The White Paladin

~Chapter Thirty-Five~

     "There's no point in debating this any further. (Y/n), Zarkon isn't tracking you." Allura says as we all sat in the lounge.

     "What do you mean? I was the one trapped on their ship, I was asleep at some point while I was there, and the witch was really interested in my Azarethian form. It can't be that hard to believe that it's me...right?" I ask and everyone looks around at each other as I take a seat on the couch.

     "Well, she's got a point. I would absolutely travel across the galaxy to find you." Lance says with a wink and I didn't even have the strength to be annoyed at him.

     I sat forward and placed my face in my hands and closed my eyes. I feel a hand rest on my shoulder and I look up to find Keith staring down at me.

     "(Y/n), it's not you. It's me." He says and I sat up quickly and stared at him blankly along with the others.

     "What are you talking about?" I ask him as he sits down next to me on the couch.

     "I just think...I mean Zarkon must have imprinted on me during our fight...or something." Keith says and I stare at him catching his obvious hesitation.

     "Look! The fact is, we don't know how Zarkon is tracking us. It could be through the Black lion. Every time Zarkon gets close to it, Shiro has to fight him for control." Pidge announces.

     "That's only when Zarkon is nearby. No paladin has been able to connect with their lion over a vast distance." Coran states.

     "Well whatever it is, what do we do now?" Hunk asks.

     "It doesn't matter how he's tracking us. We're going to take the fight to the Galra soon enough. They've been chasing us from galaxy to galaxy. The last thing they expect is for us to come after them." Shiro says in a stern tone.

     "The hunter becomes the hunted. Awesome. That's a tagline from like six of my favourite movies." Lance comments with a smile.

     "As it so happens, I took our list of recent Galra attacks and analysed them for both commonalities and anomalies among the attack sites. I was hoping to create an algorithm that would, within a statically acceptable margin of error, provide a list of target rich Galra environments, color coded because what are we? Animals?" Pidge says as she typed away on her computer and we stared at her blankly as she activated a hologram showing the universe with those color coordinated dots spread throughout it.

     "So.....it's a Galra finder?" Hunk asks.

     "No, 'finder' suggests that it locates the Galra. Whereas it would be more accurate to say that my model predicts their likeliest..." she paused after turning to us and seeing our completely blank expressions.

     "Fine...it's a Galra finder." She says with a sigh.

     "So where are the Galra?" Lance asks and Pidge types something into the computer and the hologram zooms in on one of the planets.

     "The nearest ones are right here. On a planet called Taujeer." Pidge says.

     "Then that's where we're heading. Everyone should get some sleep. Tomorrow we'll find that Galra fleet and take it out." Shiro says and everyone began to walk out.

     I noticed Shiro approach Keith as I was about to leave and I stuck outside the door and listened in.

     "Is everything ok?" I hear Shiro ask Keith.

     "Yeah why?" Keith asks with a tone that obviously seems like he's hiding something.

     "You just seem a bit, anxious." Shiro says softly and I lean further into the wall to listen better.