DEFEAT burns throat, in ways unimaginable – as his eyes scour the stars, searching and searching and searching as though he could find something more than them beyond the glittering sea. how could he have let this happen ? shiro was – shiro IS – the one who would lead them to victory. to help the universe re-establish itself after the defeat of zarkon. they would all go home, and with teenage abandon they’ve forgotten in the midst of war, LIVE their lives to the fullest. but SHIRO – he shoves a palm against his cheek, feels the strange sensation of his warm hands pressed to cold skin. he doesn’t cry, and he would never cry, but this doesn’t exempt the boy from heartbreak. there was something of home to find in shiro ( in all of them, really, but with him it burned the brightest ). and now that he was gone, keith felt more lost than ever.
there was a sound of something moving, metal hitting the ground, and keith whips around to find pidge standing there awkwardly.
“ pidge – what are you doing here ? ” FUNNY he should ask – considering he himself needs to sleep. but his heart still burns too hot, and his thoughts are too strong. “ you should … sleep. i’m heading off to bed myself. ”
Shock - it can’t even describe their lose. Their leader was missing, the galaxy’s shining messiah had vanished and the future shakes in uncertainty. If stars did weep, they cried the loudest when bright and for this reason, Pidge hated the night. Sleep was a mere hopeful wish, anxiety took its place unforgiving in vengeance and by forsaken chance that sleep came, nightmares washed over in waves - drowning her further and further into fear tangled screams.
Now she avoided her room as a child hide from shadows. Her skin itched in fear for the demons that would be conjured in her panicked course and she drove herself into breathless work. Tinkering, mending - a false comfort to heal something that could never be fixed.
It was a mistake, being in the wrong place at the wrong time that she found Keith. She would have walked away, she should have walked away, but in realization that he was crying - the wrench from her hand dropped as her stomach twisted painfully and she wanted to run.
You can’t cry. You’re never cry. You’re the strongest out of all of us. Please ___ don’t cry.
She flinched when he spoke, feeling as though she had been caught watching something intimate and she didn’t respond. She didn’t want to speak because if she did, the tears and the anger wouldn’t stop. It would never stop.
Instead she abandoned the need to run or apologize, walking up to the boy with dimmed faith and kneeled down behind him. Her arms wrapped around him, unsure and weary, ready to take flight like a started bird, and she buried her face into his shoulder and listening to a faint heart beat beating against rattling ribs.
❛ Keith. Stop pretending to be BRAVE and be scared with the rest of us. ❜
