Its a bit of a surprise when she leans - but its a welcome one and, slow, careful not to overstep, he wraps his good arm around her small frame in return, tucking her a bit more into his side. Where she's safe. Where he can keep her safe. She's not the only one that let something they should have caught slip past them. And it had almost cost his team everything. Being dead didn't seem like enough of an excuse.
"Katie," his voice is soft to match his half-embrace. "You can't do everything. You can't out-think the entire galaxy all at once, no matter how good you are. There is no one, in the history of our world, that's always managed to cover everything. A lot of them have gotten lucky but no one can do everything. You had no reason to go digging. Kuron acted like me, the Black Lion trusted him - he was me. And he loved all of you just as strongly and honestly as I do. He still does, even if he has to figure out what that means now." He gave her a gentle squeeze against his side and didn't let go, dipped his head to bring his eyes closer to hers so she could meet them if she needed to. If she needed to measure whether he meant what he was saying or not.
"And Katie - you did stop him. Not when he escaped. He took down the entire team. You couldn't have stopped him, not with as little warning as you had. But - you stopped the program Haggar made him download. You saved the team, you made sure Keith had a place to bring us back to - that there was even a Voltron to form to fight Lotor with. Haggar did - terrible things to Kuron. She ruined our arm, made it eat us alive, drained so much of our life out of us to make it into a canon that we nearly died. That - didn't belong on the castle. It was too dangerous and she was too determined and - we're too dangerous when we're not holding back. I don't ever want any of you to see me when I'm not holding back. I don't want any of you to know what that looks like. It didn't belong on the castle. I'm glad he didn't fight Keith there. You stopped Kuron where you were meant to. You saved the team." Gentle he stroked a hand over her head. "I'm very proud of you, Katie. No one else could have done what you did. We still have a team because of you."
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"Katie," his voice is soft to match his half-embrace. "You can't do everything. You can't out-think the entire galaxy all at once, no matter how good you are. There is no one, in the history of our world, that's always managed to cover everything. A lot of them have gotten lucky but no one can do everything. You had no reason to go digging. Kuron acted like me, the Black Lion trusted him - he was me. And he loved all of you just as strongly and honestly as I do. He still does, even if he has to figure out what that means now." He gave her a gentle squeeze against his side and didn't let go, dipped his head to bring his eyes closer to hers so she could meet them if she needed to. If she needed to measure whether he meant what he was saying or not.
"And Katie - you did stop him. Not when he escaped. He took down the entire team. You couldn't have stopped him, not with as little warning as you had. But - you stopped the program Haggar made him download. You saved the team, you made sure Keith had a place to bring us back to - that there was even a Voltron to form to fight Lotor with. Haggar did - terrible things to Kuron. She ruined our arm, made it eat us alive, drained so much of our life out of us to make it into a canon that we nearly died. That - didn't belong on the castle. It was too dangerous and she was too determined and - we're too dangerous when we're not holding back. I don't ever want any of you to see me when I'm not holding back. I don't want any of you to know what that looks like. It didn't belong on the castle. I'm glad he didn't fight Keith there. You stopped Kuron where you were meant to. You saved the team." Gentle he stroked a hand over her head. "I'm very proud of you, Katie. No one else could have done what you did. We still have a team because of you."