Breathe Deep

Flux

Kolivan's silence was less than reassuring. Keith could tell that the wheels were working in his head as he systematically went through options and possibilities. However, the fact that it wasn't an outright agreement chilled him to his very core.

"Kolivan, please." Shiro pleaded to the communications screen, "We need every bit of help we can get."

Kolivan's eyes drifted to Keith for a brief moment, standing next to Shiro in the mess of Voltron paladins that filled the Galran's own screen. Keith wasn't sure what those gears were shifting then. Was he too angry with Keith to help them? He might have gone against everything Kolivan had ordered when it came to Vartex, but Lance didn't have to pay for that. A small grimace threatened to overcome Keith's features, but it laxed when Kolivan finally spoke.

"We have precious few resources, Paladin." Kolivan gave a minute nod, "But we will do everything we can with what we are able to spare. We will find him."

"Thank you." Shiro's countenance eased visibly, "I knew we could count on the Blade of Marmora for help."

"Indeed. Voltron will always have an ally in us." Kolivan signed off with that.

When the screen cleared, Keith let out a deep breath he didn't even realize that he held. Apparently, there was still doubt lingering in Keith about Kolivan and his judgments. (Perhaps, even, vice versa.) Even so, he was glad that the Marmoran leader offered what help he could. They would need every bit to try and find where these attackers took Lance. And how.

Keith still couldn't believe that they just up and vanished before his own eyes. The edge of his blade cut nothing by air. He scanned his memory of the incident over and over, trying to find what options and windows of opportunity he had missed. Each time he concluded that it was his fault. If he hadn't told Lance they were over, he wouldn't have stormed off on his own. If he had just let Lance have the moment with him he wanted to share, despite the ache of pity-saving pretense, he would still be there. With him. Or at least he could have done better to stop them from taking him. It tore at Keith's innards like a rabid beast and he felt like all that was left were the shredded scraps of his conscience's carcass rotting in his stomach.

"You can't think of anything that might clue us in on who they might have been, Keith?" Matt digitally paged through some images of known bounty hunters that he downloaded from public domain servers as well as what the Rebels had in their databases. "None of these people look close?"

"No." The defeat in his voice was clear to everyone in the room.

Hunk placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. He smiled in soft reassurance when Keith looked over to him. "We'll find him." Keith nodded subtly.

"What's really upsetting to me..." Pidge continued to hack away relentlessly on her panel, "Is that his BLIP is completely undetectable."

"You're not saying that he's-" Allura was cut off before she could finish the thought, not that she wanted to.

"No. I mean, it's vanished. If he was, I would at least get some reading. A flatline. A function ping at minimum." Sister Holt explained. "But it's just... gone."

Keith's guilt-beast rumbled again at the notion Allura had brought forward. There was a dread that pricked at him in that split-second. A dread that would overcome him for the remainder of his days if it had been true. Lance had been stolen for little over two and a half hours by then. Three vargas, at most. They searched much of the square they had been working out of, asked locals if they had seen or known anything about the abductors with little success. Even those within the Rebellion were of little knowledge, though they did promise to keep their wits about should anything present itself. He swallowed thickly when Pidge denied the possibility, suppressing that monster within for a little while longer.