Chapter Text
Lance ran his fingers through his hair, gazing into the mirror he had placed inside Red, long ago. Back when he was still somewhat new to this whole job, back when he still cared about his appearance. Then, life became just a hubbub of danger and mayhem. Blowing up Galra cruisers, watching Lotor win Allura’s trust (and his, but only to a certain point), just to shatter it and leave them with broken pieces to clean up on their own.
Because of this, it wasn’t until after the castle had blown to bits, and the Paladins were reduced to five lions and a mission to earth that things had… “calmed down”, long enough for Lance to notice the change in his appearance.
His normally deep brown hair was beginning to grow in white. It wasn’t enough to be that obvious yet, you had to know what you were looking for to notice it. But, given time, Lance would eventually have a full head of pure white. “Just like Shiro’s,” Lance whispered to himself.
“Did you say something Lance?” Lance heard Shiro over the comms and swore softly, he had forgotten to mute his mike.
“Yeah, yeah I’m fine, no worries, what about you guys?”
Coran responded, “Just fine, but we may have to make a small pit stop to pick up more supplies. We appear to be running low.”
Lance nodded, “Got it, anywhere in mind?”
This time, Allura spoke, “Planet Latens seems to have all we need, but all their stores are far apart from each other. I hate to suggest this, especially when we are weakened at the moment, but for times sake, I feel we should separate. I’m sending coordinates of the closest towns on the planet with the supplies we need to your lions now.”
Lance watched as his screen beeped loudly, and a map showed up of the planet with various parts pinpointed. “Got it,” Lance said at the same time as the other paladins.
“Alright everybody,” Keith spoke over the comms, “Allura, Hunk, Romelle, I want you guys on food, Pidge, I want you to go with Coran and Korolia to find parts we need for repairs. Lance, you’re with me and Shiro. We need to find medical supplies and ammunition.”
Normally, Lance would have complained about being with Keith, but now...well. This new, older Keith actually intimidated Lance, so he resorted to just mumbling “Sure.”
Quickly, the paladins (and crew) split into their respective teams, and went on their way.
Latens, as it turned out, was a very dry planet; the reason all the town's and stores were so apart, was because they had to built on rare oasis’s scattered around the planet.
It was also because of this, that they had to land the lions a short whiles away from the towns. This way, the water of the oasis could be protected from any extra dust that billowed up in the air when ships landed. However, this did mean a long hike for the paladins.
As Lance walked next to Keith and Shiro, he couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable. He didn’t know these versions of them. Keith had changed in the two strange years he had lived, and Shiro...This was a Shiro that had died months ago. A Shiro that Lance hadn’t gotten to know in all this time, a Shiro that didn’t know Lance the way he should have after all this time. In short, Lance was stuck with a man lost in the past, and a man far in the future.
If he hadn’t been the odd man out before, he was now.
Lance coughed, “So...uh...Shiro, how’ve you been so far? You feel ok?”
Shiro chuckled a bit, “I’m not sure if ‘ok’ is the right word, but yeah. I’m fine,” He turned his head and smiled at Lance, “You know, I may not have been here physically, but I was watching from the Black Lion, and I have Kuron’s memories stored in here,” he tapped his head jovially, “I may not be the same exact Shiro you knew before, but I still know you Lance. There’s no reason to be scared.”
Lance blushed, slightly ashamed at how easily Shiro had read him. “Sorry, I just...It’s a lot to get used to.”
Shiro smiled warmly at Lance, “That’s ok, take your time.”
Lance smiled back, he had to admit, this Shiro was...kinder. More dad like. He glanced over at Keith, who hadn’t said a word this entire time. Instead, Keith had just been staring down (the height difference was..odd now) at Lance the entire time.
“Uh..Keith? Are you ok dude?” Keith squinted at Lance, who squirmed uncomfortably at the hot stare. “Keith? Seriously man, you’re freaking me out here.”
“Do you dye your hair?”
“What?” Lance reached up and touched his hair, confused, “What are you talking about?”
“Your hair, it’s roots are white.” Keith began brushing through Lance's hair.
“Really?” Now, Shiro had joined in the staring game. Lance’s scalp tingled with the unwanted attention. “Huh,” Shiro said, “Keith is right, your roots really are white.” Shiro began running his hand through Lance's hair as well.
Lance tried brushing them way, to no avail, “Get off me guys, seriously, it’s no biggie. It’s just hair. That's what happens when you're healed by Altaen magic. Besides, it’s not like my hair color change was as drastic as Shiro’s, I don’t understand why you guys are so obsessed with it.” Lance huffed.
Keith and Shiro stopped brushing his hair and glanced at each other in worry. “Lance, when exactly did Allura heal you?”
Lance raised an eyebrow quizzically, “Back when I got hit by that energy beam on that Galra base,” he looked over at Shiro, “If you have all of Kurons and Blacks memories then you should at least remember it.”
Shiro frowned, “I remember you taking a hit, I don't remember hearing that you were injured.”
Lance froze, “You guys...you guys don't know?”
“Lance, how badly were you injured?” Keith asked, worriedly.
Lance felt uncomfortable, “Er, guys, don't worry about it. It's nothing, it all happened in the past.”
Keith became stern, “Lance, as your leader, I order you to tell me what happened.”
“You can't-"
“And I,” Shiro said, “As your other team leader, also order you. That's a double order soldier.”
Lance glared at then, “You can't do that to me, that's not fair!”
“Yeah it is,” Keith said, high-fiving Shiro, “Right, brother?”
“Right,” Shiro said, smiling.
Lance groaned, ever since Shiro had returned from the dead, Keith and his relationship as ‘Big-bro, Little-bro’, had strengthened; the two were quite the pair.
Lance rubbed the notch above his nose in annoyance, “Ok, you know what guys? Let's just put a pin in this, boop,” Lance mined putting a pin in, “And just finish the mission before we take too long and the others wonder where we are.”
Keith and Shiro glanced at each other, smiled, and promptly sat down where they were, leaving Lance to gawk at them.
Keith smirked, “Not moving till you tell us what happened.”
“Seriously?!” Lance rolled his eyes, “Fine, you two can sit there and waste time, I have a mission to complete.” Lance began to set off, fists clenched in anger.
“If you don't tell us, then I'm sure we can get Allura to tell us.”
Lance froze, growling as he turned back towards Keith and Shiro, both smiling wide, knowing they’d finally gotten his attention. Lance stomped back over and sat down hard, blowing dust into the air.
“You guys really won't let this one go, will you?”
Keith shook his head, “Nope. Now, story time.”
Lance bit his lip, “You know, you guys are making a much bigger deal out of this than you really should be.”
“Enough delaying, Lance, what happened?” Shiro said, suddenly far more serious, Keith adopting the same expression.
Lance took a deep breath, “Fine,” He grumbled, “It was when Haggar got into your-Kurons,” Lance said, nodding at Shiro, “Head. Kuron panicked, and...stopped supplying power to the shield system.” Lance took another heavy breath, was it getting harder to breath? It was getting harder to breath. “The-the system didn't like that. It released an energy beam, beaded for Allura, I couldn't let that happen, So I jumped in front and took the hit.”
Keith let out a small gasp, “Do you mean to say, you took an energy beam head on? In Red?” Red had the least amount of shielding of all the lions.
Lance nodded, and both Shiro and Keith shared one more worried glance.
Shiro looked over at Lance, eyes a mixture of pride and sadness, “That was very brave you Lance,” he said.
Keith growled like he was keeping himself from saying something.
“What happened after that?” Shiro urged Lance to continue.
Lance swallowed, “Well...um...It's a little hard to explain.” all the blood in his face seemed to drain away, “It's...uh...see…”
“Lance,” Keith said sharply, “What happened.” He stated it like a command, which it probably was.
Lance shifted uncomfortably, “Allura healed me and we won the fight.” he finished, lamely.
“Lance…”
Lance sighed, “Fine, I died. I died and it was super weird, but Allura came and helped me so it's alright now, don't worry.”
“You what?!” Keith shrieked. Shiro’s eyes widened in shock.
“You died and didn't think it was important enough to tell us?” Shiro scolded.
Lance raised his arms in defense, “I don't know, it didn't seem important at the time!”
Keith glared at him, “What on earth constitutes you dying as ‘Not important at the time’?”
“Well...we were busy with...with Lotor, and the Galra...and...and Kuron…” Lance shifted, “It just...took backseat for while and once the Castle was destroyed we were busy with earth so it just...left the backseat and flew out the window, besides, “ Lance glanced over at Shiro, “I thought you already knew, I figured Allura would have told you guys or you must have seen it happen.
“I just…” Lance seemed to wither in their stares, “It never came up till now,” he whispered.
“Lance,” Shiro said, leaning forward to comfort Lance, but Lance pushed him away, standing up and dusting sand off of him.
“Ahem,” Lance coughed, giving them a wary smile, “I think we have supplies to go pick up, what do you think?”
“I think we need to discuss this with the team,” Keith said, “We can't go keeping monumental secrets like this from each other, not to mention, we need to speak to Allura about using her power so often. We can't have people dying, but we also can't have her keep bringing people back from the dead.”
Lance rolled his eyes, trying to bring back some humor, “I already told you Keith, it doesn't matter. I wasn't even dead for that long, now let's go.” Lance forged on ahead, leaving Keith and Shiro behind.
“We are definitely talking to everyone about this,” Keith mumbled as he charged after Lance.
“I couldn't have said it better myself,” Shiro agreed.
The Paladins of Voltron were in for a serious talk when they got back.