[ video ]

[tempredmental]

Who: Keith, Open
Broadcast: Yes
Action: Huntress, Blameless, or Iskaulit
When: starting August 17 and through the rest of the month

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VIDEO

[The feed was a little shaky as Keith got settled. His voice was a little quiet for a moment.]

...how these happened so close together...

[He was definitely muttering to himself. The picture spun until it was facing him. He looked different. Tired, a little bruised up, older... he'd visibly aged further than Lance, Pidge, or Shiro. His hair was longer and even more grown out than before, and, when he turned to face the camera for real, there was a large burn scar along the right side of his face.]

Hey... just letting everyone know I'm back, I guess. It's weird how close this happened this time. But, yeah. In case you guys were wondering...

Oh, and, uh... thanks to whoever looked after Snow while I was gone. I appreciate it.

[And with that, he clicked off.]

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ACTION

[Keith could be found around the Huntress, the Iskaulit, or the Blameless. There might be a stop or two to the Bishop and the Tourist as well to check up on Pidge and Allura respectively. In person, he was a bit taller, and his shoulders were wider. Guess who's jacket didn't fit him anymore. His shirts were all a bit tight across the top now, too. He was going to need some new clothes when they get to the next system.]

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{OOC: Keith is back! Unlike his buddies, returning home dumped him into a quantum abyss that caused him to age two years faster than anyone else on the team. Once he got back from that trip to the team, he fought Shiro, and the two of them are pretty beat up because of it (hence Keith's new facial scar).}

Comments

[tempredmental]

[Even longer for him...]

It's fine. You guys weren't wrong.

[Keith had a lot to deal with at the time. Shiro's disappearance and accepting him as gone was kind of the icing on the cake, so to speak. It had set him off in all sorts of bad ways. He'd never been good at accepting loss. And then feeling torn between Voltron and the Blades, it was a lot all at once.]

I'm glad to be back, though. I missed you guys.

[pidge_out]

[Pidge breaks into a big smile at that.]

We missed you, too. Thanks for coming back.

[tempredmental]

Of course.

[Honestly, it had always been in the plan to come back at some point. He just hadn't been sure when it was going to happen because they had no idea how long it was going to take to figure out that quintessence supply route.]

Honestly, I didn't really want to leave. But it was really something I believed needed to be figured out, and I couldn't keep dividing my time like that. It wasn't fair to you guys, and it was making the mission with the Blades take longer to finish. So, it was good that, even if it wasn't really Shiro at the time, someone was able to take the Black Lion. I got my mom back, and that was good, too.

[He sighed a little.]

I just... if I'd picked up on things about Shiro sooner, though, I wouldn't have left. And I feel like I missed something. I feel like I should have known.

[pidge_out]

[Still smiling, Pidge gives him a light nudge with her shoulder.]

Dude, come on. You don't have to explain yourself. It's fine. And as for Shiro...

[Here her expression wavers a bit, turning her eyes up toward the ceiling like she'll find an answer up there or something.] ..None of us could've known that would happen. There was no way to tell. Allura probably stood the best chance of being able to detect something like that, but she didn't.

[tempredmental]

[He managed a weak smile in response to the nudge, and then shrugged a little.]

I guess.

[He sighed.]

It just stinks all around. I wish I didn't have to do what I did... that I could have found a better way to get him back.

[pidge_out]

I know.

[She lets out a sigh of her own, letting her thoughts wander.]

...Did we tell you how we kept the castle from killing us?

[tempredmental]

[Keith's eyebrows shot up.]

Wait... that happened again?

[He only knew about the one time with the residual energy from Sendak's crystal.]

I mean, Shiro mentioned something about a bomb or ... [He sighed a little.] While we were fighting, he said he'd rigged something to make sure everyone was killed... that it wasn't worth it for me to keep fighting him because there was no one else left.

Is that what happened?

[Honestly, Keith had been scared when he made that first call once he was back in the Lion. Had Shiro succeeded? Had the others managed to survive? He had no way of knowing.]

[pidge_out]

[She nods once before launching into it.]

It wasn't a bomb, exactly. It was a virus. It went through and systematically shut the entire castle down, and then tried to make the teludav explode. It nearly out-maneuvered me because- because it knew me. Because it came from Shiro.

[Here she gets a little quieter. The memory is still fresh, after all.] ..I barely managed to stop it. Only because the first time I'd ever scanned Shiro's arm, I- I made an anti-virus for it.

Using it... Actually having to use it... felt awful.

[tempredmental]

[Keith hesitated. Part of him wanted to be angry that Pidge would have thought about doing something like that, but, at the same time, she hadn't exactly been wrong, had she? And it had saved everyone's lives. And the fact that she felt awful about it? That said something.

He cautiously reached out a hand, placing it on her forearm.]

You saved everyone. That's the important part.