Heat (Voltron Smut)

Biology

[A/N: Ho boy, another safe chapter. Don't worry, guys. We'll get to the smut soon, I promise.]

The next morning, Keith wouldn't wake up as soon as the others. "C'mon, Keith," Pidge pounded on the door, "Hunk made pancakes!" After a few ticks of waiting, she opened his door. "Alright dude, what's going-" she paused after seeing him laying in bed panting, with his face cherry-red.
She panicked, running into the kitchen to find the others. "Pidge," Hunk said to her as she entered the room in a hurry, "I thought you were gonna go wake up Keith. Is he gonna shower first?"
"Something weird is going on with him," she told then, still shuffling her feet.
"Just calm down," Shiro told her. "I'll go get him. We can put him in a pod."
"Good idea, number one," Coran announced. "We can heal him and check his vitals for the issue."

Several minutes later, Allura and Coran stood by Keith's pod, reading off his vitals and making faces. They murmured some things to each other that the remaining four paladins didn't bother to decipher. "Alright, paladins," Allura began, "we've figured it out."
"Well," Hunk began, "is he alright?"
"That's just our concern," Allura answered, "he's completely fine. All of his vitals, besides his body temperature and heart rate, are completely normal. Even those readings are both healthy for a human of his physical standing."
"So why was he like that earlier?" Pidge remembered the weird state she found her teammate in.
"Well," Coran began, "as you all know, Keith is half Galran."
The four widened their eyes at the sudden mention of his halfbreed background. "So it's something to do with that?" Lance asked.
"That's right, number three." Coran curled his moustache, twirling it around his finger. "It's possible that this is a side-effect of his Galran blood. Number one," he turned to Shiro, "when you were at the base of the Blade of Marmora, did they mention anything of his heritage?"
"Well while he was doing his soul-search thing, we could see what he saw, even if it was a vision." The rest of the group listened intently. "He saw his father in it. He was human."
Coran threw up his index finger. "That must be it then! The signs all point to it." A smirk appeared on Coran's face as if he solved all of life's mysteries. "He is going through his mating cycle!"
Everyone else's jaws dropped, and Allura approached him. "Coran, are you sure about this? I mean, these signs would prove your theory if we were talking about a female."
"That's just it, princess. Most Galran genes are recessive to those of humans, which would explain his appearance, but some still come out. Gender assignment works the same way between humans, Alteans, and Galra. His Y chromosome came from his human father, and the X from his Galran mother."
"So what you're saying," Pidge tried to understand, "is that he's acting like this from his mom's genes?"
"That's the ticket, number five! Some of his genes messed around in his body, giving him a mating cycle that runs in," he looked up thought for a minute. "It occurs every three Earth months and lasts for one Earth week."
"So it's like he has a period," Lance shouted, making Hunk cringe.
"Come on, man. That's not cool." Hunk's face stayed scrunched up.
"Unlike females," Coran corrected, "number two will not bleed, because he does not have the proper organs to permit that. However, his craving to mate will compensate for that, making his hormone levels rise tenfold." He smashed his face against the glass container with Keith inside. "Right now, as we speak, there are particles in his mind just telling him to find a mate. The entire process really is very intriguing."
"So we're gonna keep him locked up somewhere, right?" Pidge asked. The entire group looked at her in shock. "What? I don't wanna see him making that face anymore. He looks so needy and it's really weird to see, especially from Keith."
"I'm afraid we can't do that for the whole time," Allura stepped in. "Though I would prefer to stay out of any mating processes, we can't simply quarantine. It is inhumane, and can lead to issues in his brain." She sighed, making everyone else realize that she had bad news coming up. "We'll have to let him walk around like he normally does, yet we need to observe him more."
Coran, noticing that the princess was uncomfortable, continued for her. "Now, if he tries to violate anything that seems dangerous for him or whatever the object may be, you must stop him. Because he is a half breed, he may be more or less tempted to use inanimate objects. That's the current objective for you paladins."
"Since we have some downtime," Shiro interrupted, "we can use it to do some research on Keith, so it doesn't hurt us in the heat of battle."
"Yes, of course," Coran nodded. "Also, being of Galran descent, his senses of sight, smell, and hearing are naturally higher than the average human's. That being said, he can smell the pheromones of other beings during his mating cycle. Luckily, us Alteans have extremely subtle pheromones, yet human pheromones are incredibly easy for a Galran to pick up, so watch out. Also, a Galran on her- I mean their cycle gives off strong pheromones to attract their mates, so you may smell that."
"That makes sense," Hunk confirmed. "But there's still one thing: observation by the subject. If the one being observed is aware of it, then that can effect the test results."
"That is why you mustn't mention this to him," Allura commanded, yet in a soft tone. "He will possibly lose trust in all of us and feel like he's been betrayed or outcasted. Make him feel normal. Please, paladins."
"Yes, princess." Shiro nodded and the three youngest paladins followed suit.
Lance cocked an eyebrow. "So, when are we gonna release the mullet?"
Coran tapped a few buttons on the pod. "Right now." Shiro's eyes shot open immediately and he caught Keith, avoiding a painful landing. "Have a nice time, you all." With that, the Alteans left the room and the remaining humans brought their passed out teammate to his bed.

Their first time taking care of mate-crazy Keith was pure hell. He kept rubbing against things and smelling everyone like a lost, confused, blind cat. During day 7 of his first cycle, the remainder of the team decided to split up the responsibility by days.
"Why does she only have to take care of him for one day?" Lance shouted, sounding nightly offended.
"I pulled him off of the most weird, random crap," Pidge argued.
"She's right, Lance," space dad agreed. "All you did was take his bayard away so he would stop licking it."
"I can't help it that Keith is just a freak around Pidge!"
"Well now you'll get a healthy dose of freaky Keith," Pidge crossed her arms feeling a bit triumphant.
"Alright, so let's run over the plan one more time," Shiro announced and the rest nodded. "I'll take care of him for his first and fifth days. Hunk, you get second and sixth. Lance gets days three and seven. Pidge gets day four, and if it happens, day eight."
Once that was all established, they all wrote their info down wherever it would be visible and noticeable to them, and went off to search for Keith. He was spread out on the couch. Naked. Pidge found him.