[C][AU][Future AU] Messages

There had been a meeting with a recently freed planet about joining the new union and rebuilding their society. There was another meeting with the newly reformed Galran Empire (now, as he had to keep reminding himself, was referred to as New Daibazaal) in three vargas.

In the time between there were messages to attend to. Probably some plant in need that wanted there help. Or another emergency meeting with a council over something frivolous that they will be arguing over for hours. Maybe go through some fan mail.

So he sat at the main navigation desk, with all the intents and purposes of going through these important messages, playing what the humans fondly called to as 'Altean Snake'.

"You're playing Riktaar'kl again?" a voice sounded from the doorway.

Giacinto stood with a little smile on her purple lips, holding a little blue-skinned brown-haired baby on her hip. The baby was playing with her loose, curly hair.

"Trying to forget about the Daibazaal summit?" She bounced the child as she strode forwards.

Dick flushed as he was caught out, and quickly shut the game down so the message board popped up instead. Not that it mattered. He hadn't been getting good scores.

In an un-princely manner, he tilted his head back to look at Giacinto and the child in her arms.

"Something like that."

Really, he hadn't given it much thought at all. Meetings like these had become so often, it was like second nature. They always went a certain way that he knew what to come, so little threw him off. It made the anxiety over them was manageable.

The little boy in Giacinto's arms squealed when Giacinto stop beside Dck's chair, reaching out for the prince. Agota adored Dick. Any chance he had to be close to the Altean prince, he took it.

Giacinto set the boy in Dick's lap, and Agota gave a big toothless grin.

She caught sight of what Dick was really trying to avoid on the message board. There were three more messages from the Black paladin's communicator up on the message board.

She sucked her teeth.

"It's okay to miss him, Dick."

Dick took the child from Giacinto, and let out a playful groan, pulling a face at him.

"What has Giacinto been feeding you?" Dick asked, ignoring the half-altean beside him. "You are far heavier then you were earlier. I'm surprised the ship is still moving. We still need to make the ship go fwoosh."

Fwoosh being the very technical term from hyperspace.

He gently encouraged the child to sit comfortably in his lap, although Agota seemed more interesting in standing on one of his thighs. Just the one. There was no concept of weight distribution.

Agota mimicked the fwoosh noise excitably, bouncing on the thigh he was very precariously balanced on.

Giacinto shook her head, reaching out to tap at the keyboard in front of them.

Fleck's voice rang out through the room.

"Black to Castle. Black to Castle. It's been... twenty-six quintents. Do you even listen to these broadcasts any more? I wish I could get an answer."

Dick let out a slow breath out to keep his breathing steady. It hurt as much as the first time he heard it. There was a tugging in his chest.

He hesitated for a moment, refusing to look at Giacinto.

"It is better this way."

He made Agota sit again, but he stubbornly stood up again. Reluctantly, he took hold of his hands he balances him, accepting his fate of having tiny feet bruising him.

"For who?" she questioned, running her fingers through Agota's hair.

"He's clearly not happy. You're about as cheerful as a Klanmuirl with indigestion. Must be the citizens of the universe!" She glanced her fist off her palm, as if she had the idea, the dropped into an unimpressed stare. "No, wait. They're mourning the loss of Voltron. Huh... I'm not seeing anyone who benefits from this."

She'd dealt with thirty-four quintents of this moping. She was done with waiting for him to realise what an idiot he was being.

Dick groaned out a sigh and closed his eyes. Then he tilted the head to the side towards Giacinto, in a silent demand for the same treatment Agota was getting. He deserved it more.

"We're not happy now, but..." He shrugged.

Honestly, now, he couldn't think of a reason as to why this was for the best. He was so sure of the decision all those quintents ago. Now he felt he was far too deep to go back on it.

"But? But what? Eventually the pain of your pointless separation will fade and you'll both live happily ever after separately? Or the pain will get worse and worse until you can't deal with it any more? I don't-"

She stopped abruptly and her yellow eyes narrowed.

There was a long moment of silence.

"Dick... Richard... are you... Did you do this to try and comfort me?"

She hoped to all that was sacred that he hadn't.

Dick snapped his gaze up to Giacinto.

"I- What? No."

There was a similar feeling to how he was caught out playing Riktaar'kl. His mouth felt dry.

"I mean, I'm altean, he's human. He wanted to go and see his family back down on earth and I wasn't going to deprive him of that. It isn't fair on him. On us."

She knew that look, that guilty, tense look.

Pain seeped into her features. "Dick-" She shook her head slowly, reaching out to cup his cheeks.

"Dick, my Heart, this wasn't for you to do. Do you think I want you to suffer like I am?" She brushed the loose locks of his blond hair from his face gently. "I wouldn't ever want you to lose your partner, Dick."

He felt his chin wobble, just a little, uncertain how to answer her, throat dry. It wasn't the only reason he and Fleck split, but there was truth in it. There was only so much time he could give to people.

He was abruptly pulled out of it when Agota laughed and slapped his hands over one of Dick's cheeks and pulled on his hair. He hissed.

"Ta, please don't pull peoples hair. It hurts," he said, trying to gently push his hands away from his face, but Agota seemed intent of pulling on the loose strands, laughing.

He took his tiny fists and held them in his own, to keep them away. Agota seemed to find this amusing for all of two seconds before he started to cry.

"Dick. You can't-" She was cut off by the cry.

"What is all that noise, little one?" Giacinto swept the crying child up into her arms, and with a few well-placed bounces and an almost scarily accurate impression of a baby Katakamuirl, Agota was giggling again.

Giacinto had a way with children that was impressive for such a strong warrior.

The message board lit up with an incoming broadcast.

"Black to Castle. Black to Castle. Come on, Dick. Answer me. Please. I miss you. I'm- I can't do this any more, Dick. I can't."

When the broadcast cut out, and the room was silent for a moment, Giacinto turned her gaze down to Dick.

"Yeah," she agreed in a totally disproving tone. "Better for everyone. Answer him," she urged. He needed to answer Fleck and call him back to the Castle.

"I- I can't."

This was still new. Fresh. A human month wasn't long enough to get over this. What was the saying? It gets worst before it gets better?

"If I answered him it wouldn't be fair. It is just going to prolong... this."

He gestured around himself.

"The only thing I'm seeing being prolonged is your stupidity."

She leaned against the command panel, ignoring the pulling of her hair.

"Did you even ask him what he wanted, Dick? Or did you decide? I know-" she began, holding one hand up to stop him from speaking. "You said that he wanted to see his family again, but when did he say that? I haven't heard him say that for years."

She tucked her arm back around Agota safely. "If you decided to send him away with the justification of something he said years ago, I'm going to kick you to your New Daibazaal summit from here."

He dropped his gaze down to his hand and his shoulders slumped.

"Saying it like that, you're making it out like I [i]banished[i] him or something."

He spun the ring around his finger, refusing to look at Giacinto again.

"I just wanted what was best for us. All of us."

Giacinto sighed softly.

"Remember when the war began, Dick, and one of the first things Zarkon did was blacklist me when I sided with your father? I wasn't allowed on Galra soil, to have contact with anyone Galra."

She looked away. "I made that call every day. That call. It's a banishment, Dick. You can dress it however you want, but those calls aren't the calls of someone that's happy to be where he is."

A moment passed of weighted silence.

He ran his hands over his face and sighed.

"It's... different."

Quiznak, he knew how much that sounded like bullshit. He was on the loosing side of the argument here. The resonings as to why he encouraged Fleck back on Earth that he was so certain on a human month ago were, in all honesty, stupid.

But how could he face him now?

"It is," she agreed.

She held the baby in her arms close.

"He did it to punish me for choosing my child over him." Her eyes turned up to Dick.

"You're doing it to punish yourself for making me choose between the universe and him."

The brass tacks of this situation were rough, but they needed to be put in the air.

Dick felt his throat clench. He was at a lost on what to say.

"We're in an age of peace, Dick."

She stood and adjusted her grip on the still-happy Agota. She began towards the doorway. She paused before she left.

"Answer this. Who needs punishing during peace?"

Then she left, leaving him to his own thoughts.

Red to Castle, Red to castle. There is a code five on earth. I repeat, a code five on earth.

Dick sat up straight and alert as a voice came from the castles comunication system. He felt dread weigh heavily in his stomach.

Code five?!

From Lucas, too. There had been no sign of him since drooping him off on Earth.

He pushed a return button.

"The castle has received your message; a code red on earth. Give us the details of the emergency."

Yeah, it is Black might waste away from sadness if you don't fucking answer him back.

Oh. Oh.

Dick closed his eyes and tilted his head back.

Why did red paladins had it out for him?

He took a deep breath in and a slow one out.

"This is an improper use of the codes and comunication system, Lucas."

"T

Fleck snorted when Lucas picked up the communicator, shaking his head.

"I've been trying for a month, Red. You think a fake code-"

"The castle has received your message; a code red on earth. Give us the details of the emergency."

Dick had replied. Something ugly churned in his gut and twisted his expression in hurt as Lucas responded, looking altogether too proud of himself.

"This is an improper use of the codes and communication system, Lucas."

Fleck sat still for a long moment, then stood silently, sweeping from the apartment, his shoulders shaking.

A moment later, out in the walkway, there was a loud thud and a strangled grunt of pain. Fleck hunched over the wall he'd just punched, forehead pressed into the rough surface. Cracks spidered out from where his knuckles were pressed into the buildings crumbling rendering. His knuckles were starting to bleed, and the blood was clumping together little chunks of rendering and dust.

His shoulders were still shaking, but much more violently now. He wasn't trying to suppress anger now. Now he was trying to stop himself from crying.

"Done trying attempting to destroy my apartment complex?" Lucas asked wrly.

He leaned again the wall, bottle of whiskey in his hand. The communicator he left on the couch. Dick can handle five minutes of being ignored after be silent on Fleck for a month.

He clapped a hand on Fleck's shoulder, unsure of what to say that was soothing. This was much more a yellow or blue expertise. Red had a tendency to do dumb, impulsive shit and not always think about the consequences. He was a prime example of a paladin stereotype just then.