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It wasn’t long before Shiro was recovering in a healing pod and both Hunk and Lance were aboard the ship. Keith had been resting in his bunk when they’d arrived, but Pidge had come to notify him shortly afterwards. She was the only one besides Shiro that knew about Keith’s real feelings for Lance. Hunk had gone to make himself and Pidge something to eat, while Allura, Coran, and Lance quietly talked around Shiro’s healing chamber. Keith couldn’t hear their words, but stopped when he saw Lance’s horrified expression at something Coran had apparently said.
The look of utter horror on Lance’s face make Keith’s heart ache, feeling as if someone had punched him. Allura and Coran simply looked apologetic and a bit nervous.
“But… why would Keith do something like that?” Lance’s voice shuddered as he spoke, and Allura reached out a hand to Lance’s shoulder. Keith’s breath left him. He did something? What could he have possibly done to make Lance look like that? To make such a terror-stricken face?
“He was doing what he thought was the right thing to do at the time.” Allura said gently, trying to comfort the blue paladin. Lance shrugged her away.
“No. I have to know. Where is he?” Keith’s eyes widened at this, and he turned around the corner he had been eavesdropping from behind and ran down the corridor.
What did he do?
Keith sprinted for the dorms, but decided against it. Lance would find him there. The training room would be too obvious as well. So where… Keith dashed off to the last place Lance would think to look.
The blue force-field engulfed the blue lion easily, and Keith sat, leaning his back against it. He knew avoiding Lance would only go on for so long, but… he just couldn’t erase the Lance’s face from his mind. Guilt, fear, and hesitation gripped him. Was it Shiro, asking Keith to be the next black paladin? No, there wasn’t any reason. Shiro was getting better, and he’d be normal in no time. Keith would never pilot the black lion anyway; he knew he was no leader. Not like Shiro. How the quiznack could Keith ever live up to that kind of expectation, anyway?
He decided it didn’t matter, but one thing was clear: Keith did something, and now Lance hates him. More than their usual arguments, too. This seemed to have struck a deep cord with Lance. No jokes, no jabs about being better, or wounding Keith’s pride while Lance had the clear advantage over him? Yeah, something was wrong.
“KEITH!” Anger was all Keith could make out of the voice. Lance was pissed. Keith debated running into his own lion, but it was too close to the hangar door where he could see Lance entering at the moment. Shit.
Keith tried to hide by quietly fleeing towards the corner of the room. The force-fields of the other lions obstructing Lance’s view enough for Keith to hide unnoticed. He circled around to the other side of Blue. He heard Lance sigh and mumble something aloud about Keith not being in the hangar, due to Red’s force-field still being up (Keith was too far away from Red at the current moment). Blue’s force-field dissipated and Lance sat at the lion’s feet. He leaned against his lion and started talking, his accented voice carrying throughout the hangar.
“I don’t know where else to look, Blue. I can’t find Keith anywhere.” Lance sounded… off. He didn’t seem ready to chop Keith’s head from his shoulders. Lance sounded depressed, more than anything else. Keith’s heart sank. He knew he had to face Lance. If nothing else, something was bothering the blue paladin, and Keith had to fix it. Or at least try to.
“Lance?” Keith called out in a small voice, coming out from hiding. He stood before Lance, who narrowed his eyebrows and stood, but lunged at Keith.
“How could you!” Lance screamed, grabbing Keith’s shoulders hard enough to bruise, and violently shaking the red paladin. “What the quiznack, Keith! How could you be so fucking stupid! ¿Porqué, Keith?”
“Lance, I-” but Keith stopped as Lance’s hands lowered to the sides of Keith’s arms and gripped his jacket sleeves. Lance crashed his face into the crook of Keith’s neck and his shoulders shook. Sniffling and whimpering followed. Keith was at a loss for words. Lance was… Lance was crying into him. Teardrops fell to Keith’s shoulder and he wrapped his arms around Lance.
“Why would you do that? Why, Keith, why? ”
“What… what did I do, Lance?” Keith kept his words soft and reproachful. Lance sniffled and leaned back, out of Keith’s reach.
“You went after Zarkon. You’re an idiot, Keith. You could have died, why didn’t you listen to Coran?! Why couldn’t you have just thought of the team for once instead of yourself?! Why, Keith?” Lance’s words turned sharper and harsher as they left his mouth. “Are you that obsessed? Do you have a death wish?!” Lance’s lip trembled again, and he turned away from Keith, who stretched out a hand to Lance’s arm. Lance roughly pushed him away, and hugged his arms around his own self. His voice dropped to a quivering whisper. “We can’t afford to lose you, Keith.”
“I know. I’m sorry. I know we can’t form Voltron unless all of us are-” Lance whipped around and cut Keith off again.
“You little ignorante piece of…” The back of Lance’s hand was suddenly striking Keith’s cheek, and shock rocked the red paladin. Usually he could see a blow coming and deflect it, but with Lance… Keith was just more vulnerable. “It’s not about Voltron. It’s not even about the others.” Keith said nothing but looked incredulously at Lance, whose expression turned depressed again. Keith hated that face. Lance’s face was not, and should never, look that incredibly sad. “Keith, I can’t lose you.”
“You hate me.”
“No, I don’t. Sure, I may act and say that I do, but I really don’t. I care about you, and I don’t want to lose you. If we’re going to fight Zarkon, we’re going to fight him together. As a team. We work better together than apart. I can’t lose you. We can’t get back to Earth and see our families until we defeat Zarkon. So we’re kind of a family now. The seven of us. And we were just torn apart and now that we’re all back together… I just, don’t ever try to save the universe by yourself again, okay?”
“Okay. Lance, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize how much I meant to you. It wouldn’t help the team if I got hurt. Or worse. I’m sorry.” Keith did his best to sound as sincere as he felt, and Lance sighed.
“Screw the team. I don’t wanna lose you, Keith.” Lance stepped forward and pulled the ends of Keith’s jacket so the Keith ended up in Lance’s strong, naturally-tanned arms. Keith’s cheeks heated up, and not only on the side Lance had slapped him on.
“Me?”
“Yeah, I won’t have anyone to push around anymore.” A hint of smile played on Lance’s lips, and Keith eased into their embrace.
“Don’t worry. I’m not leaving anytime soon. I promise.” Unable to resist, Keith pressed a kiss to Lance’s temple, and blushed furiously. Lance stared down at him, and after a moment of nothing but a blank stare, Lance put on his ‘lady-killer’ smirk and leaned forward to kiss Keith’s lips.
“Good, because I won’t let you go losing yourself, either.”