So, my introduction to this fandom was reading whump bingo fics...like, literally, I hadn't even started watching the show yet at the time. It's really no surprise, then, that this is the first thing I write. It was supposed to be a oneshot...then it just kept going...so I ended up dividing it into three parts.

If you're just here for the whump and angst, then the first chapter can stand alone. The second chapter will be more whump from a different perspective. The third chapter is where the comfort/recovery starts and where the fluff lives, but it also has it's own generous portion of angst. The whole thing is already written, but I'll probably spread the posts a week apart.

Trigger warnings for past child abuse and nyctophobia.

Hope you enjoy!

Surrounded.

The friendly little welcoming party had turned hostile without warning in less than two ticks, and had multiplied just as fast. Now Keith was completely surrounded by the tall, hulking aliens, and the majority of them had blasters trained on him. He was trapped, and there were few things in the universe that he hated more than being trapped.

Slowly, Keith raised his hands up above his shoulders, turning his attention back to the one who appeared to be the leader. "There's no need to get violent. I come here with peaceful intentions. You've heard of Voltron, right? I'm one of the paladins of Voltron."

The mob of aliens only inched closer to him from every side, and his heart rate picked up even more. There's too many of them. I can't fight them all off. "We're looking for more planets to join our alliance. To help us fight against the Galra Empire."

At this the leader laughed derisively, and spoke for the first time since his short 'welcome to In'aro' speech, before everything had gone rapidly downhill. "You claim to fight against your own kind?"

Keith's heart plunged into his stomach. How did they know? "I...I'm not..."

"Silence, Galra scum," the leader hissed, a forked tongue flicking between his green teeth. "Surrender to us now, and you will not be harmed."

Every muscle in Keith's body tensed, ready to fight, as the ones with guns moved ever closer. No, no, I can't surrender, I've got to get back to the Castle... "Please, contact Voltron. Talk to the other paladins, to Princess Allura. They can explain everything." Why aren't they here right now? I never should have come alone. I can't get captured, they won't know what happened to me.

The leader gave a nod, and two of the In'aroans closest to him lowered their blasters and lunged forward. Keith's bayard was in his hand in an instant. He sliced at each alien before they could get their hands on him, leaving oozing black cuts in their pale green skin.

As expected, complete pandemonium broke out. Three more aliens were on top of him almost immediately, trying to grab and subdue him. Keith knocked one away, only for a blaster shot to whiz in front of his torso so closely that he could actually feel the heat off of it. A second shot bounced off of the armor on his forearm when he spun around to face the other two attackers, sending a jolt out to his wrist and elbow, but not causing any damage. The third shot, however, came from behind and found the small, unprotected spot just above his left knee, piercing through his flight suit with ease and bursting out the front of his leg. Keith stumbled forward with a cry of pain.

That instant was all the In'aroans needed to latch onto his arms and force them behind his back, wrenching his bayard out of his hand. He struggled against them, but the aliens' upper bodies were at least as big around as Hunk's, and there was no budging his arms against that strength. Heavy manacles were quickly snapped around his wrists. They seemed to be attached directly to one another, leaving no wiggle room.

"Please," Keith tried again, panting from adrenaline, fear, and pain. "I mean you no harm. I'm not with the Galra, I promise."

The leader approached him, clearly unafraid now that Keith was shackled and being held firmly in place. "I don't need to know if you're with the Galra. All I need to know is that – whether you look like it or not – you are Galra. That's plenty of reason to lock you away."

With another nod to his soldiers, he turned and began walking back through the mountain pass from which he had originally appeared. Keith was pulled forward none too gently, gritting his teeth against another outcry as his injured leg was forced to bear his weight. At least it wasn't bleeding. That was the one good thing about blaster wounds.

They walked for what seemed like vargas, first winding through the rocky yellow mountains, then out into a wide open desert that reminded Keith of home. He hadn't missed home much in the time since they had all left, but this was one of those rare moments where he would have given anything to be sitting in his little shack, alone in the middle of the Arizona desert.

Stubbing his toe on a rock brought him abruptly back to the present. He would have pitched forward, unable to catch himself, if it hadn't been for the tight grip the two soldiers had on his arms. He should have been grateful for that, he supposed – a broken nose was the last thing he needed right now – but it was hard to feel grateful when all of his internal alarms were blaring, danger danger danger! People were holding him in place so that he couldn't move and that was not good, never good, being held means getting hurt, I have to go, I have to get out of here! It had been a few years since he had needed those alarms so much, and he had even gotten better about letting Shiro hold onto him on occasion without them going off, but all of that progress had flown out the window now.

The procession came to a sudden halt in what seemed to be the middle of nowhere. It was only when green lights burst to life in a giant circle around them that Keith noticed that the terrain under his feet had changed. It was covered by a layer of sand, but they were all standing on some kind of metal surface. The leader struck the ground with his staff twice, and vibrations started up underneath their feet, causing Keith to tense up even more. Then they were sinking, a smaller portion of the circle breaking away from the whole and carrying them down, down, down, the desert slowly disappearing from sight. Panic rose up in Keith's throat. He jerked forward, as if he would suddenly be able to break free and run and leap up onto the edge before it was too late, but all he succeeded in doing was sending fire shooting up his leg again.

The last glimpse of the desert vanished over his head, and Keith found himself looking at what had to be cells – rows upon rows upon rows, all around the circle, going on and on as the platform sank lower into the dark. The first several rows had large windows, in some of which he could see aliens of various races watching them go by. Then the windows stopped, replaced by metal doors whose seams could barely be seen. The further down they went, the darker it became. The bright sun up above only just reached into these dark crevices.

Finally the platform shuddered to a halt, then creaked slowly forward so that it was flush against the wall on one side, right in front of a cell door. A smaller circular platform, just large enough for someone to stand on, whirred up from beneath them, green lights around the edges illuminating the In'aroan it held. He hovered next to the leader for a moment, exchanging a few, quiet words, glancing back at Keith once or twice. Then he flew to the door and slid it open with the press of a button.

Keith was marched forward again. He desperately did not want to go inside, not in there, no, please, not in there, but his attempts to struggle only got him shoved roughly into the cell, the extra jarring to his leg sending him stumbling to his knees and almost onto his face. An instant later, they were on top of him again, jerking his helmet off of his head and ripping away his armor until he was left feeling vulnerable and exposed in only his black flight suit. His boots and socks were the last thing to come off. The metal cuffs stayed.

"Listen." He tried his best to keep the desperation out of his voice, to not come across in any way close to the dangerous, aggressive person that they thought he was. "I understand why you're doing this. I get it. But please, all I'm asking is that you contact Princess Allura of Voltron and let her try to work this out." The soldiers were leaving, and he shuffled himself around painfully to face the door. "Just tell her what's going on, and see what she has to say." Allura was the diplomat. Allura would know what to say where his words had failed him.

The leader merely sneered at him as the door began to slide closed. Keith tried and failed to get his feet underneath him, almost falling over again in the process. "We still need In'aro as an ally in this war!" he called out. "Don't let my blood get in the way of defeating the Empire!"

Just before the door shut, he heard the leader mutter to another, "If he doesn't stop his babbling soon, feel free to shut him up yourself."

With an ominous clang, the door latched into place, and Keith's breath caught in his throat as the darkness settled over him. From outside, there was another creak, and green lights shone briefly through the tiniest of cracks under the door. But that light dimmed, too, as the platform began its ascent back to the surface, and continued to dim more and more as the mechanical sounds receded. When the boom of the platform locking into place at the very top of the prison echoed down like a rumble of thunder, there was not a sliver of light left. Keith blinked, and blinked again. But try as he might, there was nothing there for his eyes to adjust to. This darkness was thick and unmoving, swallowing him up where he sat pathetically with one leg still tucked underneath him and his wounded left leg stretched out in front.

Okay, breathe. Just breathe. Gotta keep breathing. It's not like this is the first time I've been locked in a dark room. It was the first time that it had been quite this dark, and the first time that it happened on an alien planet with a gaping hole in his leg, but that was beside the point. Okay, if they actually contact the Castle... He tried to ignore how unlikely that scenario actually seemed. If they actually contact them then they'll have to get through some negotiations, but Allura and Shiro will make it work somehow. I'll be in here a couple of quintants, tops.

He sucked in a deep breath. If they don't contact them, then they're not expecting me back for four or five quintants. Plus they might give me some more time on top of that, plus they'll need to handle negotiations once they actually figure out what happened. So, unless they try to contact me before then and get worried when they can't get through...worst case scenario it'll be a movement or so. His heart stuttered at the thought of sitting in the dark for an entire movement, but he quickly shoved the panic back down. I can do that. I can handle being here that long. His eyes shifted down to where his knee should have been, if he could actually see it. I mean, it's not like I'm bleeding out or anything. It just hurts.

And what if they don't come at all? Keith clenched his teeth and shook his head violently, trying to rid himself of that little voice that he hated as much as it hated him. "They'll come. I'm the red paladin. They need me."

Hauling himself up off the cold floor, he braced himself against the inevitable pain and limped further into the cell, in the general direction of the metal slab bed he had glimpsed before everything had gone dark. It didn't take him long to find it, since the cell was only a few paces wide in every direction. He perched on it carefully, bracing himself from sliding down by propping up his right leg, and leaning against the wall in as comfortable of a position as he could find for his arms.

Guess this is the last diplomatic mission I'll be going on by myself. Not that he was complaining. The diplomatic side of things was not his forte, never had been. Sure, he had volunteered himself for this one, but only because he felt guilty otherwise. Lance was still in a cryopod getting over a mild concussion from their last battle, Hunk was too stressed out about his best friend being hurt to leave his side, Pidge and Allura and Shiro were busy trying to work on the Castle's defenses after it had taken a few too many hits, Coran was running back and forth trying to both help them and keep an eye on Lance at the same time, and that meant that Keith was the only one not doing anything important – useless, as usual, the little voice helpfully supplied – and Allura had bemoaned, "In'aro is right there, so close, and it would be such a shame to pass it by without trying to bring them into the Coalition when they have weapons and military experience," and so Keith had volunteered to go alone.

So even though he'd have liked to say that it was Allura's fault for wanting the alliance so badly, and for wanting each of them to learn how to handle diplomatic situations on their own, and for assuring him that the In'aroans had been a peaceful race for many deca-phoebes...or one of the others' fault, perhaps, for not volunteering to go with him...it was really his. He had gotten himself into this situation, no one else. If anybody else had come, they would have been able to talk themselves out of trouble, but that had never worked for him. Besides, if anybody else had come, there wouldn't have been any trouble. None of the others are Galra. He still didn't know how the In'aroans had known, but it didn't matter. They knew, and they hated him, and he couldn't really blame them for that.

.o.0.O.0.o.

Time was impossible to track. His best guess was that several vargas had passed, even though the pessimistic side of him said that it might have only been a few dobashes. The fact that his arms had gone numb from too much pressure on them was really the only indication of time he had. Standing onto one leg, he tried to shake the blood flow back into them, with only limited success.

A sliver of green light flashed underneath his door, and he flinched. Then a small, rectangular hole opened up near the floor, letting even more of the green light through, and shadowy hands reached in to place two items inside the cell. Keith hobbled forward as rapidly as he could go, the pain in his leg suddenly seeming much less important than interaction with a living being.

"Hey, wait!" The little opening was already sliding shut. "Has anyone contacted Voltron yet?" The hatch snapped shut and the light vanished, the person outside not even hesitating at his call. Frustration mounted in Keith's chest, and he kicked at the spot where the hole had been, ignoring the resulting stubbed toe. "Come on!" he yelled through the door. "Would someone please just give me some answers here? Just tell me whether or not you're gonna call them!"

Silence answered him. Growling, he kicked the door again, and again, this time minding his bare toes. When he had thoroughly set his leg on fire from standing on it for so long and accomplished absolutely nothing, he groaned and dropped his forehead against the door. Who am I kidding? Of course they're not going to call. And nobody's gonna try to contact me, either, so I might as well get used to the idea of being here long term.

Suddenly the light was back, even brighter this time, and he barely managed to straighten up in time to not fall out the door when it opened fully. Before he was even able to process what was happening, there were hands on him again, propelling him backwards into the cell and slamming him up against the wall. His vision somehow simultaneously went white and black as his head bounced off the metal surface and something in his wrist snapped. A scream that he couldn't even hear tore out of his throat.

When he could see again, there were two In'aroans pinning him in place, and another leering in his face, just barely illuminated by the hovering green lights outside the door. "I don't stand for that kind of racket in here," he snarled. "Good prisoners are silent prisoners."

"O-okay. I-I'm sorry," Keith stammered, trying to quell the nausea churning in his gut. The internal alarms were blaring again danger danger danger! and the pain traveling up his right arm from his wrist was like molten lava, but he couldn't move, couldn't fight, don't fight it, just take the pain, fighting it only makes everything worse. "It won't happen again."

"Too late."

Hands came at his face and he cringed, expecting to be punched or choked, but instead something metal slid underneath his chin. His eyes flew open wide as it slammed down over his mouth and nose. All of the instincts telling him not to fight it were gone, complete panic taking their place because oh quiznack they're muzzling me like a dog and I won't be able to breathe! but once again, fighting only got him shoved further into the wall. He screamed again at the pressure on his wrist, but they were already wrenching the straps tight over his head, clamping his jaw shut and muffling the sound. Two more leather straps cut across his cheekbones, and another two wrapped around his neck just under his jaw. All of them were pulled as tight as they could possibly go, digging into his skin at all angles.

The jailer stepped back, admiring his work. "There. That'll shut you up. If it doesn't stop you from banging around in here, though, I'll come back and chain you to the wall, too. Got it?"

Keith nodded, blinking back the tears that had formed in his eyes before they could spill over and humiliate him even more. With a final snort, the jailer turned to leave, and Keith was released. The door slid shut, the green lights vanished, and darkness reigned once more.

His breaths echoed loudly in the silence. He hadn't been able to stop panting since the muzzle was first put on, and he knew he was going to end up hyperventilating if he didn't stop, but his lungs still felt empty and he couldn't open his mouth and everything burned – his leg, his wrist, his throat, his lungs, his eyes. Keith slid down the wall to the floor, trying desperately to remember that technique Shiro had taught him for grounding himself.

Five things you can see...but he couldn't see anything, just the never-ending darkness. Four things you can feel...I can feel...pain...and more pain...and metal, everywhere, metal on my face... This wasn't helping any, he was making things worse instead of better. There was nothing to hear, or smell, or taste, the whole world was just darkness and metal and pain, and frantic breaths through his nose and tears pouring down his face unchecked.

Finally his starving lungs had enough, and he passed out.

.o.0.O.0.o.

It was a disconcerting thing, waking up and opening your eyes and being met with pitch darkness. There was no sense of time, no telling how long he had been out. The side of his face was cold from where it had been touching the floor. When he twitched his cheek muscles against the feeling, however, the muzzle dug into his face and he almost went into a panic again. This time he sat up abruptly and dug his wrists back into the wall, letting the sharpness of the pain become his focus instead of the contraption on his face.

Despite the fact that he had just woken up, he was completely exhausted. Shiro would say that being unconscious doesn't really count as sleep. It's why he would always send the paladins off to bed as soon as they got out of a cryopod. There was really nothing better to do in this place than sleep, anyway, so Keith slowly dragged himself up off the floor and hobbled back over to the slab. Not that there's any difference between this "bed" and the floor. I don't know why I bother. It was the principle, really. He had slept enough nights on the floor in his childhood, he didn't need to repeat it now.

It took ages of lying awake with pain pulsing through most of his body, but he finally drifted into a fitful sleep. He was woken by a clank, opening his eyes in time to see someone remove the two untouched items from in front of the hatch and replace them with new. Food and water, he could see now, though his pupils protested against the harsh green lights. Swallowing as if to remind himself just how dry his throat was, he levered himself up off the bed as the hatch shut and crossed to sit next to the bowl and pouch. He stared down at the darkness where the bowl was, the scent of the food faintly reaching his nostrils through the muzzle.

Is this some kind of sick joke? Giving me food that I definitely can't eat, just to torment me? His stomach let out a whine. As much as he hated it, though, he knew that technically he could make it without the food. It was the water that would be key. Thankfully, it was a hydration pouch with a straw, and rubbing the muzzle across his shoulder revealed a few small bumps that had to be holes in the front of it. If the universe could be on his side for just this once, then maybe he could manage to make this work.

His first thought was to try to maneuver his hands around to the front, to make his life easier all around. But after quite a few dobashes of writhing on the ground, trying to get the cuffs past his hips in any way possible, all he had accomplished was exhausting himself and making his knee and wrist hurt even worse. He was pretty sure that if there had been just a little bit of give between the cuffs, he could have done it. As it was, though, he resigned himself to picking up the water from behind, and carried it over to set it on the bed before kneeling down in front of it.

Getting the straw through one of the holes without the use of his hands was way harder than it should have been, and he hated to think of how ridiculous he must have looked attempting it. Eventually, though, he succeeded. Parting his lips, he held the straw in front of his clenched teeth and painstakingly sucked in the sweet, cool water. It was slow going, since he had to wait for the liquid to filter between his teeth so that it wouldn't spill out his lips, but that didn't matter. What mattered is that he wasn't going to die of dehydration before his team came for him.

If they come for you. He sucked in a deep breath through his nose, trying to ignore the restriction of air flow that meant it wasn't nearly as deep as he wanted it to be, and squeezed his eyes shut. They'll come. Of course they'll come. It would take them too long to find another red paladin, and the universe needs Voltron. Besides, Shiro wouldn't just leave me here.

With that thought, he curled back up onto the slab and fell into a slightly deeper sleep than before.

.o.0.O.0.o.

Large, rough hands. Grabbing, yanking, slapping.

Angry voices. Brat. Ingrate. Good-for-nothing.

Limbs colliding harshly with the floor.

A door slamming. Darkness.

A cold doorknob in his hand, rattling but not giving way.

Tears streaming down bruised cheeks. Please...please, I'll be good, I promise...please let me out.

Keith woke with a gasp, but the nightmare didn't fade. He was still surrounded by darkness, with no way out. From somewhere in the corner of his cell he thought he heard a sneering voice, that man's voice, and he bolted upright, scrambling backwards on the bed until his back pressed into the wall.

No no no no no no, he's not here, this isn't real, this can't be real, but it was so dark, and how would he even know if someone else was in the room with him? Maybe he chased him down, maybe he found him here, maybe he sneaked in while he was asleep and was waiting in the darkness to pounce when he was least expecting it.

He was still aware enough that he knew how ridiculous all of those thoughts were, but he still couldn't seem to get them to stop. Come on, get a grip on yourself. He dropped his head back onto the wall behind him with a thunk, then repeated the motion, the bruises left from his earlier collision amplifying the pain across his skull and successfully beginning to distract him from the panic.

When both his breathing and his mind had slowed, he let out a shuddering sigh. It had been a long time since he had had to deal with regular nightmares about that house. They still came on occasion, and with the similarities of this situation he really wasn't surprised that they had returned now.

He didn't let himself go back to sleep for a long, long time after that. He was still awake when the next three meals came, which taught him three things. One, they seemed to come in pretty evenly spaced intervals, he was guessing in the morning and at night. If that was true, then he could use them to track how many quintants he was here. Having some idea of the passage of time was a huge relief. Two, if he didn't return his water pouch to its spot in front of the hatch, it wouldn't be replaced. Three, his eyes had decided that they really, really didn't like the sudden bursts of light, no matter how dim it actually was. On the other hand, he was pretty sure that the small, reliable breaks in the darkness and silence were the only thing keeping him from going completely insane.

After drinking the water from the fifth meal he had been brought so far – making it, presumably, the end of his second full quintant there – he finally fell back asleep, unable to make himself stay awake in the dark any longer. Another nightmare followed, though not quite as terrible as the first. He fell into a bit of a routine after that, in what he hoped wasn't a vain effort to keep his body on a regular schedule and also keep his sanity. When the evening meal came, he'd drink some of the water, then try to sleep, waking throughout the night from nightmares or pain and drinking more of the water to distract himself. Before the morning meal, he'd return the pouch to the front of the cell, and used the new pouch to keep him going throughout the day whenever the hunger decided to be especially obnoxious.

It was those vargas between the morning and evening meals that were the hardest to fill. He spent a large part of them pacing the cell, altering his pattern, first around the perimeter, then zig-zagging from wall to wall and end to end, then making figure eights. It made his leg hurt like quiznack, so he couldn't keep it up for very long at a time, but the rhythm of his feet, even with a limp, kept him from having to think too much.

In between bouts of pacing, he had to come up with other ways to occupy his mind. He was sure if he were Pidge, he'd be working on some crazy equation or technical solution in his head, but math and technology were never his strong suites. Lance and Hunk probably had lots of happy memories of home to think about, unlike him, or maybe Hunk would be coming up with some new recipe to try when he got out. Food was one of the last things Keith wanted to think about right now. Shiro would probably meditate, which he did try, but he had never been very good at it.

He did lose himself in memories a few times – the few good memories he still held onto of his dad, of time spent with Shiro before Kerberos, and of carefree moments in the Castle. It was difficult, though, not to let those memories spiral down into something darker, into either the bad memories or just missing the people in the good ones. Honestly, he hadn't thought in the past that he would ever genuinely say he missed Lance, Hunk, Pidge, Allura, and Coran. They were an odd group, and one that he still wasn't sure he quite fit in. But sitting in that cell, thinking about all of their oddities and wishing they were there for more reasons than just rescuing him, he had to admit that somehow, they had made it past his heavily fortified walls. Somehow, he not only liked them, but trusted them, and maybe even thought of them as friends.

Rather than being a sweet, heart-warming realization, it put a pit of dread in his stomach. Stupid. Haven't you learned your lesson by now? Just because you think of them as friends doesn't mean they think the same about you. Lance has made it pretty clear that he doesn't really like you. Hunk is nice to you, but he's nice to everybody. Pidge hardly ever speaks to you. Allura only tolerates you and your Galra heritage because you're useful to her. And Coran...well, same as Hunk. He's nice to everybody.

Shiro's the only one you can actually trust to stick by you. When they come for you – if they come for you – when they come for you, it will either be his doing, or it will be because they didn't want to lose their red paladin and their alliance. The others don't care. They'd probably just leave you here if they thought they could find another paladin who was more like them.

The more the thoughts went on, the more agitated he became, until finally he shot up off the bed in a frenzy. I can't do this anymore, I can't. I have to get out of here. He wanted to rush to the door, to throw himself against it until he busted through, but he was too afraid of the consequences. Instead, he focused on the cursed muzzle, scraping it first against his shoulder, but quickly giving up on that and dropping down to use the edge of the bed. Frantically, he pried at every side, but it never budged, never gave him even a fraction of an inch more room to breathe.

Finally, he collapsed in an exhausted heap on the floor, feeling warm blood oozing from several spots around his face. At least it was a new sensation besides cold metal and pain. Staring out into the deep darkness, he hummed a cracking, meaningless tune, and waited for meal nine and nighttime to come.

.o.0.O.0.o.

The first thing he noticed when he tried to get up the next morning was that his leg hurt. A lot. Obviously it had been hurting the whole time, but unless he was walking on it, generally it was more of a throbbing pain. This was sharp, fiery, almost like the wound was brand new. It took him a few dobashes to make his way across the small room, just barely getting his pouch to the hatch in time to receive a new one. Slumping down against the door, he drew in heavy breaths, glaring down at the knee that he couldn't see, like that would somehow fix whatever the problem was. He wished he could just remain there and not have to move again. Unfortunately, though, the water was much easier to drink when it was sitting on the slab, and his stomach was a yawning chasm. He was forcing himself at this point to pretend that the water actually made that better, instead of just making him feel all sloshy inside.

Eventually he gathered his strength and crossed slowly back to the bed, taking a few sips of water before lying down again. Pacing was definitely not happening today. Forget about circadian rhythms, all he wanted to do was sleep.

When he woke again, he was freezing. At that point he had gotten used to the coolness of the metal against the bare skin of his face, hands, and feet, and his flightsuit had kept the rest of his body from getting too cold. But this chill seemed to have taken a firm hold of him, all the way down to his bones, and was racking his body with shivers. Even the sip of water that he took was far too cold as it sank down his esophagus and pooled in his belly.

It took a long time lying there, wishing he had a blanket or could at least wrap his arms around himself, before the shivers subsided enough that he could fall back asleep. The next time he woke, he was still cold, but at the same time he felt like he was burning from the inside. That was when it finally clicked in his mind. Fever. I have a fever. Great. Getting sick was just what I needed. He didn't seem to have any other symptoms, though, besides being extra tired.

It was probably almost time for another meal to come. Levering himself up, he hissed through his teeth as pain shot through his leg. Oh, yeah. There's that, too. Which might mean that this isn't just getting sick, it's an infection. Honestly, he was only surprised that it hadn't happened sooner. He hobbled slowly toward the door, leaning his right side up against the wall the whole way, and carefully placed the water pouch before crumpling to the floor to wait for the new one. Eyes shut, he leaned his head back against the wall, trying to ignore the fire behind his eyelids and the ache all over his body.

Today is quintant five. That's as long as I was expected to be gone. Maybe the team will have tried to contact me today, to find out when I would be back. If I can just...make it through this infection...for a couple more quintants...

He ended up falling asleep again, there on the floor. The evening meal came without rousing him, which he only confirmed for sure after maneuvering painfully around to pick up the water behind his back. That took up almost all of his energy, so he gave up on the idea of going back to the bed and instead lay down next to the door so that he could reach the straw.

The next vargas...quintants...he didn't even know...were a blur of sleeping and waking, dreams that seemed far too real and staring out into darkness with no energy to move. His lips were painfully cracked, his throat not much better in the dryness department, but he couldn't seem to muster the strength to lift his head and try to find the straw. His temples pounded in time with his heartbeat, joining in the symphony of his throbbing wrist and screaming leg.

"Keith."

His eyes flew open, startled by the sound. Shiro? A grunt escaped his lips as he tried to voice the name.

"Hey buddy." The familiar face appeared above him, smiling down at him. "It's me."

Shiro. Relief flooded through his veins. You came. You came for me.

"Of course I came for you. I'm gonna get you out of here."

The fact that Shiro was reading his mind didn't register with him anymore than the fact that he shouldn't be able to make out his features in the darkness. He was just so happy to see his brother again, to finally get out of this dungeon. He tried to return the loving smile, but the muzzle pulled against his skin painfully.

Suddenly Shiro's expression grew serious, angry even, and to Keith's shock his features morphed into those of Allura. "Actually, we've decided just to leave you here. You're not worth the trouble."

Keith's eyes went wide, and he shook his head desperately. No, please! I'm the red paladin, you can't form Voltron without me!

Allura scoffed and waved a hand dismissively. "We'll find another. Perhaps I can even fly Red, she was my father's lion after all. We don't want to ruin our chance at an alliance with In'aro, and they want you imprisoned. I can't say that I blame them." She sneered. "Galra mutt."

Tears began to form in Keith's eyes as she stood and turned her back on him. No! Don't leave! You can't just leave me here, please! Allura paid him no mind, though, disappearing into the darkness.

Shiro! Where are you? Please come back! His silent pleas were ignored, and Keith sobbed until he couldn't stay awake any longer.

The next voice he heard was even less friendly than Allura's had been. It was unmistakable, that deep, gravely snarl, and he knew exactly who he would see before he ever opened his eyes. That man, the man from his nightmares. His footsteps thudded across the floor until he was looming over Keith, belt folded and ready in his fist.

"Good-for-nothing brat! I'll teach you to disrespect me!"

Whimpering, Keith kicked weakly at the ground with his uninjured leg, scooting himself backwards until his hands bumped into the wall and pain shot through his wrist. Deep down, he knew it wasn't real, knew there was no way that he could be there, but that didn't stop him from being terrified. I-I'm sorry! I'm sorry, it won't happen again, please don't hurt me! He was suddenly a little kid again, cowering and begging despite knowing it would do him no good.

"Stop your sniveling now, or I'll double the lashes!" The man stormed nearer, raising the belt over his head, and Keith did his best to fold in on himself.

Before the blow could come down, there was a clank and the hatch slid open. Keith cringed, squeezing his eyes shut against the blinding green lights, and moaned pitifully. When the hatch clicked shut, however, the man was gone. Green spots danced in front of his eyes, but no other figures made an appearance. Only the dark and the metal and the pain remained, and the fire inside his body and haze in his mind.

.o.0.O.0.o.

It was not until his fourth or fifth time hearing voices that he refused to acknowledge them. He wasn't sure if he could open his eyes even if he had wanted to, anyway. The voices seemed to come from a distance at first, mumbling, then there was a mechanical whirring and light grew behind his eyelids. He whined in his throat, squeezing his eyes shut tighter and turning his face to the ground as the voices became louder.

"...th! Keith, can you hear me?"

Not real not real not real not real.

"...not sure...conscious..."

A hand cupped the back of his head, and he flinched. The hand jerked away. That...sure felt real.

"...'s burning up."

"...leg's injured...you think...infected?"

There were more farther away voices, speaking in harsh tones. Keith wondered distantly what they were angry about.

"...just get him...Castle."

He tried not to let hope fill him at the mention of the Castle, he really did. After all, this was not real. But then one of the voices was murmuring reassuringly in his ear, and hands were sliding beneath his shoulders and knees and lifting him up off the floor, and it all felt so real. His head lolled against a smooth chestplate, and that felt real too, and it smelled real, too, it smelled like...

Shiro? Once again, the word came out as nothing more than a hoarse groan.

"Oh, quiznack, what is that on his face?" The second voice was a little clearer now, and definitely belonged to Lance. "I think I'm gonna be sick. Shiro, we've got to get that thing off of him."

"We will." Shiro's tone was one Keith didn't hear often, a dark tone reserved for his most serious moments. "But he's too sick to linger here. Getting him back to the Castle is our first priority, we'll have to remove his...restraints...later."

One of the angry voices in the background sounded vaguely familiar, as well, but before Keith could place it they were moving. Light suddenly whited out his vision, even through his eyelids, and he cried out, burying his face in the chestplate as best he could.

"...his eyes...too bright..."

Something silky slid over his eyes, and he jerked, panicking at the unexpected touch. It did block out some of the light, though, and he let himself relax again as it was tied behind his head.

"Shh, it's okay, buddy." Shiro's voice was soft and close by. "We're just trying to help. We're gonna take care of you, okay?"

Though Shiro wasn't moving, he could feel them traveling up and up, and it finally started to sink in that perhaps this really was real, that they had come for him and were taking him home. That thought was only amplified as they jerked to a halt and there was a sudden explosion of Red's presence in his head.

My Paladin. Hurt.

Keith had never been happier to have the ideas of a mechanical alien lion pressed into his mind. Hey, Red. I'm...okay.

Angry. Protect.

At this point, Keith wanted nothing more than to drift off into unconsciousness, but he rallied his thoughts for one more message. Don't...do anything reckless...'kay, girl?

Red's only answer was something along the lines of an indignant huff.

Shiro was walking again, people were talking, and the atmosphere around them changed. Then he was lowered carefully to the ground and propped up against a wall.

"Just go drive. I'll take care of him." The third voice that he hadn't been able to identify was right next to him now, and was undoubtedly Allura, which took Keith by surprise. Of all people...Allura had come to rescue him? She had apologized for shunning him after the whole Blade thing, but still, it was easy to second guess whether she had really meant it.

She spoke again, this time with the gentlest of tones. "Keith. I'm not sure how much you're hearing and understanding right now, but...I got a key from your jailers. I'm going to remove this muzzle, alright?"

Small, gentle hands lifted his head forward off the wall, then began fiddling with the straps on the back of his head. In a moment, there was a quiet click, and everything loosened all at once. Keith held his breath in anticipation. The hands moved to the metal around his mouth, gingerly prying it off his skin. He let out a high-pitched grunt as it began to pull away.

Allura sucked in air through her teeth. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry."

The next instant, the muzzle was gone, and Keith dropped open his aching jaw to let in a glorious burst of air. It slammed into his lungs with a vengeance, sending him into a coughing fit that would have knocked him to the floor if Allura had not caught him in her arms.

"Shh." She allowed his head to lay on her shoulder, stroking his hair, and he didn't have the energy to feel ashamed. "I've got you. You're alright."

"A...llura?" His voice was a harsh croak, rasping out of his dry throat. He wondered vaguely how many quintants it had actually been since he had stopped drinking water.

The hand petting his hair paused. "Yes, Keith?"

His mind swirled with fever and the intensity of everything that had happened in the last few dobashes, and he lost what he had even wanted to say. "You...you came for me."

"Of course. Of course we came for you."

"You said you wou'n't," he slurred. "You were gon' leave me there an' I deserved it, I'm jus' a half-Ga'ra an' the In'roans hate me an' I...I screwed up the 'lliance, an'–"

She interrupted his feverish rambling with another shushing noise. "No, Keith. You didn't deserve it, not at all, and you didn't 'screw up' anything. We wouldn't just...I mean, if we had known sooner..." It was a rare thing, to hear Allura stumble over her words, her voice cracking slightly with emotion. "I'm so sorry that this happened to you. But we'll talk about all of that later, alright? Right now I'm going to try to get these cuffs off of you."

She didn't move him from where he leaned against her, merely reaching around behind him to work the key into the cuffs. They popped off and hit the floor with a clatter. His arms relaxed automatically, but he didn't attempt to move them from behind his back. He wasn't sure the muscles would respond if he tried.

"Here." Allura pushed him up off of her enough to grab his left arm and tug it gently between them, setting his hand in his lap. He groaned quietly as blood finally began flowing back through the limb at a normal rate. When she reached around to his right arm, though, he couldn't stop from fully crying out.

Allura jumped, unsure of what she had done, then tried again with her hand placed further up his arm this time. She tsked as his wrist came into view. "Well, this is certainly broken. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt it."

"'s 'kay." He was on the verge of passing out again, her voice and the sounds of the ship around him growing dimmer. Then there was a familiar jolt, and a moment later footsteps approached.

"How is he?" Shiro demanded anxiously.

"Unrestrained now, at least," Allura replied. "But he's a bit delirious, and I discovered a broken wrist, as well." She shifted underneath him, adjusting her hold. "No, let me, Shiro. I can get him to the infirmary faster than you."

He was airborne again, his body being jostled as Allura sprinted with him in her arms. Over the next several dobashes he faded in and out of consciousness, only half aware of many voices conversing around him and his flightsuit being stripped off of him and replaced with something softer.

His awareness returned just in time to hear Coran say, "Alright now, let's get him into the pod."

Panic seized him. No, no, not a pod, I can't go into a pod, dark and cold and trapped can't breathe danger danger danger! He didn't know who was trying to pick him up, but he flailed and kicked against them with sudden renewed strength.

"Whoa! Keith, it's alright, calm down! It's just me!" Shiro's voice was normally grounding, but now Keith paid it no mind.

"No! No, no pod, no, no!" he howled.

"Keith, you have to go in a pod. I'm sorry."

Hands tried to grab him again, and he lashed out even harder. "No, don't make me! I can't, I can't! Please, no!"

Shiro's hands, one flesh and one metal, finally caught hold of his arms and pinned them down by his sides. "Listen to me. I'm sorry, I know you don't want to go in a pod, and I have a feeling I understand why. But Coran did a scan, and this infection is shutting your body down. We don't have a choice. If you don't go into the pod now, we might not be able to fight it ourselves. You may die."

The alarm bells were blaring so loudly in Keith's head that he barely comprehended any of what Shiro had said. Even with his arms immobilized, he continued to struggle with all of his might.

Shiro's voice sounded farther away when he spoke again, as if he had turned to someone else. "...can't lift him like this...gotta get him in there..."

A couple of garbled responses, then Coran's voice came very close to his ear. "Alright now, Number Four. Don't worry. I promise you'll feel better very soon."

There was a sharp prick in the side of his neck, and Keith gasped in shock. Something cool pressed into his forehead, and Shiro's breath ghosted over his face. "I'm sorry, buddy. I'm so sorry," he whispered.

The temporary energy was rapidly leaving him, his legs dropping like lead to the table and his brain turning even more sluggish than before. He felt his arms being released and someone scooping him up as if from afar, too far removed for him to do anything about it. The last thing he heard before slipping away was Shiro promising to be there when he woke up.

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