A comfortable warmth pervaded throughout, tempting him to retreat back into the respite of that rare escape called sleep. He might have let the sensation take him if somehow his body didn’t know to wake in spite of itself.

A lulling throb soon took up within the confines of his skull, banging against the door of consciousness, urging him awake. The sensation reminded him of the few mornings he’d experienced when too many drinks and not enough food hit him in wrong spots, and he’d woken up with a profound, uneasy sense of lost time.

He groaned, or at least he thought he did.

Behind the screen of closed eyelids, a kaleidoscope of reds, greens, and blues intertwined with one another like psychedelic, liquid snakes. Occasional bright white super-nova flashes exploded among them, making them scatter like mutant ants whose hill had been disturbed.

Bright white explosions…like Blazing Sword making quick fix of one of Haggar’s robeasts.

Keith brought the progress of his thoughts to an immediate halt. Something about robeasts concerned him. Robeasts…Haggar…

Zarkon!

A surge of electrical adrenaline ripped throughout his entire body, and he bolted upright in ready for battle.

“Take it easy, buddy,” came a familiar voice. But it wasn’t familiar right away, and Keith began to panic.

An unknown force pushed itself against his shoulder, urging him to lie back down. Keith fought it with what minimal strength he had, but he collapsed back to horizontal like the stem of a solitary flower in a monsoon wind.

“Calm down,” came the voice again. “You’re okay…just relax.” It was trying to reassure.

But the trained Captain’s instinctual settings were tuned fully to ‘DANGER’ status, and again he attempted to rise. Still, the force held. Blinded by a fluorescent intensity too unnatural to be daylight, he struggled to see into his new predicament.

Fortunately, as his vision began to adjust to the brightness around him, he was beginning to realize that he would not come to meet with any of his enemies. Not on this day anyway.

The familiar facade of a relieved, yet concerned figure came into view.

“You had us all pretty worried for a while there,” the man who was his friend said. “Can you say something?”

As his first officer came into his full view, Keith could see the deep etchings of unabashed worry that marred his usual wry expressive air. Even in his fugue, Keith would realize that he had never quite seen this degree of contained emotion on the face of this man who was his friend and teammate. As it was, his first Lieutenant hovered over his supine, battered body, regarding him like a concerned new mother would her baby had it contracted a case of the sniffles.

“Keith, say something.”

He swallowed hard against the scratchy dryness of his throat. “How did I get here?”

A brief hint of relief came over his friend’s expression, but it was quickly overshadowed by something vaguely sinister. “I think you should be the one who’s answering questions right now.”

Just at that moment, the two giant swinging doors of the medical wing burst open to reveal a concerned figure in a white coat. Doctor Gorma offered a slight smile to his newly conscious patient but quickly took to examining the man who he comically referred to as his “best and most frequent customer.”

The aging doctor placed the drum of his trusty stethoscope over the area of Keith’s heart. “Breathe normally,” he instructed, and Keith might have done so, but the strange nature of Lance’s statement and the accusatory glare which he was currently being favored with was enough to have his breath catch in his throat. But just as Keith was about to say something of it, the momentary pall was over, and a cheap grin spread across Lance’s unshaven, fatigued face.

“That was fast, Doc” the man who was Voltron’s Blazing Sword said. “You must be a psychic. He just woke up.”

Now with a pocket light, the doctor was carefully inspecting the reactivity of Keith’s pupils. “Actually, I was finally catching up on my paperwork when Keith’s monitor went off. I figured he was either having a coronary, or he had finally woken up. I just figured that he was up, considering this boy’s ability to miraculously heal time and again.”

The doctor, seemingly content with his findings, stood upright and crossed his arms in front of him. “I swear, Commander, you must have used up at least seven of those nine lives of yours.”

Keith offered up the proprietary chuckle but quickly turned his attention back to his friend who was now engaged in a standard lean against the far wall. Lance met his friend’s inquiring stare, but reacted to it with nothing more than mirth mixed with something else. Later, Keith would recognize that ‘something else’ as contempt.

“Well, Keith,” the doctor chimed in, “you can go back to your chambers tonight if you feel up to it, but I want to see you sometime tomorrow.”

“Of course,” Keith replied. “Thank you, Doctor.”

Gorma nodded and retreated the same way he had come. In and out, just like that. That wasn’t Gorma’s usual style, but this hadn’t been a usual 24 hours either.

Before Keith could formulate one of the many questions he dared to ask, Lance answered one of them. “You’ve been out for about twenty hours.”

Keith’s gaze went beyond the room’s only window to find the outside world dark. An entire day had been lost to him. With that notion, a sudden, dreaded thought came to him, one that impacted with sheer panic.

“Zarkon?” was all he could manage.

“There has been no enemy activity,” came the answer. Lance carefully took a seat on the edge of the bed. “I hate to do this to you right away, but I have a few questions of my own. Do you feel up to it?”

Not that it was a request he could refuse, but even so, his own curiosity needed to be satiated as well. Keith nodded.

“Where did you get that bump on your head?”

Keith thought a moment. His mind was still a little on the hazy side, but unfortunately, he did remember exactly where the bump had come from. He looked to the far end of the bed and stared blankly at his blanket covered feet. He didn’t want to look his best friend in the eye when he lied to him. “I…can’t remember.”

“Well, what do you remember?”

Keith hesitated, taking careful time to compose himself into a sitting position. “I went to town. I had an appointment. I remember sitting in the market square, and then…I’m sorry; I just can’t remember.”

Lance’s gaze shifted to the floor as he exuded a heavy sigh. “Can’t or won’t?”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re lying to me.”

“Lying?”

“You seem to have forgotten that we’ve had a full day to figure out that you didn’t have any scheduled meeting with any town leaders yesterday.”

A heavy tension filled the room. Keith simply shrugged his shoulders, trying his best to convey ignorance of the memory. “I just don’t remember…”

Lance’s control of his already fraying temper continued to fade. “You have to see it from my point of view, Keith. You tell us that you’re going somewhere, and then you don’t come home. When we go to look for you, where you said you would be, and no one has seen you…or was supposed to have seen you for that matter. Of course, this sends Allura into a full-blown panic attack until we get back to find your half-conscious body dumped right in front of the lion monument. I mean, I’m sorry Keith, but you have to cooperate with me here. Or have you forgotten that when you’re out of commission, I’m in charge.”

Keith could feel his composure starting to slip. Even if Lance didn’t have the proof, he probably could see that Keith was lying. Lance had that annoying ability. It made life incredibly difficult when half the truth needed to be told.

“Wait a second, you found me where?”

At that moment, the doors of the infirmary began to creak. Slowly they began to open, whining all the while like a sick alley cat in want of its weekly meal. A brief pause ensued, and a curious head popped in from behind them. Suddenly, a pink blur flew through the room like a blond demon possessed.

“Keith!” she exclaimed. “You’re awake!”

Propriety but a distant memory, Allura mounted the bed and ingratiated herself in a greedy embrace, almost managing to knock the object of her affection back to horizontal in doing so.

Her face buried deep in his neck, he heard the faint murmur of muffled sobs. Moved by the rare display of emotion, he returned the eager embrace. “Shhh, Allura. Everything’s fine – I’m okay.”

“Well,” came a loud, interrupting voice. “I think I’ll be heading off to bed. I’m a little sick of babysitting Captain Disappearance here.” He hesitated. “Um, Princess?”

Remembering herself, she sat back and began to wipe her damp cheeks with the backs of her hands. “Yes?”

“Could you see to it that the Commander makes it back to his quarters tonight?”

“Um, sure. Thanks, Lance. Goodnight.”

There was something about how she said that – “Thanks, Lance. Goodnight.” For some reason, Keith didn’t like how she said that at all. It wasn’t a normal goodnight; it was an intimate goodnight, like somehow they knew something he didn’t, like he was left out of some secret privy to just the two of them.

“Pleasant dreams, Princess.”

Lance’s cordial smile faded slightly as he turned to his friend. “We’ll talk more in the morning, Keith.”

“Sure.” Keith’s expression remained unchanged, but Lance could always see beyond the surface of things. Keith was hiding something. But that could wait until tomorrow. For now, everything was back to fine again, and that in itself would be enough to sleep on.

The silence in the room after Lance’s departure was unexpectedly comfortable. Keith shifted the blankets around to avoid watching the Princess dry her eyes.

“So,” she smiled weakly, “I’m almost afraid to ask what happened.”

He hated to lie to her, but anything was better than what was the truth. “I think,” he began, looking toward the window, “I think…I was thrown from my horse. Something must have spooked him.”

Allura’s bright eyes suddenly seemed to change. They took on a new measure of concern.

“What’s the matter?”

“Well, it’s nothing really.”

But it was something. Keith hesitated, then reached over and took her hand in his. “You can tell me. What’s on your mind?”

“Well, it’s just that…your horse was found in the stables.”

Keith tried desperately to hide his own look of bemusement at that piece of information. In the stables? How could that be?

“He probably just wandered off afterward and was found by a stable hand,” he offered.

Allura seemed satisfied with the explanation, and her expression of concern was replaced by one of relief and unabashed contentment. They were back to being comfortable again, and he let himself be lost in the soft gaze of hope and love that he’d come to know so well. It was almost enough to make him forget about the nagging ache that resided deep within his skull.

Allura slid her hand out from under his grasp. “We’re just glad that you’re alright. I have to be honest with you, Keith; I’m relieved that it was only an accident. For a while, I thought maybe you had run into Lotor out there.”

Keith marveled at the intensity buried deep within the weight of those words. He knew exactly just how much she feared for his safety when it came to Lotor’s blood lust for his life. Everyone knew that he was more than a match for his sworn enemy, but that was only if the game was played fair…and Lotor never played fair.

“Hey now, if I had run into Lotor out, he would have gone back to Doom in a body bag.”

With that, she stood and tidied her ruffled gown. “Well, it’s time you be tucked in.”

Keith carefully eased himself from the bed as his thoughts came quickly. How was he going to deal with this entire situation? If it meant his own death, he could never allow any harm to touch her – that was for certain. She needed to live…make the Universe a better place. She needed see her people thrive again. A being so good and beautiful as she deserved to know peace in her lifetime, and he would do anything to give it to her. Hell, he’d sell his very soul to the Devil in order to give it to her.

One thing was for sure, he would have to figure a way around this problem by himself, and fast.