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The Gibraltor station was large and there were many empty rooms for Lance to explore. If there was an afternoon where Hanzo didn’t want to tutor him, and Pa was off somewhere else Lance was given full reign and responsibility to explore and keep himself out of trouble. (mostly he succeded)
He found different things: like old lockers of people he didn’t know and area’s he could climb up and out of the way just to see what exactly Winston did in his spare time without being caught.
It was one afternoon of mindless of this mindless wandering when Lance was looking for a more interesting area to explore wen he stumbled across some potted plants stationed to keep watcher over the entrance to a place Lance had definitley not explored.
When he easily snuck past the potted guard he took a peak inside: somehow grass had been padded across the floor creating the illusion of being outside, but circling the whole room was a dirt path that let to various clusters of flowers and vines.
Who had the time to even work on this?
Lance took the path and looked at the greenery, admiring how well kept and lush everything was. As he made a turn around one of the taller bushes he stumbled across a Zenyatta meditating in an empty patch of the grass.
Zenyatta was one of the first Omnics that Lance had met after the situation at Kings Row, at first it was a little jarring and Lance had frozen up when he first met him.
The tension hadn't lasted long when Lance realized that Zenyatta was by no means a gang member. Well, he was a member of a close knit group but they were peaceful by nature.
“I see you have found the Arboretum, young Lance.” Zenyatta greets his orbs still chiming softly in their mesmerizing pattern. Lance shifted from foot to foot, hands shoved in his pockets and leaned on the back of his heels to give the appearance of being more relaxed.
“Uh, yep. Very nice. I like all the…grass.”
Zenyatta chuckled softly (which was wild to Lance because as far as he knew they didn't have diaphragms or vocal chords.)
“Yes, Bastion and I worked together on this space so we could return to nature after a hard mission.”
Oh. Bastion was the turret Omnic, another Omnic that was hard for Lance to wrap his head around.
“Cool.” Now Lance was thinking about how Omnics had the ability to connect to nature and could levitate and talk to birds? Before now, Lance had thought of himself as a pretty open minded individual, but after the whole Kings Row incident Lance was starting to see how he reacted to Omnics become more clear, but Zenyatta had never done anything to him. Nor had Bastion, and treating them differently because of it was no way to act.
“Why not take a seat?” Zenyatta offered, motioning beside himself in the patch of grass they were in. “I find meditation can help clear the mind of any troubles.”
Lance, still a little uncertain sat next to the floating Onmic and folded his legs. “I don’t think I’ve ever meditated before.”
“You can learn.” Zenyatta ensures, “Just close your eyes, take in deep breaths, smell the grass, the flowers. Let out the breath just as deeply, Count the seconds of your breath. Four in, seven out.”
Lance frowned, “But…you don’t have lungs..how can you do that?”
“As an Omnic, I have other senses I can focus on to reach a meditative state. Focus on your breathing.” He chides lightly even going to far as to gently tap the back of Lance’s head.
The meditation lasts for who knows how long, Lance at the time couldn't really get a grip on the idea of meditation, with the breathing and the focusing. It does eventually become a bit soothin. Even a little relaxing. He listened to the chimes of Zenyatta’s orbs and that helped too.
Eventually, Lance’s stomach growls, interrupting the meditation. Oh gosh. Lance felt his cheeks redden and there was only a small chuckle from Zenyatta.
“I think that is enough meditation, for now, Lance. Let us go meet the others in the mess hall.”
On their way down, Lance thought about the meditation, the orbs, how Zenyatta could float, what made a person a person. He chewed on his bottom lip in thought. Not enough to make it bleed, but it was becoming a little bit sore with how much thinking he was doing.
“Something on your mind?” Zenyatta asks lighting as they walk, Lance grunts releasing his poor abused lip.
“Yeah. I’m just…trying to wrap my head around how you can be…you.”
Zenyatta makes a noise that is similar to humming and he turns to Lance, “You will not be the first, and you certainly will not be the last, Lance. I dare say the path you are starting on will lead you to open your horizons. In the eye of the Iris, Man and Omnic are equal.”
“The Iris?”
Zenyatta nods, summoning a warm yellow orb, “The Iris is what breathes life into Omnics, it has been around for longer than us of course, watching over humanity. In the eye of the Iris, man and Omnic are equal. It gives me the ability to levitate, and heal. Or harm.” The orb turned into a dark ominous purple. Lance leaned a little away from it. “The Iris can bring harmony or discord, but it loves us all, and connects us.”
Wow. The Iris Certainly sounded better than the guy that Pastor Greg talked about.
“In fact,” Zenyatta continues, “One of the goals of my meditation is to connect to the Iris. Because if you gaze into the Iris and connect with it, you connect with everyone.”
This was news to Lance, and small bud of..warmth kinda bloomed in his chest as he looked at Zenyatta in awe. Lance had misjudged Zenyatta instinctively because of his bad experience, but this Omnic right here was accepting Lance had taught Lance about meditation... if Zenyatta and Bastion were nice, how many others were too?
Even after stuffing himself with food Lance’s mind was still buzzing, he laid on the floor of the apartment, staring at the ceiling thinking about what Zenyatta had told him. The iris…Man and Omnic being equal. The meditation. The orbs. There was so much that Lance didn’t know. Lance sat up. He had to go talk to Zenyatta again.
The first place that Lance looked was the garden area, and Lance was relieved to see that Zenyatta was there meditating.
“I had a feeling you would return.” Zenyatta said, his voice calm if not laced with a little humor. Lance could imagine him smiling if he had muscles or uh, joints too.
“I have a lot of questions.”
“Do not be discouraged, Everyone begins in Ignorance. Ask your questions, Lance. And meditate a while if you like.”
Lance sat down and asked questions for what seemed to be hours on end, eventually, his mind quieted and for a few seconds in their meditations, Lance could have sworn he felt the edges of something, like the petals of an Iris.
Now:
“To bond with your Lions is like a form of meditation. You must calm your mind and connect with the consciousness of your Lion. You need to understand them. Communicate with them. That way, you can communicate with each other more instinctively without having to use voice commands.”
Oh boy. It was one of those exercises. These types were not fun for Lance, especially since meditation wasn’t really all that easy for him now a-days. So many thoughts, not enough tranquility.
Blue seemed confident in him as she purred when he climbed into the cockpit.
“At least someone has faith in me.”
Lance took a breath and tried to remember what exactly you were supposed to do when you meditated. ‘Just close your eyes, take a deep breath’ Lance took a breath, smelling the sweat of the cockpit and felt how his breath stirred the air. Listen to the breathing…calm your thoughts.
Meditation must be like riding a bike cause Lance actually started going into a light meditative state after a few short minutes. His mind already floating and pretty tranquil. He reached lightly for Blue, and she reached back lapping at the edge of his consciousness kinda like brushing up against a buddy on a couch while watching some Netflix. (oddly specific but it was true, and it made him smile.)
‘Hey there, B eautiful.’
‘Hello, my Paladin.’ Was her response and there was a flash of light- a familiar warmth and Lance was shocked to the core when suddenly he wasn’t sitting in the cockpit of his lion, but standing in a grassy field looking into a vast swirling Blue and whitesky.
“Curious.” Intoned a familiar voice, “This is a surprise, Lance. The Iris has certainly blessed us.”
“Zen? What’s going on? What is this place?” Lance looked at his hands, which should have been in his Paladin armor but he was wearing his normal everyday clothes instead. Trippy.
“We are in a meditative state, and the Iris is connecting us it seems. How interesting.”
The Iris? Lance wasn't sure if he could believe that. He looked around this new space. Grass, the occasional flower fluttering in a non-existent breeze. On the horizon were golden curls of something that crawled up the horizon to meet the sky, they almost looked like the petals of a flower.
“I didn’t think I COULD meditate this deep.” He murmured to himself in confused awe. Zenyatta hummed in thought.
“I feel…another presence here.” There was a yowl and Blue reared her head so she was above the tall grassand she was..she was like any normal lion. Large proud, but blue. This was kinda scary AND awesome.
“Blue!” Lance grinned at his lady, Blue gave a cat smirk, grooming her Paw, no longer paying attention to him.
“I take it you know this Lion?”
“Of course!" Lance wheels around grinning from ear to ear, "We’re like, best pals. She’s the most beautiful Lion in whole wide Universe. Although, she’s much…bigger in real life. And made of metal.”
Zenyatta hums, “I see, then this must be the manifestation of her soul.”
Blue got up then with a stretch and trotted over to Lance, and pressed her face into Lance’s chest. “Oof! Easy girl!”
“Head Scratches. If there’s any use of bringing you to this plane it is for you to shower me with affection while you catch up with your Shambalii friend.”
Oh. Uh. Lance reached up and started to scratch lightly at Blue’s skull, just behind her ears. Zenyatta reached out and began to pet Blue as well.
“So, tell me, Lance, what have you been doing? You’ve been missing for nearly 7 months on earth, your family is worried.”
Lance felt guilt just wash over him again, his scratches become more half-hearted and looked at Zen with a bit of a grin, “Uh, would you believe me if I said I was saving the universe?”
--
Over the next who-knows-how-long, Lance shared with Zenyatta his experiences as a Paladin of Voltron, “We saved a rock planet. It’s a planet made of rock- but it’s alive and has a soul! It’s great!!”
“Sounds fascinating.”
Lance shared about the Capture the Flag battle with his team mates. He talked about his friends on the various planets and how they were doing.
“It seems you have grown into quite the hero Lance.” Zenyatta praises and Lance beams.
“You think Pa’ll be proud of me?”
“Lance, your father is proud of you no matter what. In fact, he’ll be more than pleased to hear of your adventures.”
Lance froze. “So…you’re gonna tell them?”
If Zenyatta could grin, he would be at this moment, if the tone of his voice was anything to go by, “Oh most certainly. Until we meet again, Lance.”
“See ya later, Zen.”
And then the vision faded out, and Lance came back into his own body, wiggling his fingers first and toes
“Zenyatta is interesting. I haven’t seen someone like him in many millennia.” Mused blue in the back of his mind. It was a kind of tickle and bubble, like what water looked and felt like when it brushed across the sand.
“Blue? Oh god, you’re in my head!!!!” Lance cheered and did a little dance in the cockpit.
“I’ve always been ‘In your head’ now you can hear me better.”
Lance was about to quip back with a deaf comment but was intterupted.
“Lance, is everything okay in there?” Came Coran’s voice through the com’s. “You’ve been in there longer than any of the other Paladins. We’re getting a bit worried down here.”
“Oh, I’m fine. More than fine. Great actually.” It’s totally not like he didn’t just find out he could connect with an Omnic deity through blue and talk to one of his Pa’s friends possibly giving them a way to contact and reconnect with his family back on earth or anything.
“Blue and I were just having a really DEEP conversation about….self-care! Yeah, she totally just divulged all the wonderful secrets about fermented food goo I was on the verge of cracking.”
“While that would be an interesting topic, we did no such thing,” Blue complained and Lance sighed.
‘I know. But…I can’t just TELL them what happened! This is a… delicate situation on our hands!”
“If you say so,” Blue said.
It would be fine. He would figure out a way to tell them without totally shattering their viewpoint of him.
--
Two weeks passed and every time Lance opened his mouth to even bring up the subject of the whole meditation with the rest of the team he froze up and his thoughts on the ‘what will they think of me, they only knew me as Lance what if they stop liking me, what if- what if they start acting like they like him MORE’
He was agonizing over this on the way down to dinner when he bumped into Keith.
“Whoah, easy there. What’s gotten into you?”
“Me?” Lance defends, crossing his arms and backing up a couple of spaces in the large hallway. “Nothings wrong! What’s wrong with you?”
Keith blinked and went, “Oh…kay.” Then ignored Lance, continuing into the mess hall. Smooth Lance. Smooth. Way to not draw attention to yourself.
It only escalated from there as every time now when somone would approach him Lance would jump and be like ‘Me? Agitated? Naaaawww.’ ‘Whadya mean I screamed like a girl? That’s very sexist Hunk! I thought you were better than that!’ or something even more embaressing.
Things finally came to a head when Pidge cornered him. (two weeks and four days after his whole situation with Blue and Zenyatta.)
“Okay. You’re hiding something. Either spit it out or I’ll squeeze is out of you.” Pidge had their ‘I’m not joking’ expression on which consisted with arms crossed, set jaw, and pinched lips.
“Me? Hiding something?”
“Yeah! Every time you say something cool- and don’t you DARE tell anyone you heard me say that- I KNOW it’s come from somewhere else. But no matter how much I rack my brain over it or search my encyclopedia on my laptop I can’t come up with ANYTHING. Buuuutt.” Pidge got a catty grin on. “I think I may have a puzzle piece.”
They reached into their pocket and took out an image of a cup. A cup that Lance had made an Olkari festival. The one he had painted dragons on. Cause he was feeling homesick.
“THIS particular cup is important to you. I tried some image searches and I found an interesting tale, the dragon brothers. Japanese. AND connected to a particularly influential family in Japan. You know…the Shimada’s.”
Lance froze up. What was he supposed to say? Apparently, nothing because Pidge flourished the picture in front of Lance’s face again.
“WHAT exactly would you be doing, connected to the Shimada clan of all things? Your family isn’t Japanese. But I did a little digging, and yeah I don’t have the whole internet at my disposal anymore but the laptop I brought DID have a lot of info I had downloaded because I was bored. I found something interesting. I had a document extremely old just labeled something I had nearly forgotten about: Overwatch. When I was little I had been obsessed with the group and learned all I could about them. So, Lance.” Pidge crowded up to him, “WHAT exactly, connects you to earth's ex-hero group?”
Pidge not wanting to let this conversation continue to be conducted in the hallway, had dragged Lance to the table and sat him down forcefully. “You sit here, and you will TELL us what you know!!”
--
Everyone was frozen, and Hunk even had a piece of food goo hanging from a fork, halfway to his mouth, and the others were just..confused, their expressions in varying degrees of concern.
“Lance?” Shiro prodded gently from his seat, “What’s this about?”
Oh boy, not the Dad™ stare. Lance didn’t look up, he gave a small peak though and squeaked when he saw the Dad stare.
“So. Uh, Pidge here wants me to tell you guys where I get all my awesome one liners.” He gulps.
Everyone was silent around the table and it was extremely unnerving. Even HUNK was quiet, he had a ‘you can do it buddy’ smile on his face. It helped just a but at the same time, he had never shared this much about himself before. Sure, sometimes he told them stuff about his family in Cuba but he only barely hinted at his family in Overwatch. Like that time with Allura and the game of Capture the flag.
Honestly, he hadn’t thought that he had mentioned his Overwatch family so much….it was fun making Pidge lose their mind, but he should’ve been more careful.
But. It was also an opportunity. An opportunity to get messages back to their family about their situation. And it would just be WRONG to not do that. Okay. He was totally gonna do this.
Lance took a breath, “So…I’m a little MORE than just a boy from Cuba.” And he shared his story about his Pa, he shared about Overwatch and the history with the Omnics, reminding everyone (and quickly catching Coran and Allura) up with the Omnicrisis, and Overwatch and who they were, and what they did to save everyone.
“So for like, a whole summer I spent time with them. And…when we meditated, I connected with this force that the Omnics call the ‘Iris’ it’s like their God or something, Blue was able to help me get to a state where I…went into it or something, and I saw a friend. Zenyatta.”
Allura made a humming sound, her arms were crossed and her gaze was far away in thought, “And this, Zenyatta you mentioned, is he one of these ‘Omnics’?”
Lance nods, “Yeah, but he’s one of the wisest but fearsome people I know.”
“Well, this sounds like an interesting situation! With the ability to speak across Galaxies like that, it would be…well, interesting! If we could get more people into such states getting secret messages to each other would be a perfect way to stop Zarkon's army!”
Lance shifted awkwardly in his seat, “I don’t think the Iris is meant to be used as a tool like that, dude. It’s- it’s kinda a sacred thing. It would just be WRONG.”
Coran looked a little disappointed at hearing that but he still nodded, “It’s fine, M’boy. It was just a thought. I wouldn't want to step on any toes.”
“So…through this…my family can know I’m alright?” Hunk asked softly from his place at the table, the fork now set on the plate and his hands clenched into fists on the table. The way he had asked was delicate and fragile; his expression carefully braced for rejection and Lance placed a hand on his buddy’s shoulder, and gave a strong squeeze.
“Buddy, Zen’s probably finished talking to my Pa who’s on a mission to spread the word to ALL of our families.”
Hunk looked like he was gonna cry, and scooped Lance up in a hug, sniffling a bit into his shoulder, “Thanks, Man.” He croaked out, and Lance smiled, rubbing his pal’s back. “It’s no problem Hunk, seriously.”
Everyone let Hunk have his moment before he sighed and pulled away, scrubbing at his eyes. “Uh, sorry about that. I- I’ve just…I didn’t realize I missed them so bad.”
No one blamed Hunk for the burst of emotion, honestly, it was surprising it hadn’t happened sooner. Lance know for sure HE had had plenty of breakdowns and bouts of homesickness. Hunk had supported him when he could, and it just now occurred to Lance that HUNK needed just as much support.
“It’s okay buddy, it’s been hard on all of us,” Lance assures and looks at Pidge who now looks a little uncomfortable.
“My Mom is still on earth…but… I don’t think your dad…”
Lance grinned, “Trust me. Pa will be able to find your family no problem Pidge. Your mom will be included in this, and if not, I can always get my mojo on and see if I can contact Zen again.”
Pidge’s hunched shoulders relaxed and the air was finally, finally starting to clear.
Allura cleared her throat, “Well, this was certainly an eventful meal. I think it best we all retire so we can get some rest for tomorrow.”
There were no arguments as everyone got up from the tables and headed to their rooms. Pidge was on Lance again, with phrases like, “I knew it!” and “WHY did it take so long for me to figure out?” as well as, “How does this Iris thing even work? Lance?”
To which Lance placed an arm around Pidge’s shoulders and leaned down to their level.
“Pidge my friend, here’s some advice a good friend of mine told me once: Do not be discouraged, everyone begins in ignorance.”
Pidge thought that phrase over, and it took a solid second to go from ‘oh wow, neat advice to YOU DID NOT JUST PULL ANOTHER OVERWATCH PHRASE ON ME’ As Lance cackled and danced away from the punch Pidge threw at him.
It’s kinda amazing how a little meditation can make things so much clearer.