Chapter Text
Lance could barely open his eyes. His head was spinning, burning, barely allowing him to hold a straight thought. He couldn't move his limbs, couldn't even feel them as they were hanging at his sides. His skin felt as if a million needles coated with liquid fire were piercing it.
His eyes moved painfully under his half-closed eyelids. He tried to figure out what was happening, but he couldn't grasp anything above the pain. His ears were buzzing. He tried to breathe slowly and concentrate on thinking. Remembering. They had defeated the robeast. Earth was safe. Hopefully, the whole team had survived without too much damage. Research teams would soon arrive and get them out of there. He was sure of it. He had to do something, move at least a little to make the extraction easier.
He tried to sit up. His eyes snapped open as a sharp pain pierced his lower back. Mouth open on a silent scream, finger crushed on the armrest, he let himself fall heavily, tears in his eyes, sobs choked in the back of his throat.
His mind drifted. There was pain all over him, only pain. He tried to move again but his breaths were so jerky and faint he felt like suffocating.
Concentrate, he told himself, breathe, you can do it.
His throat burned, his chest barely raised. He felt like something was off, one or two ribs had probably broken under the shock of landing. Maybe even more. He couldn't determine the damage but something was telling him that if he moved too much, he would take the risk of piercing his lungs. He could slightly feel his legs and arms shaking but couldn't control them, just like they weren't really his. His head, resting on his right shoulder was as motionless as the rest.
Fear rose in his chest. He tried to stifle it but it grew and grew again until his chest was rising faster, drowning his body in pain.
He had lived many things since he embarked on this space war with the others, but never before had he felt prisoner of his own body. Not even when the castle ship had been attacked for the first time by Sendak. At least at the time he was unconscious for the most part. Now, he was fully aware that his body was an aching jail to his foggy mind. He closed his eyes and waited. It was the only thing left for him to do. Red wasn't answering his calls, neither was his body and he was so deep in his prickly cocoon of pain that even lifting his eyelids was coasting him too much energy.
He was drifting between wakefulness and sleep when he heard screaming outside.
"MacClain? Lance McClain? Are you ok?"
He opened his mouth to answer but only a trembling breath passed his lips.
A wave of anguish overwhelmed him. The marks. He couldn't let anybody see the marks. He straightened up, teeth clenched in agony.
"Paladin MacClain, can you hear me?"
A wave of light flashed around him. He narrowed his eyes. Someone rushed to his side and knelt in front of his seat.
"Hey, are you ok? Oh my God, you're bleeding!"
"Shh... m' head..."
It was barely a whisper. The man reached for his face. Lance gave in to panic and grabbed his wrist with in a trembling gesture. His breaths became whistles as a stinging feeling pierced inside.
"Wait... You have to... promise..."
His head was throbbing, a vibrant clanging echo spreading in every inch of his consciousness. He was going to faint, he could feel it. But before that, he had to make sure that nobody would see, that nobody would know.
He met a pair of worried brown eyes.
"I'll get you out of here, don't worry," the man said in a soothing voice. "He's awake", he shouted to someone behind the seat.
Lance winced.
"Shh, you must promise," he repeated, his fingers tightening around the man's wrist. His body was so sore, he wasn't even sure his grip was as secure as he thought. "Your name."
"Mathias. My name is Curtis Mathias. What do you want me to promise you?"
"My face... nobody can see... the marks." He closed his eyes, trying to ignore the twinge that was taking over his consciousness more and more. "The blue marks on my face... you must promise to always... cover them... no one can see them. Never. Understood?"
"Paladin McClain, I don't know if..."
"Promise me... I'm begging you..." The sound was choked, barely audible. His hand fell.
Curtis hesitated a moment but nodded firmly.
Lance let the pain take over and passed out, not sure if he had seen correctly.
When Lance regained consciousness, he was laying down, surrounded by the softest sheets he ever touched. Well, it was probably not actually true but it sure felt like it. A thousand questions popped up in his mind but he first took a second, eyes closed, to inhale deeply. Fresh air, cleaning products and lavender. His chest rose and fell with ease. There was still a dull ache lingering in his head and lower back with a light buzzing in his ears, but after a quick mental check, he noticed that everything else seemed alright. He opened is eyes. He was in a hospital chamber, alone and if the lighting was anything to go by, it seemed really late at night. He turned to the bedside table and smiled when he caught the sight of a flower pot full of purple and white tulips. He stretched a hand to catch a purple one and played with it between his fingers before rubbing it softly against the tip of his nose. Simple, sweet and pretty.
It felt like home. Those were his favorites. He remembered the first time it began to mean something to him. He was five. He had just gotten into a heated argument with Veronica and was so mad at her he had stated that he wouldn't put a foot in the house until she apologized to him. Stamping outside, arms crossed, cheeks full of angry air, he had walked toward the back of the house where he'd found a bench to sit on. It was cold but his will for rebellion was stronger than his shivering body. His mother had found him there. It just took her a look at his expression to understand the situation. She had taken his hand and brought him to the covert part of the garden where she kept her favorite flowers. He couldn't really remember how long they had stayed there, talking about what each plant meant, how to take care of them or why they hold such a dear place in his mother's heart, but when the night fell, they came home, his joyful self back with no memory of what had happened with his sister. Veronica was still mad, but it was only because she had looked desperately for him and had began to panic, not daring tell anyone that their little one had ran away because of her. He had then given her the flower with a sorry face. Bright purple, barely touched by rain water. A token of peace.
Every birthday she gave him white tulips along with his gift while he gave her a purple one. It was a weird habit they had caught without really noticing at first. But then he went in space. For several years. Plus the ones he didn't even remember passing. He hadn't thought about that for so long. He felt something heavy in his throat. He had avoided thinking about home for so long and when he came back, they were so caught up in the fight against Sendak he hadn't had the time to just appreciate being home.
He put the flower back in the pot and sunk back in the soft pillow under his head. He was home. It finally felt like it. Despite the hospital setting, the uncertainty, the light pain he still felt, despite everything he didn't know yet about what was happening outside this room... It felt like home. No war council to hold, no pressure, no tense or expecting looks, no mission to go in. Just a bed and some pretty flowers. He closed his eyes and just took a minute to contemplate the silence. Without realizing it, he was soon fast asleep.
He woke up again when something gently brushed his cheek. He opened his eyes and crossed two oceans of sweetness.
"Mama!"
Two arms encircled him with more love than it was humanly possible to receive at once.
"Mijo," she whispered, stroking his hair, "I'm so happy you're fine. You have no idea how scared you I was!"
Lance's throat was too tight to answer, he just squeezed her harder against him. Nobody gave better hugs than his mama, she was the only person in the world who knew how much he liked them. How much he needed them.
She finally let him go and left a kiss on his forehead. He opened his mouth, ready to ask her every question he thought about when the door opened to make room for the rest of his family. Sylvio and Nadia jumped on his bed. They had no regards for his wounds, too happy to see him awake. He didn't complain and took each under one arm as they pressed against his ribs, drowning him under a million words.
Everyone started to speak at the same time, covering each other's voice creating a noisy mess. Questions, comments, jokes, stories. Lance tried to concentrate on his father's words but then Nadia pulled his clothes for attention, causing Sylvio to do the same while trying to cover his own mother's words. Lance was tempted to tell them to talk in turn but was at the same time so happy to see them all around him that he just didn't dare say a thing. He frowned when he noticed someone missing : Veronica. Luis told him that she was stuck at work but would come later. He didn't mind, he knew his sister well enough to know that if she could have come, she would be there. But then again, she already visited him at least once : those flowers were definitely from her.
He was not usually a very patient person, but every time his nephew or niece made him a smile full of teeth and dimples he just surrendered. They all stayed until a doctor came and dragged everyone out. The woman made sure to replace his bandages and asked him some questions about how he felt, giving him a reassuring smile. She then left the room, advising him to take some rest. He welcomed this new loneliness with gratitude and quickly drifted again more tired that he thought he would be.
When he opened his eyes for the third time, a man was sitting by his bed. He blinked a moment, searching his memory for a name but nothing came. He didn't seem to be able to replace the guy's face. The man turned the page of the book he was reading when he realized that Lance was awake. He smiled softly.
"Glad to see you're awake. How are you feeling?"
It took a few more seconds for the Paladin to recognize the brown eyes full of worry that were staring at him. Curtis, if he remembered well. The guy who found him. He immediately put his hands to his face, panicked. The marks! How could he have forgotten?
"I covered them. With a little makeup, it did a pretty good job. But I must say that with the number of doctors that gravitated around you, it really wasn't an easy task."
"Thanks," Lance sighed. "How are the others?"
Curtis put his book on the bedside table and leaned over him, elbows on his knees, fingers crossed.
"They are fine. They are all awake. Miss Holt and Mister Kogane were the first ones to recover despite some serious wounds. You remained unconscious for two weeks, more than all the others. When I found you ... well, I didn't really know if you'd survive the shock. Your head was bleeding so much that doctors were afraid that you would never regain consciousness. As for the marks ... I must confess I am rather curious about them. From what I understand, these marks are Alteans, right?"
"Yeah," Lance said, resting his head against the pillow.
"But you are human."
"As far as I know." He didn't want to talk or event think about it. It was already bad enough that a total stranger knew they existed. "Look, I'd prefer not to talk about it, is it possible?"
"As you wish".
Lance could see that the idea of not having the answers bothered him, but he didn't insist. Instead, he told him about what was going on in the world, the state of repair and all the new measures that were being put in place. In his two weeks of unconsciousness and the week and a half he spend in bed since, he had missed quite a bit. Defense systems were being installed in the largest cities of the world in priority, built on the basis of technological mix between the Galra, Altean and human technologies. With the collaboration of the Blade of Marmora and the different alien races that came to help Earth, the progress were way faster and efficient than they would have been with human effort only.
Curtis paused when he saw Lance dozing.
"Maybe I should go, you need some rest. I'll come back later, okay?"
Lance nodded and a few seconds later he was sleeping again.
The doctors refused to let him go and kept him in observation for three more days. They only freed him when he began to complain so loudlyand flirt so hard with nurses that everyone that passed the door was on the verge of slapping him. It is with more relief than he could ever say that he returned to his private room with everything exactly where he had left them the last time he was there.