Chapter Text
The hope that Lance was clinging to slowly fell as he watched Keith carve yet another tally on their tree.
Nine days.
It had been nine days since their last battle. Nine days since they had proper sustenance. Nine days since they were captured. Nine days since they escaped. Nine days since they crash landed on this stupid planet.
Lance could see that Keith was getting skinnier by the day. Lance knew that he was, too. It didn't help that Keith kept vomiting from what Lance assumed was a concussion.
"We need to go further out, today," Keith started. "There obviously isn't any food nearby. We can't keep eating leaves for every meal."
"Yeah. You're right. I'm just scared that we'll lose the pod if we go too far," Lance said. They had been living in a Galra escape pod for the past nine days. It wasn't an ideal living situation, but they were cold and desperate. It was certainly better than exhausting their energy to make a haphazard shelter out of branches and leaves.
"True," Keith groaned. "This situation is so fucked."
Lance put his hand on Keith's shoulder. "C'mon, man. I know this is hard, but… we can think of something," Lance paused for a moment to think. "Hey, what if we just marked our way? You could just carve into the trees with your knife, so we can find our way back. There has to be food out here somewhere."
There has to be food. Not just more fucking leaves, Lance thought.
"Sorry, sorry… I'll be less hostile," Keith sighed and looked at the ground. "That's a good idea, though. Let's head out now before it gets dark again."
The days on the planet were very short. Like five hours short, kind of short. It made it hard to do anything. They had to get their fire going when this planet's version of the sun came out. They used broken glass from the crash of the escape pod as a magnifying glass to make their fire. Luckily, it hadn't rained since they got there, so all the firewood was dry. That also meant that their water source was so scarce that it was decently muddy. It wasn't the most pleasant thing to drink, but if it kept them living for another day, then they would do what they had to.
Keith and Lance kept walking, marking tree after tree. It all looked the same. The same stupid jungle no matter where they turned.
"Alright, how about we stay walking an hour at the most, and if we don't find anything by then, we turn back," Lance said.
"Sounds good to me," Keith mumbled. "We can't be out here at night."
"Exactly. Hopefully, by then, we'll have found somethi-"
"Shut up!" Keith hissed and whipped his hand back to stop Lance from progressing.
"Dude, wha-"
"Shh," Keith crouched down slowly and crept toward a large bush.
A lot happened in the next second.
Keith sliced his blade through the air and into the bush. He pulled out some deranged and feral version of a bunny on the end of his knife. The creature was hissing and gnawing at Keith. Keith held out the knife as far away from himself as possible, but the damn thing ended up sliding off the blade, and latching its teeth onto Keith's forearm.
Keith screamed.
Lance panicked.
"Shoot it!" Keith yelled, as he desperately tried to yank the thing off his arm.
"Then stop moving! I don't wanna shoot your arm!" Lance yelled back.
Before Lance could accidentally shoot Keith's arm, Keith flung his arm so hard that the bunny was sent flying into a tree. It started limping away, but Lance shot it with his gun and watched it fall over before it could escape.
He quickly turned toward Keith and knelt down. "Oh, God. Keith, are you okay?" Lance asked, frantically grabbing Keith's arm and examining the bite. It was bleeding a little bit, but nothing that would be fatal. Hopefully the bunny didn't have a fatal, venomous bite, either.
Keith pulled his arm to his chest. "I'm fine. Just go get the stupid bunny before some other animal takes it," he said.
"Okay, but tell me if you start feeling bad," Lance said.
He turned around and grabbed the bunny by its hind legs. Just to be sure, he checked the pulse. Thankfully, its heart wasn't beating, so at least Lance didn't have to worry about anymore deranged-bunny-bites.
"Alright, it's dead. Let's go back now. We should try and cook it before the sun goes down," Lance said.
He reached his hand out for Keith, which Keith took very sloppily.
"Thanks," he mumbled, as Lance pulled him up.
Lance hummed in response, and the two started walking along the marked tree trail of theirs.
"We can try the opposite direction tomorrow," Lance started. "This bunny will be enough to last us for a couple days. Hopefully we can find a more, uh- peaceful food source," Lance looked toward Keith for affirmation, but found that Keith was holding back a grimace. "Keith? Buddy? You okay? You look like you're in pain," Lance frowned.
"I'm fine. That sounds like a good idea. Let's just get back to the pod," Keith replied, without glancing once at Lance.
"Can I see your arm?" Lance asked. Keith had his right arm across his chest, keeping the bite hidden.
"No. It's fine," Keith snapped back.
Lance huffed a sigh and tried to refrain from putting Keith in a chokehold- and not the good kind.
"Why not?" Lance quipped.
"Because," Keith said.
"Because?" Lance asked.
"Because," Keith growled.
"C'mon, Keith," Lance sighed. "Obviously it's hurting. Show me it, so I can try to help you."
"Fine," Keith huffed, and averted his eyes as he stuck out his arm for Lance.
"Holy shit, Keith! It's swollen to all hell!" The bite had to be two inches in diameter, and a centimeter high, at least. It was red, and Lance could almost see it throbbing with his own eyes. The only saving grace was that the bleeding was practically nonexistent at that point.
"I said it's fine," Keith retorted.
"Dude, clearly it's not," Lance said. "We have to get back and figure it out soon."
"Whatever," Keith mumbled.
They started back on the trail toward the escape pod in silence. There wasn't a lot to talk about, being stranded on an unknown planet.
About fifteen minutes later, Lance started noticing that Keith's steps were becoming less calculated. He was getting slower with each pace.
"Woah, woah, Keith. Why don't we slow down for a bit. You're really not looking good," Lance said.
"I already said that I'm fine," Keith retorted. Just to try and prove his point, he picked up his pace significantly.
The downfall to that, though, was that Keith fell down.
"Dammit, Keith," Lance said as he jogged up to Keith and kneeled beside him.
He was coughing into his arm, and Lance saw Keith's eyes roll back into his head as he slumped over and laid unconscious.
"Fuck," Lance hissed, and flipped Keith over. His face looked sickly pale, even lighter than his usual complexion. Thankfully, Lance felt a pulse when he put his fingers under Keith's ear.
At least he only fainted, Lance thought. He didn't want to think about the other alternatives that the bite could have caused.
Lance heaved Keith up into his arms bridal style, and put the deranged bunny on Keith's chest for the sake of his convenience.
After a little while of following the trail, Lance finally made it back to the escape pod, luckily not having run into any more deranged bunnies.
He set Keith down next to the dying fire, careful not to put him too close, so that he didn't wake up with a charred mullet.
Lance looked around in the escape pod for his helmet that acted as their bowl for water. He found it, and, thankfully, there was a little to spare from the previous day. He tried pouring some of the water on Keith to wake him up. Of course, it didn't work, so Lance figured that he might as well shake Keith to consciousness. Lance hovered close to Keith and grabbed his shoulders, violently jerking his body about, which eventually resulted in Keith slowly blinking his eyes and groggily looking around. That probably didn't help the multiple concussions that Keith must have accumulated by that point.
"Keith, get up. We've gotta make this fire and cook this bunny before the sun sets," Lance said, with little remorse.
Keith groaned and turned his head to the side.
"What the fuck," Keith growled. He attempted to push himself up off the ground, but fell flat on his face. "Ow…"
"Oh- uhh, that's not good," Lance said.
"No shit," Keith mumbled, still face planted in the dirt.
"Okay," Lance started. "Let's get you up."
Keith couldn't even find the strength to protest as Lance grabbed under his armpits and dragged his limp body to the base of their tally tree.
"Alright, I'll go get our fire going so we can eat the bunny. You just sit there and try to stay awake. Got it?" Lance said, to a very dazed looking Keith.
"Kay," Keith muttered after a moment of silence.
Not the most intelligible of responses, Lance thought.
***
"Keith, get up. We've gotta make this fire and cook this bunny before the sun sets," Keith heard Lance say; though, his hearing was definitely muffled.
He turned over, with a groan, and opened his eyes to be greeted with Lance, really close to his face, which Keith definitely wasn't complaining about. But then, Lance and the trees in the background doubled, and started swaying in his vision. He felt like vomiting his guts out. He couldn't move his arm. The un-bitten one and all his other limbs were slowed down in reaction time, and felt extremely weak.
Well, this fucking sucks, he thought.
"What the fuck," Keith said, in agony.
Still, he wanted to be productive and help Lance with their chores, so he pushed himself up off the ground. That didn't really work out; though, because his arms gave out on him and caused him to face plant right back into the dirty ground.
Go figure, he thought.
"Ow..."
"Oh- uhh, that's not good," Lance said.
"No shit," Keith replied. He didn't have the energy to move himself from the slightly embarrassing and humiliating position he was in.
"Okay, let's get you up," Lance said.
Suddenly, Keith found himself being manhandled and dragged by Lance, which really wasn't helping his nausea, but who's to say that the manhandling part of it really bothered Keith?
The dragging finally stopped, after what felt like hours to Keith.
"Alright, I'll go get our fire going so we can eat the bunny. You just sit there and try to stay awake. Got it?" Lance said.
"Kay," Keith mumbled, the only thing he found the energy to reply with.
Lance went off, which left a very bored, helpless, and delirious Keith alone at the tree.
Maybe I can suck the venom out of my arm? Yes, that sounds like a great idea, Keith thought.
Keith tried to lift up his bitten arm, only to remember that it was immobile. Then, he tried to lift his immobile arm with his mobile arm. His arm made it all the way to his bitten one, but for some reason his hand was refusing to cooperate, which- okay, rude, and he couldn't muster the strength to get a grip around his bitten arm, so he quickly gave up on that plan.
What if… instead of bringing my arm to my face, I bring my face to my arm? Yes, that will definitely work, Keith thought.
He started to bend over slowly toward his bitten arm that was haphazardly slung across his chest.
Yes… this is working!
He bent closer and closer to the bite.
He expected to grab the swollen mark with his teeth. He expected to be able to then suck all the venom out, and be completely cured of this nauseous hell.
He didn't expect (though, he really should have) to lose all his balance and go face first into the dirt, yet again. This time; though, he fell into an awkward snail position that made his neck crane and his back bend in all the wrong places.
Well. That wasn't very nice, he thought.
***
Lance was coming back with some firewood from the escape pod. They kept it in there, in case it were to ever rain one day. Then they would at least have dry firewood, if nothing else.
Lance climbed out of the pod with a large bundle of twigs and logs in his arms, and turned around.
"Oh, lord…" he muttered.
Why would he expect any less from Keith. The delirious boy was huddled in a snail position, with his face smushed in the dirt, once again.
"Help," Keith pathetically mumbled into the ground.
Lance dropped the wood and jogged toward Keith to aid with his slightly embarrassing and slightly comical predicament.
"Keith, how'd this happen?" Lance asked, as he pulled Keith back into a normal sitting position.
Lance grabbed Keith's chin and jerked it around to see all angles, examining for injuries.
"I tried to suck the venom out," Keith explained; though, it was a little muffled due to Lance smushing his face.
"Okay, from now on, why don't you just wait for me to try stuff like that? It would really help if you didn't keep falling and hitting your head on everything," Lance said, as he let go of Keith's cheeks.
"Okay," Keith replied.
"You didn't get a broken nose. I have no idea how, though," Lance said.
"Sorry," Keith grumbled in response to Lance.
"What? Why are you sorry?" Lance asked.
"'Cause you keep taking care of my clumsy ass," Keith said.
"Dude, it doesn't bother me. Well, I mean, it does bother me that you were bitten, and clearly need actual medical help, but… I mean that I don't mind taking care of you until we get off this cursed planet," Lance replied.
"Thanks, then. I'll try to stay upright- for your sake," Keith huffed a small laugh.
"Right," Lance replied with a roll of his eyes, and, even in the frightful situation they were in, the hint of a smile.