Thank you for all the positive feedback! I love reading your thoughts on this story, it makes me happy to know you guys like what I wrote.

Warnings: None.

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Chapter 3: Misplaced trust

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It had been a few days before Thanksgiving when they heard the news. Katie was playing with Bae-Bae on the floor of the living room, Matt sitting with their parents behind her on the couch. The sun had gone down, and her dad had just switched on the television when the phone rang. Katie scooched over to let him stand, eyes occasionally flicking over to the TV where some goofy sitcom was playing, half an ear tuned to her father's conversation.

"What?!" The shout had them all jumping, but before anyone could ask what was wrong, her father had poked his head back into the living room, the phone clutched tightly in his fist while he pointed at the television with his free hand. "Honey, put on channel two o' seven, please!"

Katie took in her father's pinched brows, his worried frown and tense posture with growing dread as her mother snatched the remote and quickly input the numbers to the local news channel. Matt sat up, his hands resting on the edge of the couch, ready stand if needed. They shared a worried look, before her brother asked, "Dad, what's wrong?"

Her father sat down stiffly in his previous spot on the couch, his fingers immediately finding her mother's, who mirrored her children's concerned expressions perfectly. She looked at her husband, then at the screen, "Samuel, what is…? Oh my goodness…" A hand went to cover her mouth in shock, her eyes fixed on the television.

"…acecraft KIBO stopped receiving or sending signals, and has all but disappeared, leading us to believe the missing crew is—" Following her mother's line of sight, Katie recognized the reporter on the screen as the same one who'd interviewed her father on next year's space exploration mission. Her eyes drifted down to the headline, reading it as it scrolled across the bottom of the screen.

CHARON MISSION ENDS IN TRAGEDY: CREW MEMBERS PRESUMED DEAD

"No way…" Matt whispered, horrified. Katie felt sick as the photographs of the pilot and her crew were shown on screen, all in their white and red uniforms. She took in their young faces, from the black-haired woman, smiling happily at the camera, to the timid, short-haired brunette, and finally to a smirking redheaded man. None of them looked to be more than thirty years old, heck, the pilot herself seemed to be only a few years older than Matt.

Katie felt sick as a thought came to her. At least they aren't my family. The relief accentuating it only made her feel guiltier. She hugged Bae-Bae close, only mildly comforted by the dog's nervous licks to her temple. What would she do, she wondered, if her family disappeared on their mission? What if the ship malfunctioned, what if they were stranded on Pluto's moon, what if, what if, what if… Her father stood again, already dialing a number on the house phone. "Excuse me, I need to call Manabu." Katie let him walk past her. A moment later her mother got up to follow him, leaving her and Matt to sit in silence while the awful news continued playing in the background.

After another minute, Matt shut the TV off, and slid down the couch to sit next to her on the floor. Katie looked over at him, at his messy hair and ridiculously large glasses, and felt her eyes mist over at the mere thought of him disappearing from her life for good. "Don't- Don't you dare disappear like that." She demanded, her voice breaking from emotion. She hoped he wouldn't comment on it.

Instead of teasing her for the weak threat, Matt put a comforting hand on her shoulder and nodded. "I won't, Pidge."

"Promise?" She insisted, her hand covering his.

"Promise." He said, not knowing he wouldn't be able to keep it.

Katie rolled over and sat up in an unfamiliar bed. She ran a hand through her damp hair and sighed. Her mind wandered back to a memory she hadn't revisited in years. The missing pilot and her crew had faded from her life nearly as quickly as they'd come into it, only resurfacing on the occasions her father had brought them up, and on the nights leading up to the Kerberos Mission when nightmares kept her awake.

A week after they heard the news, the Garrison held a ceremony in remembrance of the brilliant minds humanity had lost in its pursuit of knowledge. If she remembered correctly, she'd seen Shiro among the attendees that day, maybe she'd even been near Lance or Hunk, since the Garrison had hosted the event in its auditorium, with all the cadets in attendance. The deceased's families had been invited, but Katie only remembered seeing a group of three there: a woman in her forties and a boy around her age, along with a stoic man with long hair the same color as his dark suit.

Why am I even thinking about this? Katie rubbed her temples as she tried to sort through her brain. Usually she could focus without a problem, but the events of the last three days had her scrambling for stability. When she climbed the roof the night Shiro crashed back into Earth, she had no idea it would lead her here, millions (or billions, or trillions)of miles away from home. No one could've guessed she'd end up in an alien castle, as the pilot to an amazing lion-ship that could become the laser-shooting left arm of a giant mecha. Or that she'd be closer than ever to finding her missing family, she'd boarded the same ship they'd been in. She needed more clues, a hint, anything to start looking again. Maybe she could ask the girl they'd rescued from the Galra if she knew something about her family.

Katie paused her thought process as the girl's face came back to her. She mentally compared her to the blurry memory of the missing Japanese pilot. From what Katie remembered, the pilot had black hair and pale skin, but any distinguishing facial features were lost to her.

It could be a coincidence, after all wouldn't they have found the other members of the Charon Mission in the ship? Or they could've been separated just like dad and Matt were from Shiro. Ugh, this is getting me nowhere! Frustrated, she fell backwards onto the bed. "I figure this out in the morning." She grumbled before kicking her socks off and wrapping herself up in the blanket. Her last thought before she fell asleep, was of seeing her family whole again.

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Waking up was a slow process. She knew something was amiss before even opening her eyes. The usual sting of the device used to shock her awake never came, and Kagome was left to wonder, half asleep, what was going on. Her limbs lacked the heaviness that came after being drained for an indefinite amount of time, almost like it hadn't happened at all. How long had it been since she'd fallen asleep and woken up by herself? By herself…

There was no one around her.

Not a single living presence nearby.

At least not near her.

Kagome frowned and listened intently for rhythmic clanging footsteps, or the whirring of the extraction pod settling back into place. Nothing. Just a constant low hum, barely there, but she could feel the vibrations of it on the comfortable surface she was lying on. Strange. Her fingers rubbed the thick material under them. It felt almost like leather, but softer, fuzzier? It was nice, warm too, as was whatever covered her. Better than cold metal floors or pungent-smelling operating tables. She focused on her next intake of air and couldn't detect the unpleasant scent anywhere near her. Did that mean she wasn't in the lab?

After a moment of consideration she opened her eyes. She squinted at the brightness of the room – a room, not a pod- and waited until her eyes adjusted to open them completely. Grey and cyan surrounded her, instead of dark purple. For a moment she simply laid there, staring at the silver ceiling in confusion.

Where am I? A look around the small room didn't provide any useful information. Nothing was familiar or seemed particularly human-made, so she could rule out being back on Earth, not that she'd actually entertained the thought for long anyway.

It took another minute before she decided to sit up. A thin blanket slipped off her shoulders and gathered on her lap. She peered down at it with furrowed brows, unable to recall seeing it anywhere before. Like the cushion underneath her, it was soft and surprisingly warm given its slight weight. To be honest, she'd thought it was her hair, but it had been pulled out of her face and into an intricate braid that started at her hairline and ended just above her waist. She really, really wanted to cut it. Apart from the clothes she wore, it barely felt like there was anything covering her. She froze and looked down slowly at herself. Wait, I'm wearing… Clothes?

The blanket tumbled pathetically to the floor once she kicked it off. She shivered from the loss of warmth but didn't move to pick it up while she observed the unfamiliar clothing. Sure enough, she was wearing a dress. Mostly blue in color, with gold trimming at the hem of the skirt and sleeves ending in a point at her wrists. It was pretty, and comfortable to boot.

She pinched the fabric of the left sleeve between her fingers, trying to figure out if she was having an incredibly realistic dream or not. It was light and snug on her arm while still being breathable and stretchy, but she couldn't quite identify what it was made of. Obviously it wasn't something they had on Earth, even if it was remarkably similar to a jersey knit kind of fabric.

Kagome gave the room another quick look around before she peeked down the neckline, discovering with a grim frown that her bra was gone, likely deemed unnecessary what with the thick material the dress had along the inside of the bust. Gathering her courage, she lifted the long skirt. Thank goodness, they're still there! She nearly collapsed with relief when she saw her panties.

Just then, she heard them. Footsteps, coming from somewhere beyond the only visible exit. Fear turned her stomach to lead for an instant, before she forced herself to calm down, and think. She spread her senses out again, and felt a single presence approaching the room. Only one? Easy. A smirk pulled at the corner of her lips, though she had to suppress it when the door to the room split across the middle and opened to reveal a short, messy-haired, seemingly human kid in a green and white shirt. Kagome hesitated as she locked eyes with him. She couldn't fight a child.

The kid appeared surprised to see her. "Oh, you're finally awake! I have so many questions to ask you…!" Kagome blinked at the voice. It sounded much higher than she'd expected. So much that it almost distracted her from what the kid was saying. The kid seemed to falter under her stare, before speaking again, "Wait here, okay? I'll go get the others."

Kagome nodded slowly and made a show of staying put until the door closed, all while thinking: Like hell I'm just gonna sit here.

She sprang to her feet and bolted through the exit as soon as she felt their presence at the edge of her senses. Seeing as they'd gone left, she turned right and sprinted down the corridor in that direction. The hall ended in a fork, she went right again. Her bare feet slapped noisily against the cool metal floor; she had to make a conscious effort to be quiet as she ran, or else it'd be too easy to find her.

After a left turn she made it to a long set of gray stairs. She stopped for a moment to stare out into the darkness at the bottom and searched around for a different route.

"Wait! Stop!" A male voice boomed around her, its origin hard to pinpoint. Kagome screamed, missing the rest of what the voice said as she gathered up the long skirt of the dress she was wearing and rocketed down the steps with speed gained from true fear. The same voice gave directions to her location, she nearly missed it over her own racing pulse. "She's headed for the Yellow Lion's hangar! No, wait, now she's changed directions! She's almost in the Green Lion's hangar!"

Kagome let out a breathless curse as her attempt to throw them off was quickly foiled by the voice's insistent and curiously enthusiastic narrating. English, English, English! Why does everyone speak English in space?! She paused again in front of another fork in the hall. One, no, two presences were closing in on her from the right, and three more from the back. Left it was then.

She went left once, then again, doubling back the way she came in a different hall. "Paladins! She's going back to the entrance. Keith, you're going the wrong way, it's to the right—" Apparently one of her pursuers got lost. She slid sideways to the end of the hall and took a different set of stairs up. "Look at her go! She's quicker than a leaping snarfle!"

A what? She tripped on the last step, landing with a yelp on her knees. Thundering footsteps got louder, they were catching up. Kagome scrambled back to her feet, yanking her skirt up with desperate ferocity while she zoomed across a dim corridor. Her foot ached from the collision with the step, and her knees throbbed where they'd hit the ground. Her breathing was getting more and more erratic, she wasn't sure how much longer she could keep running—

"Hey!" She squeaked as the shout rang out behind her and ran faster, pushing her legs to their limit, and past it in order to get away. Kagome chanced a peek over her shoulder and saw an angry blur of red and black chasing after her. Why me, why? She mentally hand shot out to grab the wall, using her momentum to make a sharp right turn just as the guy following her reached out to grab her. He ran past the hall and had to double back with another disgruntled "hey!" directed at her.

Just when a smile had started to grown on her face, a big guy in a yellow shirt and vest stood at the end of the hall, his arms and legs spread wide in a clear effort to get her to stop. He even said as much, "Stop! We're not trying to hurt you! No seriously, stop!"

Her eyes dashed from one side to the other before settling on the ground. An idea formed. I hope this works!

She fell back a meter before they collided, slid feet-first between his legs and sprung back up behind him without missing a beat. "Woah… Huh? Keith STO- Oomph!" Kagome didn't need to turn to know the guy in red had crashed into him. She left the groaning boys behind, zooming past the same person who'd checked up on her and tall guy in an olive-green jacket.

"Ooh, looks like Hunk and Keith are out. It's up to Pidge and Lance-! Never mind, she passed them already. You two should try harder!"

She heard indignant shouts, presumably those of "Pidge" and "Lance" behind her, but she ignored them and kept moving forward without paying attention to the argument they got into with the narrator. There was a long, dark passage up ahead, and a staircase leading down coming up on her right. Is a map too much to ask for?! She thought as she took the stairs down two at a time. Once close to the bottom she jumped and quickly pressed her back against the adjacent wall, hiding from the light that filtered down from the hall.

"Coran, where'd she go?!" There was an aggressive quality in the question. Kagome flinched as the footsteps stopped at the top of the stairs. She could feel all four of them there, searching in the darkness for her. "I'll go this way, you three go that way." Her hand covered her mouth to silence her ragged breath, though it didn't stop her from shaking. Sweat dripped down her face to the floor; she feared they'd hear it. Her heart was hammering inside her chest, it would surely burst if it kept its current pace.

The others seemed to disagree with the order. "What? There's four of us, let's just split into pairs." She recognized the voice, it belonged to the guy she'd slipped under.

"It's alright, Hunk. Keith's just afraid he can't keep up with me."

"I think it's more along the lines of us not being able to keep up with him." A third voice corrected dryly. The kid with the green and white shirt from before.

"I don't appreciate your sass, Pidge."

An exasperated feminine voice echoed through the walls, "Paladins, stop your pointless argument and resume the search. Please."

Trembling, Kagome edged away, groping along the wall as quietly as she could to avoid tripping again. There was a blue glow beyond a stretch of darkness, she made a beeline toward it. I need to find a place to hide. It was easier said than done, considering "the voice" could apparently keep track of her without her notice.

She made it to a narrow hall when she heard a different voice from afar call out, "Could we get some light over here?"

The narrator was quick to reply, "Just a tick. Light's should be on—" Kagome glided through a door as the room behind her was illuminated, "—now."

Contrary to what she'd thought, the next room was bathed in shadows. She could barely see her own hand in front of her face. It took a while of walking blind before she bumped into something. Her palms fell on a smooth surface in front of her, possibly metal given the texture and temperature. Kagome circled it, guided by her hands. It was quite big, although she couldn't discern its shape through touch alone. Judging by the distinct sides it had, it felt geometric, most likely it was part of some sort of machine.

Suddenly there was light, far above her, and partially blocked by a strange shape. Kagome leaned back to get a better look. Two yellow trapezoid-like shapes cut through the darkness. With the way they moved… she felt like they were a pair of eyes watching her. From what she could see of the general area around them, they were part of a larger component, another machine maybe?

The ground's ever-present vibrations increased, the hum became a rumble potent enough to make her jump in fright. Did I turn something on?! She quickly retracted her hand, but the sound didn't stop. They're going to find me! Panic crept into her at the realization. She had to go hide, or else the same thing would happen to her, again and again and again… she would never be free.

Something above her moved. Kagome looked up from the ground, her hands still clutching at her head with dread, and saw the same glowing shapes now a few feet away. She could see what it was now: an enormous mechanical feline head, part of an equally large mechanical feline body. Bolts of blue throughout its length lit up one by one, revealing what she'd previously been touching to be one of its front paws. It was staring at her, waiting for something. The vibrations hadn't stopped, though now that she'd seen what was causing them, she had to wonder if what she felt was actually a purr.

Her hand reached out again, slow and unsure, to touch its muzzle. The tips of her fingers brushed against tepid metal. On contact a whirring noise began. Something tickled her senses, an enveloping sensation she felt was wrapping her soul up in a cocoon of warmth. Safe… she felt safe.

When the cat-like machine opened up to let her inside, she all but ran in. It guided her upwards to an empty seat placed in front of a dashboard. The exhaustion hit her full force when she carefully sat down in it, her trembling legs tucked in close to her chest to rest her head on her knees. The purring hadn't stopped, nor had the comforting feeling that drew her in. She felt like crying, but pushed the urge away before tears could start falling. All she needed to do was hide there for a while, until the ones outside stopped looking for her. Then, she'd look for a spacecraft of some kind, and get out, hopefully to Earth.

… It wouldn't be so easy. Who knew how far she was from her home planet at that point in time. When her crew was captured, they were all transferred to a different ship. She'd seen no other ship anywhere near Charon, so the only conclusion she could come up with was they'd traveled some distance in a short time to get them there. Given how the first Galra ship appeared out of nowhere, Kagome thought it wouldn't be too implausible for them to have done the same thing to get them back to what the one running the entire operation called the main fleet.

Zarkon.

No, she couldn't go back. Not until she found the rest of her team. She wouldn't abandon them. It didn't matter how, she'd find a way to get her crew back, but she couldn't return to Earth until she did. Kagome wasn't stupid, she knew what would happen if she went back after disappearing for as long as she had. They'd question her, likely keep her from seeing her family even after they were done. She knew too much… maybe they'd even make her "disappear" before she could even ask for help rescuing her team. So for their sake, and hers, she couldn't go back to her planet until she found them.

Her eyes closed. Sorry mama, Souta, gramps… it'll be another while until I come home… She thought with regret, and the tears she was holding back fell one by one. How long had it been since she really cried? Since she'd had the energy to even think about it? To cope with her separation she'd bottled everything up, to keep herself sane she didn't think, didn't dare to remember, lest the Galra find a way to exploit even that. But she was practically alone now, she could try to assimilate everything.

Kagome shook her head at herself and rubbed at her face tiredly, giving one last pathetic sniffle. Now's not the time for this. She had to be alert. They were still looking for her, whoever they were. From the brief glimpse of them she got, it was obvious they weren't Galra; they had no fuzzy purple skin or armor, unless Galra were just as diverse as humans, she'd assume they weren't. Actually, they looked… human. Her brows pinched together as she considered the idea. She'd been dizzied with sleep when the first one showed up in the room she woke up in. The rest of them were equally blurry in her mind since she'd been running without actually paying attention to what they looked like, so she couldn't say with certainty they weren't human.

But it doesn't make sense. What would a bunch of humans be doing here? The confusion she felt mounted with every question that popped into her head. I've never seen a machine like this, it's definitely not human. Kagome thought and quirked a tiny smile when the steady purrs fluctuated, as if it was agreeing with her.

"Um… Hello?" A hand landed on her shoulder. Kagome lunged forward with a terrified screech, twisting to face the newcomer with wide eyes as she balanced herself on the dashboard like a feral cat. The skirt of her dress got snagged on some of the controls as she backed away, but she yanked it back before it could hinder her movements. The man who'd touched her held his hands out in front of him in a sign of peace, looking as startled as she felt. She caught sight of his prosthetic right arm, attached to the lower half of his bicep, and narrowed her eyes at him. He wasn't human.

He saw her eyes flick behind him, to the exit. "Wait, let's calm down. I'm not going to hurt you." He took a small step toward her, she immediately edged away from him. Seeing this, he stopped moving closer altogether and dropped his hands so they rested at his sides. He took a long step back, raising his hands for her to see. Then, to her utter confusion, he sat down on the floor. "See? I just want to talk." He insisted, his posture relaxed and loose.

Kagome stared at him. What the…? She lowered herself from the dashboard, enough that her feet were on solid ground, ready to move at the slightest provocation. "Why," Her voice was scratchy, the dryness of her throat making itself more apparent than ever. How long had she gone without water? Clearing her throat, she tried again. "Why should I trust anything you have to say?"

The anger in her words caught the man off guard. Actually, he seemed surprised she even spoke at all. "I—"

She wouldn't let him lie, wouldn't even give him the chance to. She stood to her full height, glaring down at him with undisguised fury. "You and your soldiers chase me through this entire gods-forsaken place, and you want me to just sit and listen to whatever you have to say?!" The nerve of him!

"Don't you think talking should've been the first thing to do?! But no, you didn't even try, you went straight to chasing. And why? Because you want to lock me up again!" Her chest heaved by the end of her tirade, heat gathered in her hands. "And if you think I'm just going to let you, you're dead wrong!"

"Hey, you're the one who ran. How do you expect us to talk if you run away the first chance you get?" The man retorted. He didn't raise his voice at her like she expected, he just sat there, frowning, looking almost worried.

As if a cute pair of puppy eyes are enough to fool me. She scowled at him. "Your little GPS friend was perfectly able to talk, wasn't he?" She snapped, crossing her arms. "But instead, he just told you how to capture me. Isn't that convenient?"

He scratched the back of his head. "Look, we haven't been in this castle for long. None of us know the layout well enough. Coran was just trying to help us find you- so we could talk, not capture you- and get you back to the infirmary." He met her unyielding stare with a sincere one of his own, "We still don't know what the Galra were doing to you. Until one of the healing pods is free, you have to stay there so we can keep an eye on you."

The mention of her previous captors gave her pause. He implied he wasn't Galra, but… "What are you?" She looked at his prosthetic arm, it looked more advanced than anything she'd ever seen on her home planet.

He blinked at her. "Japanese-American…?" He trailed off, the pitch of his voice rising in confusion.

Kagome stopped breathing.

No way.

The back of her knees hit the dashboard. Her hand shot out to brace herself, but her eyes never left the man who grew increasingly startled by the second. She didn't notice when her knees hit the ground, too stunned to feel the metal floor biting into her skin. Of course, she was blind to the signs. His almond-shaped eyes, the familiar slang, all of it pointed to his humanity. She'd been fixated on the inhuman aspect of his body, had taken the prosthetic limb reaching out to her even now to mean he wasn't human. Because he couldn't be, not so far from their home, not with all the anomalies around them. Or so she'd thought.

Even with all the evidence, she still had to ask. Kagome looked up into wide grey eyes -when had he gotten so close? – and breathed again. "You're… human?" She whispered, terrified of being wrong when she felt hope again for the first time in so, so long.

The man smiled, the gesture tender and comforting. "Yeah." The answer wasn't long, but she didn't need anything more.

Relieved beyond words, Kagome brought her knees to her chest and broke down crying. Her body quivered with each mute sob. Tears and snot fell freely down her face before she buried it into the fabric of the borrowed dress, shielding herself from the man's kind eyes.

An immeasurable amount of time passed before she felt warmth on her shoulder. The hand touching her was soft. She barely stopped herself from leaning into it. Her self-control hung by a thread when three years of being touch-starved hit her like a bus. He was kneeling next to her, no longer blocking the exit. She could run, if she wanted to. She could choose to deny his claim and escape. Except, she didn't want to. Maybe it was stupid, after all she'd been through, to be so reckless and trust this man just because of his species, but she wanted desperately to believe in him. While he patted her back and murmured comforting things into the air, Kagome made her choice: she wouldn't place her whole trust in him immediately, but just a little bit was enough.

After a while, her sobs turned to quiet hiccups, and the realization she'd turned into a weepy mess in front of a stranger dawned on her. She pressed her face further into her knees, feeling like she wanted to crawl into a hole and never come out. He didn't notice her burning ears as he gave one last comforting pat and asked her, "Do you want to stay here a little longer, or come back to the infirmary with me?"

Kagome considered the offer as she tried to discreetly clean her face with the skirt of the dress (she mentally sent infinite apologies to whoever lent it to her for ruining it with her… fluids). Too embarrassed to look up yet, she muttered her answer into her skirt.

"Sorry, didn't catch that. What did you say?" Oh, why was he leaning so close, that was the opposite of what she wanted. Her plan backfired stupendously.

She let go of her legs to run her hands down her face, wiping the remaining tears away at the same time. Knowing he was waiting patiently for her response, Kagome kept her eyes on her feet while she spoke. "I-I said we can go…" She cringed at the sound of her voice. Where were the tissues when she needed them?

The man chuckled and stood, offering his hand for her to do the same. Her hand wrapped around his prosthetic one, and a shock went up her arm. They snatched their hands back, simultaneously looking at their palms, then at each other. He chuckled sheepishly. "Sorry! This thing's pretty conductive, apparently. Here," He held his other hand out, which she took after eyeing it with some hesitance. Unconsciously, she flexed her hand while they exited the room.

Her entire arm wouldn't stop tingling.

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A/N:

Hard times await our main gal. And the others.

So, when I say I'd love to hear what you think about this story, I really mean it. Does anyone seem OOC? Plot holes? Weird things in general? Let me know! I want to improve as a writer, so your reviews are important to me. Thanks again to all of you who've shared your comments and love so far, I'll see you in the next chap.

Originally posted July 7th, 2018.