Chapter Text
Being an orphan sucks. Being an orphan on the street was even worse. The winters were cold and deadly and the summers were crowded and dangerous. You had to learn to survive on your own, you had to be quiet, fast, and resourceful, plus a knife at your side never hurt either.
That’s how Keith lived for about two years before he got caught. The young boy was at a corner store trying to steal a small bag of chips. Sadly, the cashier noticed and called the police before he could sneak out. Keith wouldn’t say a word to the cops when they tried talking to him. After a while, the cops got annoyed and brought him down to the station.
“Look, kid. It’s not that hard, just tell us who we can call to come get you. The owner's of the store aren’t pressing charges or anything, we just need some info.” The officer that was in front of Keith wasn’t a big man, he didn’t look like a threat and had been trying to get Keith to talk for about fifteen minutes. Finally, Keith gave in.
“Nobody. It’s just me.”
That was all he said to the officer before child services were called. Then after about an hour Keith found himself in a dirty home with about fifteen other kids. There was no privacy, no respect, and, worst of all, no quiet. Keith didn’t remember any of the other children’s names, he didn’t find that very important, but he remembered how they acted towards him. Some of the young ones were scared of him, the older ones would smack him around until he fought back, the ones his age would ignore him, and anybody looking to adopt didn’t look at him twice. Honestly, Keith didn’t know what was worse.
He tried running away a few times, only to get caught trespassing or vandalizing by the cops and sent right back to the home. After a while, he noticed that it was the same cop every time, he was never harsh with Keith or yelling, the cop had a soft face with a scar on his cheek. He would give Keith disappointed looks before driving him back to the home.
Once Keith turned about ten, things got worse. After years of anger and hurt built up inside him, the boy started turning violent. He would get into fights with the other kids, yelling at them until the fight turned physical. Keith had a record for not stopping till there was blood. The cops were called and Keith got arrested a few times, but never charged. After seeing about four doctors and a few therapists every one seemed to give up on the young boy, including himself.
When Keith turned seventeen he truly realized how alone and scared he was. In about a year, he would be an adult and the orphanage would kick him back to the street, Keith didn’t want to go back to stealing his meals and doing what he could for money. Living in the home was hell but on the street was much worse, so sitting down in the bathroom he did the only thing he could think. Pulling out the knife he had for years, the scared, hurt, angry kid pushed down on his wrist and cut.
Waking up in a strange room with something over your mouth would freak anyone out, at least, that’s what Keith thought as he screamed and looked around him. Everything was white and his hands were cuffed to the bed he was currently laying in. This only caused more panic to shoot through his body and he screamed louder. Finally, a man with black and white hair and a white coat came running in. The quickness of his movements caused Keith to flinch slightly, the man seemed to notice and started moving slower keeping his hands where Keith could see them.
Finally, the boy stopped screaming, his body was still tense and shaking, but at least his screaming stopped. The man moved his hand to Keith’s face and softly spoke. “It’s okay, I know you must be scared. I’m just going to take the mask off so you can breathe better, okay?” Keith didn’t say anything as he felt the weight off his mouth and he could breath again. “W-....where am I?”
The man’s eyes softened more at the kid's scared voice. “You’re in a special hospital. My name is Shiro and I’m going to take care of you until you get better. Can you tell me your name?” After everything he has been through Keith had learned to trust his instinct and, right now, they were telling him to stay quiet, so he just shook his head at the older man. Surprisingly, the man just nodded back with a small smile, no anger or frustration anywhere. “That’s okay, you don’t have to tell me right now if you don’t want to. Are you hungry? I can try to get you something if you want.” The man, Shiro’s, reaction was different and it threw Keith off, for a moment he just stared at the doctor before slowly nodding.
A month had passed before Keith finally trusted Shiro enough to speak. It was a normal check up when it happened, Shiro was mindlessly talking about something random when there was a soft whisper of a word. “Keith.” That made the doctor stop moving and look up at the boy. “What was that?” Keith sighed and cleared his throat before saying a little louder. “My name...is Keith.”
After about a year, Keith grew closer to Shiro and eventually even made an acquaintance with another patient named Pidge. She was a smart girl who would mostly be on the laptop she somehow snuck in but that was okay with Keith. Once in awhile, they would get into trouble but, mostly, it would just be them sitting on a couch in the lounge, looking at different conspiracy theories.
That’s what they were doing when Shiro rushes by with an unconscious teen in a wheelchair. He was yelling at someone that was in the other room but Keith didn’t really hear what he was saying, he was too distracted by the teen in the wheelchair. Shiro was in the room for not even a minute before he was gone again, but in that time, he felt something in the hospital changing and looking down at Pidge, who was already watching them, he knew she felt it too. Closing the laptop she turned back to Keith. “Well... I think things might just get more interesting around here.”