
Pidge pushed her glasses up her nose and looked at her computer screen. “Hunk, you don’t understand. This armor isn’t built like that- it’s strong, sure, but it’s built for alien tech, not rock falls.”
“What about his helmet? It has its own set of networking and stuff right?”
“Don’t you think I tried that? I can’t tell if it’s online or not, all I get is static.”
Shiro perked up. “Static? Like the sound?”
“That could mean his comms are still holding on. If we could talk to him we could find out where he is.”
Lance turned around abruptly. “We don’t have time for that! For all we know, Keith is dead- if we wait for him to talk to us we could be waiting forever!”
“He was a point, Shiro.” Hunk said after a moment.
“We have to take our lions down there!” Lance declared, sounding to start a bit hysteric. “They can dig him out, right? Red is probably already trying to break out of the hanger, she’ll do anything to save Keith!”
“We don’t even need to take all of them! Maybe just Red!”
“Although she might try to kill us if she sees us and figures out what happened. But we could take Black! Or Blue! No, wait, Blue should calm Red down. But Yellow-”
“Buttercup...” Hunk corrected.
“She can dig! Yellow- Buttercup, whatever- she could find Keith!”
“LANCE!” Shiro grabbed the boy and shook him slightly. “Lance, calm down. You know we can’t do that. Bringing a lion down here is too dangerous- the planet couldn’t support Blacks weight. If we brought another one down with the intention of digging, we could cause another collapse.”
“THEN WHAT DO WE DO?” Lance yelled, pulling himself out of Shiro’s grip. “Sit around and hope a dead man will talk? Nu-uh, I don’t think so. We need to be down there!”
“Lance, you have to know it’s dangerous to do that. If we knew where Keith was then maybe-
“We do know where he is!” Lance argued. “He’s down there! He could be calling out for us right now, and we wouldn’t know it because we’re up here.”
Shiro took a deep breath to steady himself. “Lance,” He started slowly. “I know you want to find Keith- we all do. But a lot of ground was caved in- that pit is at least half a mile wide. That’s a lot of ground to cover to try and find Keith- we need a way to narrow it down.”
Shiro had never seen Lance’s eyes so cold. The blue paladin glared up at Shiro before turned away and stalking towards the pit.
“If we don’t start, we’ll never find him. Stay up here if you want, but I’m going down.” With that, Lance ignited his jet pack and began and jagged decent into the pit.
Hunk glanced at Shiro before going to the pit as well. “I just… Sorry Shiro.”
Pidge sighed and shoved her equipment into her backpack.
“Don’t tell me you’re going down too.” Shiro looked at her. “We need a plan!”
Pidge lifted a shoulder. “This is a plan- sorta. We need to find him. I can’t loose a brother again.”
Shiro looked at her, and for the first time ever, Shiro didn’t see the strong, brave, green paladin or Voltron, Pidge. Instead, he saw Matt Holt’s kid sister, Katie. He saw the little girl he had seen in the pictures that Matt had constantly showed off (Though he wouldn’t admit it). But then she turned her back and began her decent into the pit, and she was back to being Pidge.
Shiro didn’t think twice. He ran after his team.
(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)(::)
“KEITH!” Lance was loosing his voice. The team had been searching for hours, digging through ruble in the hopes of finding their teammate. Pidge was sitting a ways away, trying to get a comms connection through to Keith’s helmet. Hunk had started crying.
“What if we don’t find him? What if he isn’t answering because-”
“Shut up Hunk.” Lance cleared his throat before shouting Keith’s name again.
Lance was going to be sick. Down in the cavern, rocks and boulders and dirt had created mini mountains of debris. He didn’t see an end to them- though to be fair to was pretty dark down there. Still, everywhere he looked he saw the aftermath of the fall, and all he could think was, this is my fault.
“GUYS!” Shiro shouted, a few debris mountains away. “I FOUND SOMETHING!”
Lance was at Shiro’s side before he could blink. Shiro had found Keith’s bayard- crushed to hell.
Hunk couldn’t stop staring at it. It was bent, and dented, and didn’t even look white anymore. Most concerningly of all, however, was the blood stain.
Lance said nothing as he dove into the closest pile, tearing through the rubble. “KEITH!” He shouted. “Keith! Are you in here? Keith? KEITH ANSWER ME!”
The mountain shuddered and Shiro pulled Lance out of the way as it toppled over, sending dirt into the air.
“You have to be more careful!” He snapped.
Lance looked at Shiro with big eyes, and suddenly broke down crying.
“It’s my fault,” He whimpered. “If I hadn’t- then the fall wouldn’t have happened and Keith-”
Hunk stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Lance. “It’s okay, it’s going to be okay.” he soothed.
Pidge moved closer to the group, sitting next to Shiro as the two boys cried together.
“How are we gonna find him?” She asked no one in particular.
“I don’t know.” Shiro admitted. “But we will.”
Suddenly, a small sound cut through the air. Everyone froze, holding their breath and looking at each other, trying to confirm that they had all heard it.
“I’m sorry...” It was so faint, like a whisper in the wind. But there it was, the sign they had all needed.
“KEITH!” Lance screamed into his comms unit. “Where are you? Are you alive?” Silence. “Answer me!” Lance begged. “Are you okay?”
“Help...” The small voice- Keith’s voice wheezed.
“Oh my God,” Hunk looked at his team. “Oh my God.”
“I can barely hear him!” Lance turned to Pidge.
“On it! He sent the first message so if I do this, then-” The static from the line cleared. “Is that better?”
Lance looked panicked. “Are you okay? Please answer me!”
Keith groaned out a weak, “No...”.
Everyone was moving; Pidge couldn’t tell exactly where Keith’s transmissions were coming from, she could tell they were close.
“Still trying to find you!” Shiro panted, choosing a random pile of rock to dig through. “Any idea where you are?”
“Buried.” Keith sounded day dreamy, which wasn’t a good sign.
“Can you move?” Shiro needed to keep Keith talking.
“No.” The cough and scream that followed the statement sent a chill through Shiro.
Hunk was shaking. “KEITH! Keith, oh God, oh God we’re gonna find you, and then get you in a pod, you’re going to be alright, alright?”
The line had gone silent again. The team shared looks and began to dig through the debris faster.
“Keith, stay awake.” Shiro demanded. “Keep talking to us.”
Shiro’s heart skipped a beat. “Yes, yes you can. Stay awake Keith. Keep talking to us, we’re going to find you.”
The team was silent as they dug, praying that Keith would talk to them again. It was a full 30 seconds before he did. “You’re too late.”
Lance slammed his fist into the ground, tears running down his cheeks. “DAMMIT, NO WE AREN’T!” Keith wasn’t supposed to sound like that, Keith wasn’t supposed to sound weak and broken and…
“Listen Mullet, you’re gonna make it through this.”
“I didn’t want to die alone.” Keith replied dreamily.
Everyone froze, unable to speak or move.
“You’re not going to die.” Pidge’s voice cracked, and she realized she was crying. She hadn’t cried since she learned the Kerberos mission had been lost.
“I’m not alone,” Keith’s voice was so weak, it was hard to hear him. “You’re with me. I’m not alone.”
Hunk sobbed. “No! No, you were never alone. And you aren’t going to die. You’re going to be okay!”
With a shuddering breath, the team heard, “I am okay. It’s our job, right?”
Lance’s breath hitched. “It isn’t out job to die!”
No one was digging anymore. They couldn’t. It was all they could do to strain enough to hear Keith. And, thought nobody would admit it, no one wanted to miss what could be his last words.
“Heroes...” Keith’s voice was fading. “Heroes weren’t meant to...” His voice trailed off.
Shiro went cold, sitting down hard.
“Weren’t mean to what?” Lance looked up at his friends for help. “What weren’t heroes meant to do Keith?”
There wasn’t even static anymore.
“Keith?” Lance’s heart stopped. “Keith? KEITH!”
“Answer me!” Hunk shouted into his comms as Lance launched himself into the nearest pile of debris.
Pidge was yelling too, until she saw Shiro, silent and gray on the ground. As she watched the hope drain from Shiro’s eyes, she understood what Keith was going to say. She too, sank to the ground, watching in numb confusion as Hunk wept and Lance dug furiously.
“What were you going to say?” Hunk still babbled into the dead line. “Keith, finish what you were going to say, please. Please Keith, answer me.”
“Survive.” Shiro swallowed heavily. “Heroes weren’t meant to survive.”
