Fighting the Flames (A Voltron Legendary Defender Fan Fiction)

Chapter 4

 "I..." Shiro looked down. "Keith should be the one telling you this but..." he glanced over at Keith, who was seemingly sleeping in the pod. "When Keith was nine, his father died in a fire. He was a firefighter and went back into the building after it was deemed too dangerous, to save a child. Keith's mother left when he was a baby, which left him to be placed in the foster system. He stayed there for several years, and it was terrible. The families... they didn't treat him well, so he ran away several times. While he's never said it outright, I suspect that some of the families he was placed with were downright abusive."

They all gasped, "Keith... doesn't have any other family?" Shiro shook his head. it was almost unthinkable for someone like Lance who had so many relatives, it was ridiculous. If one day his parents had died, he would have had a long list of Aunts and Uncles stepping up to take care of him.

"Eventually," Shiro continued. "I made a visit to Keith's school. That's how we first met. I saw that he had a lot of potential, so I recommended him for the pilot program at the Garrison. Eventually, I found out about Keith's... rough... home life, so I took him in, along with my partner Adam. That is, until the Kerberos mission..."

"Poor Keith..." Allura had tears in her eyes.

"He's had a hard life..." Hunk wiped the moisture from his own eyes.

"That must be why he's so... guarded all the time." Pidge said sadly, "He's afraid of getting too close to people..."

"I've been making fun of him all this time for being broody..." Lance said in shock. "I... I had no idea..."

"Why didn't he tell us?" Coran asked.

Shiro sighed, "I don't think he wanted you to view him differently. With the revelation that he was half Galra, I don't think he could take having any more attention drawn to him."

"I was so terrible to him..." Allura cried. "I... I treated him like dirt..."

"And you have since apologized," Shiro assured. "And Keith forgave you. It's in the past."

"So... now what?"

"All we can do now is wait for him to wake up..."

Several days later, Coran called them into the med bay. Keith would be waking up any minute, and they all wanted to be there when he got out. They all waited in anticipation as the pod slowly hissed open.

Keith slowly blinked his eyes open, and they all cheered, "Wh... what's goin' on..."

Coran and Hunk slowly helped him out of the pod, and into a chair. He looked up, and saw Shiro, noticing the bandage on his shoulder. "You're ok!"

Shiro knelt down and squeezed him as tight as he could, "Don't you EVER think about doing something stupid like that again! I... I don't know what I would do if I lost you..."

Keith had tears in his eyes but smiled up at him, "I couldn't lose you either..."

Shiro smiled, and pet his hair. "Don't worry buddy, I'm not going anywhere. You're stuck with me."

"Us too!" everyone else piled in and gave Keith a tight hug.

"I'm so sorry I've been making fun of you for so long," Lance said with tears in his eyes.

"And I'm sorry for how I treated you after we found out you were part Galra," Allura added sadly. "That was wrong of me, and I am ashamed."

Keith looked at them in confusion, "What's going on?"

"Shiro... told us about your dad..." Pidge said quietly. "We didn't understand why you were so upset."

"Oh..." he looked down quietly.

"And because of that..." Hunk continued. "We all realized that we have said some kind of hurtful things to you. And we wanted to apologize."

Keith smiled at them, "There's nothing to apologize for. Lance, you and I were just joking around and Allura... I don't blame you for how you reacted. The Galra destroyed your home... I probably would have reacted the same way."

"Oh, Keith..." they all wrapped him in another hug.

Keith blushed, "You guys are the best... now can let go before I suffocate!" they all laughed and simply squeezed him tighter, refusing to let him go ever again.

The End.

(A/N - Hey guys. Thanks so much for reading. It really means a lot. I hope you liked it. When I say Vol, you say...?)