Please enjoy this un-beta'd, barely edited speculation on what might happen in season 6!

"Lance, would you stop pacing around like that?" Pidge snapped, not looking up from her laptop. She didn't know why the boy had come to the Green Lion's hangar, and she hadn't minded at first, but he was beginning to distract her from her work. Much to her annoyance.

"Did you notice anything different about Shiro?" Lance asked in return, stopping in his tracks, but now tapping his foot.

"Is this still about how he snapped at you the other week? Just give him some time. He's probably just having a bad… month." Pidge paused as she thought of times Shiro had acted strange lately. She had to hand it to Lance that Shiro had been acting off, but she didn't think too much of it. "Maybe his PTSD is acting up."

"But what if it's not just that?" Lance asked. "What if, like, when he disappeared that time, that witch lady got him and turned him into some Manchurian Candidate-Winter Soldier!"

"What makes you think that?" The girl asked, clearly not impressed by Lance's conclusion.

"Well, first off, Keith found him in a Galra fighter. Then he suddenly started complaining about these headaches and suggesting we do dangerous stuff when we've formed Voltron, and when we don't follow along in doing that dangerous stuff he suggests we do, he goes rogue and does it anyway!" Lance listed off, and before he knew it, he was pacing around the room again. "It's like he's not the Shiro we know anymore… Heck, he said so himself. He took me somewhere private when Allura and Lotor were out learning alchemy and he told me that he doesn't feel like himself. And at first I just thought he was maybe a little out of it, but then when the plant Robeast trapped us and we were on that weird astral plane thing, Shiro called out to me… But he didn't feel like the Shiro we have now, he felt like the Shiro we used to have. Before he disappeared. I couldn't hear what he was trying to say because of the interference, but if we can find the information anywhere it's in the Black Lion."

"So, what you're getting at is that you need me to hack in to the Black Lion and find out what he was trying to say?"

"Yeah, basically that."

"That's all nice and good, but how are we going to get inside the Black Lion? I don't think Shiro is going to like it very much if we question his credibility in front of him."

"Don't worry. I've got an idea." Lance smiled.

"I 'immediately have to come back to activate the Black Lion' for you?! Have you lost your mind?! I've disobeyed on enough missions as is, I'm pretty sure Kolivan is going to kick me out if I skip another one!" Keith shouted over the holographic screen.

Lance flinched. He hadn't expected the other to lose his temper that quickly. "Come on, Keith, it's important." He pleaded, but Keith didn't seem to be listening.

"Besides, what could you possibly want with the Black Lion?! She's in perfectly capable hands with Shiro."

"See, that's just the thing." Pidge cut in.

"We think something's up with Shiro."

Keith looked at Lance, the shock on his face evident. "What do you mean, 'something's up with Shiro'?"

"It's a long story." Pidge sighed. "We'll tell you everything we know when you get here."

"I'm in." Keith said without skipping a beat. "Give me one quintant. I'll be there."

"This better be more than a hunch, Lance." Keith sighed as he let the others into the cockpit of the Black Lion. He only had approximately two days until he had to go back to the Blade. Not unexpected, Kolivan had been very reluctant to let him go. However, Voltron was a crucial ally to the Blade of Marmora. If someone or something from the old Galra empire was influencing the thoughts and actions of its leader, that could spell disaster for the entire cause. And so, Kolivan wanted to rule out that possibility as well.

"Trust me, Keith, I really don't want to be right. I wouldn't have called you if I had any other ideas, but you know just as well as we do that this is a risk we can't take." Lance said grimly. "I just want to know what Shiro was trying to say that day…"

Keith only nodded and sat in the pilot's chair, powering up the Black Lion. Meanwhile, Pidge crawled under the dashboard, plugging the same cable that she regularly used to interface with the Green Lion in to the Black Lion.

"Honestly, I'm not even sure if my laptop can decrypt Shiro's input, or if the Black Lion recorded or even registered it." Pidge said, sounding much less confident than usual. "Combining magic with technology is nice for the Alteans and all, but I think our technology might be a little primitive for that kind of thing."

Shiro jerked awake, sitting upright. He breathlessly gasped for air, as though he had fallen asleep face down on his pillow. However, when he looked around, he found no pillow, no bed. Only the familiar dark purple space he had fought Zarkon in only a few days ago. Or so he thought. Shiro had no idea how long he had been out. No idea how long he had been here. Nor had he any idea how to get out of here. It was when he was about to panic that he heard voices in the distance. He immediately ran towards the sound. Every part of his body ached, and despite sleeping for God knows how long, he was still exhausted, and yet, he still pushed forward as he always did. After a few minutes, he found Keith, Pidge and Lance sitting in a circle. He placed a hand on Keith's shoulder, but gasped in pure horror as his hand went right through him. "Guys?" He whimpered.

Keith's eyes snapped up from Pidge's laptop when the holographic screen in front of the Black Lion's windshield flickered to life. He rapidly tapped Pidge's shoulder to get her attention, only for his hand to be swatted away.

"Can't you see I'm working?" She snapped.

"Yeah, and I think you're done." He said, pointing at the screen. Confused, Pidge and Lance followed his gesture and looked at the screen as well, displaying a single word.

'Guys?'

The three of them shrieked when another sentence appeared on the screen.

'It's me. Shiro.'

"Shiro?" Lance asked.

"Can you hear me?" Shiro asked, kneeling in front of where Lance's manifestation sat. "Can you see me?" Desperate to be perceived in some way or another.

"W-Well, no…" Lance stammered. "But we can… read you?" He frowned, looking up at thin air. Or so it seemed for Shiro.

"That's a start." Shiro sighed in relief, daring to smile again. "Where are you?"

"We're in the Black Lion's head." Pidge explained. "Where are you?"

'If only I knew for sure.' Appeared on the screen. 'I've been here before. I fought Zarkon for the Black Lion here. But I'm not sure what or where this is, or how to get out.'

"What's the last thing you remember?" Keith asked carefully.

Shiro thought for a moment. "I think… Holding the Black Bayard… Fighting Zarkon… There was a huge explosion… Everything hurt and I thought I was going to die." He mumbled, trying to ignore the pain that was still throbbing throughout his body "And I think that's about it. Why do you ask?"

"Well… This might not be easy to take in." Keith mumbled. "You disappeared after that battle with Zarkon. Just, there wasn't a single trace of you to be found in the Black lion. About three months later, we…"

"No, Keith. You did. Not us." Lance cut in.

"I still hadn't given up the search. I knew you still had to be out there. And I found you. Or so we thought…"

"You found me?" Shiro asked, absolutely mortified.

"We don't know exactly what the you we have right now is, but he's constantly working against Allura, he constantly does whatever he wants despite all of us telling him 'no', and when we're fighting as Voltron he's constantly putting us in dangerous situations!" Lance complained.

"Do you think the Galra might have dabbled in cloning?" Keith asked cautiously.

"That's ridiculous." Pidge huffed. "Cloning is much too risky. We don't have the technology for it yet! On Earth, that is…" She trailed off as she came to the realization that however clever she and Hunk may be, the Galra are still leagues ahead of Earth in terms of technology.

"And besides, they would need some sort of material to extract Shiro's genes from. And a lot of it, too." Pidge's manifestation reasoned.

Shiro looked down at his robotic hand, flexing it. "You do realize they have my entire right arm, right? Wouldn't that be enough?"

"Probably…" She mumbled, taking off her glasses and pinching the bridge of her nose. If there was anything Pidge hated, it was being wrong.

"I guess you weren't that far off with your Manchurian Candidate, Lance." Pidge said, looking up at the other.

"Oh man, I was so hoping I was wrong…" He groaned.

"So… Now that we know the Shiro we have on the castle ship right now is a clone, what's the plan?" Keith asked.

"You're the Black Paladin now, Keith. That's up to you." Shiro smiled.

"Uh, no..." Keith's manifestation mumbled. "The other Shiro is. I'm off with the Blade of Marmora. They only needed me to get in here without the other Shiro knowing."

"Okay. Here's the plan…" Shiro sighed, resting his face in his hands. With all the other aches in his body, his oncoming headache was less than welcome.

'You're going to tell everyone else on this ship that the other Shiro is a clone, except for the clone himself. Whoever is using him might be using him could also be using him as a mole to gather information to stay one step ahead of us. However, now that we know this is going on, we will be one step ahead of them. You guys are going to have to pretend that you think he is me. That is, until I can come back.'

"But when will that be?" Keith asked, looking up at the screen. "We don't even know why you're there!"

'I think I might have an idea why. Just don't worry about it, okay? The Black Lion let me out the last time, she'll do it again. It's probably only a matter of time.'

If I get hit with more inspiration on this topic before season 6 drops, I might continue this. Until then, I'm afraid this is the best I can come up with.

But I wanna know what you guys think! Do you think this is how it might go down, or do you have radically different ideas on what might happen? Leave them in the comments, and I'd be happy to read them!