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When your ears have grown accustomed to the silence of space, to once more be a member of an enormous family could be quite the shock to the system.
By no means did that make him ungrateful. Lance was delighted to finally live in a real house, bustling with faces he’d only distantly dreamt of for years. This was what it felt to have a dream come true; to no longer wake from nightmares in a cold and empty cabin. To be filled to the brim with warmth and to feel like the universe was finally right.
But Lance couldn’t help but be caught unawares by the little things. Like, the couple of inches he had on Veronica and how he could barely balance both the kids in his arms and how Mom’s head now tucked perfectly, perfectly into his shoulder. It stung, because he had changed and so had they; the world had kept on turning and Lance hadn’t been around to see it.
Why hadn’t they grown together? It was never supposed to be like this!
Sometimes his whole body felt alive with anxiety, because, what if he had changed beyond recognition? What if the war had shaped and misshapen him, and he’d no longer fit in to the complex puzzle of the McClain family?
He knew, ultimately, it was stupid. He didn’t really believe his teammate’s stinging remarks, because the war had made him stronger and smarter and everything he’d ever dreamed of being. A paladin of the Red Lion, no less! But it hurt, hurt, hurt so bad because in that makeshift hut in the camps west of the Garrison was the cacophony that should’ve watched him grow up. But the universe had stolen that from him.
He leaned on the raw brick of an alley, stomach squirming with regret and frustration. Not at the way things had turned out; he was home, he was glad silly to be here; but at the way they had got here. He never asked for it to be this hard.
“You alright?” Lance startled; not because he hadn’t noticed Keith, rather because of the easy curiosity of the Black Paladin’s question. Keith was something he couldn’t ever regret.
Keith had started off with a temper shorter than Pidge, and a good reason for it, too. Earth had left him cruel and careless, full of a vicious concoction of bitterness and talent. How could someone with such potential keep on throwing it away, when Lance had to fight tooth-and-nail to even be seen?
Keith didn’t want to succeed. Keith wanted Shiro back, and that was all; but circumstance had dragged them all up into space and pushed them around a fair amount. Soon enough, Lance was able to look past their rivalry born of frustration. Turned out, with a little coaxing, Keith was softer, gentler. He cared with the same aggression he rebelled with. He was reckless and dorky and aggravating and brave, but above all, he was flawed.
It was ironic, that Keith turned out to be half alien, because he was so unflinchingly human. Lance couldn’t seem to shake that small revelation.
Hunk had told him earlier about Keith, supporting him as he missed his family. How it had been the most surprising thing the reckless and fickle team leader had ever done; instead of immediately spurring them both into motion, he had listened to Hunk and comforted him. Then, in true Keith fashion, taken headlong action. Even and especially if it was kind of dumb.
Those two years hadn’t changed Keith. They’d built him up. He’d really come into his own, his energy and spirit honed into the makings of a truly great leader, the truly great leader Lance had always known he would be. Right from the Garrison days.
God, Lance admired him beyond belief. He was that reminder of heroism that Lance had forever sought, because heroism spat and kicked and was never perfect.
Above all, him, standing relaxed with an invitation to confide; he was a reminder of how far they’d come. Keith was the most beautiful thing the roughhousing of the universe had ever created, just like the artist painstakingly carved marble statues.
If only Lance hadn’t been so misshapen in the process.
“Yeah, I just needed a bit of space. Ironically enough.” A smile played across Keith’s features, almost like it belonged there.
“Funny.”
Lance raised a careful eyebrow. “Right. Is…did Krolia get back yet?”
Keith gave him a full grin, and Lance exhaled with relief. “Yeah. She and Kolivan managed to rendezvous with tons of escaped Blades, and more are on the way with Matt’s fleet. Things aren’t as bad as we thought,” he said, and Lance had a feeling he was talking about more than just the Blades.
“I’m glad. Didn’t want you, uh, waking up to nobody, y’know. Back in the hospital.”
“It’s okay. I’m used to nobody. ‘s quiet in the desert.”
“Yeah, well, I made sure the Castle of Lions wasn’t ever quiet.” Lance hated the way his mouth tasted around those words.
“And still I never got used to that.” Keith’s mouth was quirked. This was the reaction he’d always wanted from his goads, a soft and fond tease. A tone that just edged familiarity.
Lance’s face fell.
“Am I your friend?” It burst out of his mouth before he even had a split-second to think. He cringed at his own voice, all breathy and needy and-
“What?”
Panic flared in Lance’s chest. “It’s just, everything you’ve said lately. When we were in space, and maybe we were all going a bit insane, but you snapped at Hunk and said that none of us were friends, like, we’d just been plucked at random and pushed together by chance. Sounded as if none of this…none of this ever meant anything to you. And, like, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad we were able to vote for each other to escape Bob, but it sounded…the way you…” Lance sighed in frustration. “Listen, if you want me gone after all this is over, just say the word. I’ll leave you alone. I just thought…I don’t know. I don’t know what I thought.”
Through the course of Lance’s ramble, he could see Keith in his peripheral vision, a thousand expressions flitting across his features. Finally, Lance braved the eye contact to see the older boy had settled on an expression of intense determination.
“Lance,” Keith said, severely. “I trust you with my life.”
“Oh,” he replied, lamely.
“Listen, I’m no good at talking, but I owe you this to try. So, I’m sorry if I’m confusing or too much or whatever, but I can’t let you think those things.”
“I think you’re better…” Lance said, regaining composure. “I think you’re better at talking than you think.”
“Yeah?” Keith’s face was all crumbled up, each word seeming to strain with effort. “I’m sorry I never was good enough. At talking, I mean, and also at leading, and everything else I’ve managed to screw up. I-“
“But Keith, you’ve never-“
Keith eased the tension in his face, just enough to let the impression of a smile through. “Hey, Lance. Shut up, it’s my turn to ramble.”
“Okay.” Lance was smiling, too.
“Okay. Yeah, well, I feel like my massively stunted communication skills have screwed up a lot of things. I should’ve listened to you, because whenever I pulled my head out my own ass long enough to listen to you, things always went right. Wish I’d realised sooner how smart you are, Lance. You my right hand man, you always know what to say.”
Lance couldn’t help himself; he beamed. And it must’ve been infectious, because Keith was fighting off a matching grin, one so bright it seemed to shine through his words.
“Do you want to know why I picked you, in the gameshow? Not because you were too annoying to be stuck with for eternity. There were two reasons, actually. And I never explained those reasons, that day, because I couldn’t quite put them into words. But now I’m going to try.”
Keith drew himself up and down in a steady breath, eyebrows pinched with concentration and eyes on the ground. “It’s because you’re unlike anyone else I’ve ever met. You’re the most incredible soldier and teammate and right hand man I could ask for, and, I know you don’t seem to believe it, but you’re the glue holding us all together. Watching you on the gameshow, manage to somehow bullshit your way through a guessing game in an alien language, that was the moment I realised you had to be the one to go free. Because, if anybody was going to procure a miracle, single-handedly prevent an Earth invasion, it would’ve been you.”
“Really?” It was all Lance could say, in his muddle of disbelief and happiness.
“Really,” said Keith. “So yeah. Of course I’m your friend.”
Lance was overwhelmed.
He could make very little sense of the inner cocktail his feelings made up, but he could identify a rising pressure within his body. It burnt a little, and began in his stomach, creeping up his throat, finally bubbling over in a laugh. It was a laugh of delight.
The boy in front of him; stilted, brave, whirlwind; made Lance burn in ways he never knew before. An object of fascination, sure, an untouchable war hero to most, maybe. But to him, in that moment, Keith was his equal. Keith was his friend.
Lance had learnt to fight on his feet, long ago now. And one of the first lessons he learnt was to always trust your instincts in combat, because quite often your muscles think before your mind.
So, in that moment, he did what felt right and enveloped Keith in a desperate hug.
Like clockwork, Keith stiffened, but in a beat he eased enough to let his own arms creep around Lance. The two of them were so different; they were strikingly different. Lance imagined telling himself, barely seventeen and at Blue’s dusty helm, that the world would end and he’d be hugging Keith Kogane.
Two bodies, pressed together. Their souls, once similar poles that pushed and pushed, once a thousand jagged angles and prickly remarks and hollow truths, were finally complete. Edges smoothed over, muscles filled out. Everything had changed, but they’d ended up in each other’s arms, as the best possible versions of themselves.
Keith let go. Reluctantly, Lance eased himself away, the lingering warmth like a phantom limb.
“Alright?” Lance didn’t answer.
He wasn’t alright. He was terrified; he didn’t know when he’d sleep peacefully again when their only remaining enemy wasn’t ever concrete, a witch with powers they couldn’t begin to predict. Each time he visited the Garrison and looked out into the sea of memorials Shiro had set up in the desert, he felt heavy with the weight of every life he failed to save. He was strung out and left over with a soldier’s instincts in an urban world that was changing, changing, changing.
“What was the second reason? Why you voted for me, I mean?” Lance asked, because in spite of all the fires deep within, he had a niggling feeling that he might be alright someday.
Keith smirked. “Secret.” Someday is better than never. Lance held on to the promise of someday like he held on to the light in Keith’s eyes.
The universe was cruel, without doubt. But maybe it was necessary. Keith was every standard he’d ever measured himself against, and now he was looking him in the eye having achieved so much. And yeah, Keith had gotten better, maybe. He’d risen up Voltron’s ranks, too.
But Lance didn’t feel like getting jealous, not when Keith was looking at him like he was the most important person he’d ever met.
It made Lance feel like he wasn’t as misshapen by circumstance as he had previously thought. Maybe a little unrecognisable, perhaps. Two unrecognisable faces, in the alley of a makeshift city filled with the bustle of civilisation unrecognisable from the face of war.
“A secret? I like secrets.” Keith laughed, his shoulders shaking, his eyes as enchanted as they were enchanting.
“You wanna talk about why you’re here? Why you’re not with your family?”
Being unrecognisable wasn’t a bad thing. It was just another chance, for the two of them.
“Sure.” He smiled. “And Keith? Thanks.”
“What for?”
Lance shrugged. “Everything.”
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