Chapter Text
Lance began to retreat into himself the longer he was forced to interrogate, and even looking at the now rare tapes sent to him made him feel faint. He laid away at night, simply thinking of how many people he’d seen collapse, kicking and screaming as they were dragged away for a crime Lance could see written all over their face. The longer he was in fighter class, the better he should’ve done, the worse it got. Iverson began to sabotage the sim, or order him to crash. He told him it was to be sure he didn’t stand out too much, and Lance had given up trying to argue with his horrible logic He knew very well it was only to knock him down a peg, make his life hell. Lance soon became so consumed with trying desperately to keep his grade up despite the way Iverson forced it down, he didn’t pay enough attention to Pidge to see how she was hiding something, or creeping off. Didn’t care enough to look at Iverson’s face, register his nervousness whenever the Kerberos mission was brought up. No, it wasn’t until after a particularly horrible interrogation and being chewed out by Iverson that he decided he couldn’t go any longer without a break, and dragged Hunk along to sneak out. He hadn’t exactly been expecting to follow Pidge, or to find out she suspected the Kerberos mission of being more complicated than the story presented to the public. He really hadn’t expected to see Takashi Shirogane or his adoptive little brother, who was really starting to grate on his nerves.
There they were, rescuing the man Lance had written off as dead, along with the rest of the non-conspiracy theorist world, and he introduced himself.
“Uh, the name’s Lance,” he’d told him, rolling his eyes. They’d gotten along alright, actually made a pretty good team on the rare group project despite Lance’s resentment for the position and opportunities Keith was given. He could immediately tell the mullet was put off by the tone of his voice, and denied it. Incredibly annoying, in Lance’s opinion.
“We were rivals?” he asked, wanting to see if Keith would crack. “You know, Lance and Keith, neck and neck.” The rival thing was a good cover story too. He didn’t need Hunk or Pidge reading too much into why he was so focused on Keith. However, the dark eyed boy merely shrugged, and began walking out with Shiro, shoving his limp form onto Lance for a second to slam his fist into the face of one of the staff trying to get back up. Lance let it go for the time being since they were, naturally, being chased by the Garrison. Still, the annoyance cropped up at Keith’s continued denial was something Lance was far too petty to ignore. So, he tucked the knowledge away for the moment, more focused on their escape. His annoyance spiked the longer he was on that hover, watching Keith fly them to safety while he could only imagine the smug, self satisfied smirk on his face. He was going to wipe it off the jerk’s face if it was the last thing he did, regardless of the spike of happiness he felt every time he visualized Iverson’s broken nose and the swollen, bandaged thing it’d been for weeks after. It wasn’t until later that night that Lance realized that he didn’t have to go back, that he was free of crumpling expressions and the frantic screams of those dragged away because of him. He could begin to try and redeem himself, or so he hoped.
When morning came and Shiro woke up, Lance could read the faint recognition in his eyes as they shook his eyes, but didn’t think much of it. It wasn’t as if they’d never crossed paths before. He’d seen him in the halls of the Garrison, that was probably all. After storming out of Iverson’s office so furiously, he didn’t realize anybody had watched the incident. Instead of pondering it any longer than he had to, he opted for irritating Keith while they went off in search of the energy the mullet head had apparently noticed out in the desert.
Lance would admit, he was wary of the lion. After entering the cave it was in, he felt like he was being watched. However, looking up at it made him cringe. He got the feeling it was very much sentient, and didn’t like the feeling of being scrutinized without being able to return the favor. It made him nervous, to say the least. He’d rather not have to deal with that, thank you very much. Still, he walked up on shaky legs and pressed his hand to the barrier. Being flooded by the images it threw at him was mind boggling, but then again so was flying away in a giant lion of all things. It made him extremely uneasy, the way it kept communicating with him. He couldn’t see a face, and wasn’t used to being forced to just listen to someone’s words, or he supposed in this case, ideas. It freaked him out a little to say the least, and he wished he had a face to put with the strange beast that he took into space.
The brunette got a sense that the lion was aware of his unease, and was doing her best to reassure. Lance tried to be open, but frankly he was more concerned about the way they raced through space, away from home. Away from what was familiar, and all in a creation he did not fully control nor could manipulate like he was used to. Lance was nervous, and from a boy who was incredibly used to having at least some form of control over his surroundings, it wasn’t a familiar sensation.
Aliens were new too.
Upon reaching the castle and seeing the Alteans, Lance felt something in him start winding up, like a toy ready to spring forth. A sort of tension building, however unwittingly. The Alteans didn’t exactly mean any harm, Lance could tell that much, but they were wary in the way that Lance was wary of his lion. Odd, how fast he’d come to accept the lion as his own. They were new and strange and had no idea of what was going on, and the Alteans worried about it. Or at least Lance thought it was worry he detected. Their mannerisms were similar to humans, but there were little differences Lance’s mind had to become adjusted to.
The way Allura scratched at her markings when she grew irritated, or how Coran liked to grow and shrink his fingers just a little when he was bored. That was an interesting trait, to say the least. Despite how increasingly comfortable he got with the team, the tension Lance felt only continued to build, like a rubber band being stretched too taut. There was a couple times he felt like it almost snapped, almost let his frustrations out about his fear and homesickness and how he could tell nobody else had settled in yet either. Even aside from the obvious faces he could read like a book, there was some gut feeling that he couldn’t help noting. Things had yet to fall into place, to make the team feel fully like a team. There was also the matter of Lance’s skills, naturally. He’d decided to hide them.
The choice came easily to him. He didn’t want to be used, forced into anything like he had been before. More importantly, he didn’t want to freak out the team. He in no way wanted them to know that he knew that Pidge was a girl, or that Shiro barely ever slept and secretly thought his pick up lines were funny. He was silent, silent when they tried to form Voltron and he panicked a little because he could feel a very much conscious, living relationship being formed with the other paladins. He wasn’t used to any sort of bond that he couldn’t control in some way or another, and it was terrifying. Still, he smiled and worked his way through it despite his misgivings.
Lance finally snapped upon meeting Nyma.
Even with everything happening torturous training drills and bonding activities, in the attack on the castle (he totally remembered the bonding moment by the way, and revenge tasted sweet), he’d managed to keep some form of his composure. No matter how much he teased Keith he rarely went beyond teasing jabs that didn’t hit too close to home. He didn’t even really lose it with Allura in the beginning like Pidge did before the resulting food fight. He mostly contained the pent up emotion he was feeling, and instead of facing it in one way or another he just pasted another smile on his lips, rearranged his face into a nice picture that suited everyone best. He lasted through everything else, it was the blonde, purple eyed alien that got him.
It was obvious from the beginning that her and Rolo were trouble, so Lance got involved.
He flirted and did his best to please the girl who clearly believed, and to be fair he was an excellent actor, that she had him in the palm of her hand. She didn’t know about when he went back in the castle to help Hunk grab what he needed for repairs that he ran off to grab his bayard. Hunk had his suspicions, and Lance commended him for it later. As for Nyma, Lance was very much aware of the fact that she was manipulating him, and as far as she knew, successfully doing so. He even loaded her up in Blue and took her for a spin. He didn’t mention how he wanted to separate her from her team, or that he saw her tap the button on her bracelet. Her ruse would’ve worked rather well if it had been anybody else, but Lance was not anybody else. The minute they stepped out of Blue and Nyma’s back was turned Lance pulled his gun.
“So, turning the blue lion in for reward. The universe’s only hope, for a bit of money. You don’t think that’s a bit callous?” he asked, keeping his distance as the woman spun to see him. It was kind of entertaining to see how quickly her bubbly facade was torn to pieces. She sneered.
“What makes you think that, and what happened to the bubbly play boy I saw up until about three seconds ago?” Lance shrugged.
“What can I say? You’re easy to see through.” He hoisted his gun, emphasizing his point as he walked back towards Blue.
“Now, you’re going to tell me exactly what you just did with your bracelet, before I leave you here.” Nyma swallowed thickly, looking to the sky.
“Nothing important,” she tried to reassure him. “Setting an alarm! No need to get upset, Lance.” Lance had been keeping his patience up until now, but he began to falter. He fired a shot off, narrowly missing her ear.
“I don’t like liars, Nyma,” he responded. She reached for her bracelet again, slowly as though he’d miss it. Another shot, singing the hairs on her arm. “None of that. You’ve got ten ticks, before I get in my lion and leave you and your partner to rot.” He’d pointedly turned his comms off for this chat. His team didn’t need to know what was going on. Lance began to back up, and Blue growled at the girl who Lance could see steadily begin to panic.
“It’s a tracker!” she hurried to explain. “Alerts Rolo to where I am. Don’t leave, here, I’ll turn it off!” she offered, slowly raising her wrist. However, a grin spread across her face as the ship appeared overhead. She lifted the bracelet to her mouth, shouting into it while Lance cussed.
“He’s got his gun out! He’s got his gun!” Lance couldn’t hear the response, but he was aware of the rope dropping from the ship for her. His lip curled in disgust. They’d really betray him, the whole universe, for some money? More importantly, if the universe fell to the Galra, he didn’t get to go back home. He was suddenly grateful for the extra military training the Garrison put him through as their prodigy, because he honestly hadn’t got much target practice recently. Without thinking, he fired a series of shots off at the rope. They all hit in rapid succession, slicing the rope through and sending the alien back to the ground. She collapsed in a tangle of blonde limbs and pigtails, while Lance stalked over, pressing the gun to her forehead and grabbing her arm to speak into the bracelet.
“I swear to god, if you don’t get down here and get your ship the hell away from my lion I am going to dropkick your girlfriend into deep space. I would recommend listening, because I am quickly reaching the end of my rope and I am very, very serious. You’ve got five doboshes, see you then.”
And so Lance waited, for the other liar to show.