Disclaimer: I do not own Voltron or any of its characters. Please don't sue me, I'm a poor college student.

Matt had been there for God-knows-how-long. It had been several weeks, maybe months. After being rescued from Galra prison by Te-osh and the Rebels, he had worked with her for a while until his face had become a bit too recognizable. The Rebels had placed him here after helping him to make a fake grave marker. He'd know some of the people whose markers had been set at that memorial. "The quest for freedom is won through sacrifice." And they had sacrificed their lives for the cause – for freedom.

He had made sure that when his transponder was placed, a code was also put on his fake marker. It was a quantum frequency. If his father were somehow able to escape and somehow able to find that place while looking for him, he would know what it meant. Even without the book, he knew his father would understand. He had to. The coordinates would lead him to Matt's current location.

Where was this location?

A listening outpost in butt-fuck-middle-of-nowhere where he had been monitoring Galra radio chatter for months. It was lonely and boring. Very few people knew where he was, not even Te-osh knew. And he had been there for perhaps months in this old spy facility trying and failing, to crack the hundreds of scrambled Galra messages that came through. He had worked every kind of decryption technology he could think of, from the things that the Rebel scientists had thrown together to old Olkarion tech. A while back he had even spent a respectable number of days with just the numbers and a Galra language log, a bit like a dictionary and still found nothing. Those were several hours of his life he was never getting back.

He was still trying to monitor ship movements when a proximity alarm went off. No one in the resistance had told him they were coming, which was protocol. So, no one, repeat, NO ONE should know this place existed… Even any evidence of gravity and life should have been hidden, so the planet should have been of no interest to passing aliens.

A secondary proximity alarm went off, indicating that said visitor wasn't just passing by, but would indeed be investigating. Matt quickly put on his mask and hid, his staff at the ready.

Matt stiffened as he watched the porthole to the base open. Whoever it was had not been fooled by the hidden entrance and was coming in. He would have to deal with them. He held back a sigh. Today was not his lucky day. He grasped his staff a bit harder as he remembered what Te-osh and the rest of the Rebels had taught him. It was kind of ironic. Before the crazy Kerberos Mission Matt had never even thought of fighting. Now he was at least proficient.

A figure in a green and white space suit used a jetpack to slow their descent into the base. It seemed to be one of the shorter species of aliens, but Matt wasn't going to underestimate them because of that.

"This must be some kind of spy facility," the figure said as they looked around, specifically at his troop movement board. He wouldn't let the spy get a better look than that. He would have to find out who this guy was working for and call the rebels.

He readied his staff and ran behind the figure hoping for a sneak attack. Unfortunately, the man saw his reflection on the screen and tucked and rolled away as Matt swung at him. Matt swung again, first right, then left with a grunt chasing the intruder. Matt twisted his staff over his head, gaining momentum. The alien was fast and ran up a post, using its jetpack to flip off and land behind him just as Matt swung again. This guy was a pain in the ass!

Just as Matt's eyes followed the alien behind him, the crazy guy pulled out a weapon for the first time in the fight and threw a grappling hook at him. Luckily Matt knew how to deal with that. Matt swung his staff in front of himself to block the strike then twirled it a bit again, bringing it to the ground and the alien along with it with a grunt. The quick little shit rolled out of the way as he went to bring his staff down on him. In the beginning, he was all for capturing this guy for questioning, now he was tempted to ruff him up a bit first if he DIDN'T STAND STILL!

He turned around, the alien still on the ground from his roll, ready to strike, both hands holding his weapon above his head when the stranger shouted something at him that changed everything.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MY BROTHER!"

Milliseconds. That was how long it took to comprehend. That was how long it took for Matt to think. Brother. The only "brother" anywhere near here was him. The only person's "brother" he was, was Pidge's. But Pidge was on Earth. But… he took a real look at the intruder for the first time and his hands relaxed from his staff, slowly moving down.

BAM!

Shit. Should have paid attention.

The next thing he knew the grappling hook had hit him full in the face. His mask had flown off, and he crashed to his knees on the floor. There was no way. It couldn't be.

He turned around and there she was with a blade to his throat staring at his uncovered face in shock.

"Pidge?"

"Matt?"