NOTES: Pidge gets a little down on herself in this one but it gets better.

Pidge was having a rotten day.

It kicked off with failing team training spectacularly – normally, nothing to get too upset about. Allura and Coran were always throwing cruel and unusual punishments at them and dressing it up as team bonding. It's just – when those tended to go south it was usually because everyone's screwing up. This time it was all on Pidge and she'd taken the others down with her.

Minefield proved to be a whole new brand of misery. Coran had gone nuts setting up explosive traps all over the training deck the other paladins would have to navigate around to reach their color coded, designated positions while Pidge took her turn conveying instructions through the helmet comms. It should have been a simple task, and probably would have been easy if not for the rule that her teammates couldn't stop moving, oh, and that they were blindfolded. The boys were completely at her mercy and try as she might, Pidge could only give instructions to one paladin at a time, essentially resulting in her having to pick and choose who got spared from walking into the moderately painful traps. In short, it was a blood bath.

Her dazzling lack of success carried over to the invisible maze and her armor was now thoroughly singed. Then she couldn't even perform adequately at the mind meld training because she couldn't stop thinking about her absolute disaster of an attempt at the bonding exercise. It was all she could do not to rip apart the dumb headbands that everyone hated because they were uncomfortable and always mushed up your sweaty hair. She knew this because it's literally been in everyone's surface thoughts while wearing the stupid things, right along with distinct sensations of curiosity and concern directed right at her.

And as if having to practically retreat to the privacy of her own room afterwards wasn't bad enough, sifting through the Galra data they'd managed to swipe on their last mission yielded zero results about her family's whereabouts again. So Matt and her father would just have to continue to rot in whatever Galran hellhole they'd been sentenced to until she could actually pull it together and be useful at anything.

Slamming her laptop closed, Pidge shoved the offending results to the edge of her bed and in the process unbalancing the tiny, repurposed pod weighing down a stack of system diagnostics on the bedside table. Cursing her short arms, she lunged across the bed to catch the small container before it could be upended onto the messy floor. That's when she noticed the plant growing inside wasn't looking so hot.

Pidge bit off a strangled swear when tears stated to prickle at the sight.

It was ridiculous and so very small in comparison to all the other upsets she was dealing with at the moment – because for all the turmoil and war in the galaxy what did the life of one inconsequential, little plant matter? But somehow for Pidge it was the last straw.

That she couldn't even let her emotions lose in the seclusion of her own room knocked something lose in the Green Paladin and a lump started to form in her throat. Gasping wetly around the obstruction, Pidge wished she had realized just how much trouble she'd signed up for when she agreed to being a Paladin of Voltron – because it sure would have been nice if anybody had said anything about the job coming with elemental empath powers.

Not long after all this saving the universe madness started up Allura had taken them aside and explained that a deeper connection with their lions equated to a deeper connection with the lion's corresponding element. She'd said that the paladins were meant to be forces of nature in their own right and that their state of mind could shape the battlefield. Pidge had found it pretty bizarre that they were essentially getting elemental mood rings but hadn't given the unexpected development too much thought beyond base scientific curiosity and slight irritation at having to bond with the forest of all things. Did it look like she wanted to be queen of the outdoors? It's nothing but sunburn and poison oak.

For her it was an ability that didn't affect much up in space. She had to be planetside to get any kind of noticeable reaction, at least that's how things started. It wasn't long after they'd shown signs of connecting with their elements that random little plants began popping up around the castle from the places they visited. Pidge wasn't sure who was responsible, but her money was on Lance or maybe Hunk. At first the plants had annoyed her; she didn't always want to be hyperaware of how she was feeling. It was bad enough she'd have to watch herself in forests and heaven help her if she ever ended up near any kind of garden or crops. But then she noticed how nice the plants looked when she was making a breakthrough on a project or learning something new and exciting.

She'd ended up with this little guy in her room that resembled the succulents back on Earth. Its thick, fleshy leaves were an unusual violet-blue color and zebra stripped with thin, water bearing protrusions in a lighter shade of blue closer to cerulean. There was also a lone stalk springing up from the center mass of leaves that just might've been capable of blooming, Pidge wasn't really sure. She'd never had much of a green thumb but her mother had always been keen to keep some manner of greenery around the house and the little growth reminded her of home.

Now that same sprout was struggling, the stalk shriveling up and twining inwards on itself like the tree in the Nightmare Before Christmas, and since it seemed to be the theme for the day, Pidge knew it was entirely her fault. This small living organism that sat at the head of her bed and made her think about returning home with her family someday was suffering. No. She was killing it. She nearly gave in to the impulsive urge to smash the fragile pod against the farthest wall and never lay eyes on it again.

But that meant accepting defeat – something that had always niggled with Pidge. She was still rational enough to understand that what she really needed was control of the situation, some proof of validation for herself and all she was trying to accomplish. Somehow it had suddenly all become tied to her ability to save just one insignificant little scrap of nature.

Her mood was causing this. Feasibly all she had to do was think about something else; that's all there was to it, right? Expect it wouldn't be that easy. Pidge knew she had a terrible habit of fixating on things and never letting go of a problem till she had a viable solution. She was going to keep worrying about her family. She was going to keep being scared for Matt and her dad working as slaves under the Galras' thumb and all the gruesome, terrible things that could be happening to them. She was going to keep feeling homesick and guilty for leaving her mom all alone on Earth. Those emotions weren't going away, but maybe she could lock them down, soothe them with something happier. Memories with her family weren't going to cut it. They'd just remind her how none of them were here right now and that it was her own fault all over again in an awful, self-ridiculing feedback loop. But memories with her team, just maybe she could focus on the people who'd been there to fill the painful void left behind by her loved ones.

There was Lance with his occasionally well timed, lame jokes, who never really protested when she used him as an outlet for her frustrations, accepting the abuse like the seasoned older sibling he was. Quick to forgive and even quicker to join her in whatever irresponsible mischief she could cook up.

Hunk with his distracted rambling, curious snooping and compassionate ear, always eager to dive into an intense round of tinkering and engineering at the drop of a hat to back up her ideas and help her work past the obstacles.

Keith with his supportive and oddly understanding silences. The biggest loner of them all, yet he'd come to her defense in a heartbeat with savage intensity.

And Shiro, who knew exactly what Pidge's family was going through because he had lived it, allowed her to think those first uncharitable thoughts about him in her ignorance of what he'd done for them. More of an older brother than a commander, he'd let her reveal her true identity in her own time.

These people weren't her family in the sense that they shared blood or had known each other all their lives, but they were hers all the same and they relied on her, believed in her. With so much faith behind her maybe Pidge could still believe in herself too.

It was slow at first, almost unnoticeable, but the sad plant perked up a bit. There was color returning to the withered leaves and the stalk began to straighten out. Pidge watched in awe as the little sprout fought and strained back to life. The bulb at the end of sprout started to bulge and grow, before popping open to reveal vibrant pink petals dusted in sparkling, golden pollen.

Pidge gasped, mesmerized. She'd done it; the little guy was going to live!

It was of course in this moment, at the height of her victory, that she inhaled a whiff of the alien pollen and promptly sneezed hard enough to scatter more pollen and dirt from the pod all over the sheets of her bunk. She groaned noisily, trying not to breathe in any more of the gold dust irritating her nasal cavities.

Maybe it wasn't all sunburn and poison oak, but nature was still a pain. Eugh.

END NOTES: I had a little succulent similar to the one in Pidge's room. It's most unfortunate happy thoughts were not enough to bring it back to life too.

Up next week will be the Guardian of Water. Thanks for reading!