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Lance was fine, he was perfectly, amazingly, splendidly, fine. Yeah, he was stuck in a years-long losing battle against a colonizer army with a lifespan more than 5,000 times his own, with no way to get back home, where his entire family probably thought he was dead - probably had already held his funeral, already put his things in boxes, already said their final goodbyes and - yeah. Yeah. He was fine. He was kneeling on the floor with a training bot frozen in front of him at midnight - whatever that meant here - and he was fine.
“Um-” Lance looked up from his hands, clutching his bayard, which he had been staring at without seeing them for who knows how long. “Are you using the training bots or…?” asked Keith.
Keith, who had nothing to miss, and no one to miss him. Lance usually felt some sympathy for that, but right now, when he just wanted a moment of peace and this swordplay junkie would not get off his dick- he just felt angry, jealous, resentful.
“Yeah, I’m fucking using them.” he gritted out. In the opening of his mouth, he realized he had been crying, the salt reaching into his mouth to strangle him.
“Okay man.” Keith shifted his weight back and forth, throwing his bayard from his left to right hand. Effortless. Anxious. “Do you want to tag team?”
And here’s when Lance feels like an asshole, when regret seeps into him through the pores of his exposed skin. Keith is just a guy. Not the responsible party here, and he wasn’t even being that dickish. Lance turns his head to the side, so his face is completely out of Keith’s eyeline, and very discreetly wipes his face. “Yeah. Sure.” He gets up, eyeing the way Keith’s hand flexes like maybe he had wanted to offer it in help but decided at the last second not to. That catches in his brain, like a folded up rug keeping a door from closing. Whatever. He reactivates his bayard into its rifle form silently, letting the blue glow wash over him.
Keith nods, twice, and then: “Resume training sequence.”
The bot springs to life, and another appears 50 feet away. Lance ducks beneath the swing of the bot in front of him, letting Keith take care of that one, and aims at the far bot, lining up, putting his finger on the trigger, shooting. They continue like this, silently taking out bot after bot, Keith slashing, Lance shooting, pacing around each other in imperfect circles, avoiding eye contact, sweating through their shirts.
Soon their pattern is well enough established that it comes easily, and Lance is just about to call for a higher level of intensity, Keith calls to him from a few yards away. “Lance,” He starts.
“Yeah?” Lance shoots another bot, eyes almost closed, it’s so easy. There’s no danger here. Only skill or the lack thereof. He has skill. He knows it.
“What do you miss?” Keith continues, spinning and stabbing a bot he had let creep up on him. “From Earth?”
Lance is almost shocked by the question. Keith never talks about anything pre-Voltron. Not with Lance, at least. Probably with Shiro, in one of their quickly whispered conversations, which toe the line between angry and caring. But yeah, not Lance. It’s like Keith just wants to pretend he just appeared the second he rescued Shiro. Which is fine with Lance - most of the time.
Regardless, he sees it for the olive branch it is, because he knows what it looked like when Keith walked in. Knows it probably looked like some kind of attack or episode or breakdown. “I miss clear blue water-” Shoot. “Sand under my feet-” Dodge. “Hearing my native language spoken by people other than myself-” Duck. “My abuela's cooking-” He shakes his head, which is starting to pound again, with the pressure and heat of tears. “My mom.” Shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot, shoot.
“I think that one is dead,” Says Keith with a small smile, because he’s somehow misinterpreting the redness on Lance’s face for that of exertion.
“Yeah, I know. Increase intensity one level!” He shouts, and spins around, hearing a bot behind him, gunning it down instantly. He hears Keith huff, the shink of metal against metal. He tenses his face and blinks his eyes quickly, clears his throat. “What about you? What do you miss?”
“Well, I’ve never seen the ocean, but I’d like to.” Says Keith, dashing past a bot to perform a distracting maneuver – which is really unnecessary at this level, but again. Keith will be Keith.
Lance is a little shocked at his words though. “Really? Never?”
“Yeah,” Huffs Keith. “Just dirt and more dirt for me. You know how it is.”
He doesn’t. He’s glad he doesn't. He wouldn't trade the beaches of Cuba for anything. Maybe a hug from his sisters. Maybe a night in his bed. That’s it.
“Huh,” Lance says, instead of all that he’s thinking, that they’re so different and still in the same awful predicament, that Keith never really answered the question, that it’s getting later and later and he’s still here. Talking to someone who he only ever squabbles with, about what troubles him most.
“It’s good you miss those things,” says Keith, right when Lance is sure the conversation has ended. “It means you still love them.”
Lance shakes his head and shoots the nearest bot. It’s so corny, so obvious, but it still hits him right in the chest.
“I don’t love anything back there,” Keith admits, switching his sword to his non-dominant hand, ramming up against a bot with a soft look in his eyes and his mouth a hard line. Lance realizes he’s been looking at Keith out of the corner of his eye this whole conversation. “All that I love is here.”
“So, just Shiro and your knife then?” Smirks Lance, trying to lighten things up, happy to let the focus fall away from himself.
“Other things too.” At that moment, Keith glances back at Lance, their eyes locking for a fraction of a second. In that space, Keith loses his footing and gets knocked on his ass, the bot poised to skewer him from above. Lance disables it with a single bullet and then calls for the simulation to pause, jogging over to Keith. He reaches out his hand, offering what he knows Keith had wanted to give just an hour ago. Keith takes his hand and launches himself up, then wipes both his palms on his jeans. Lance stares at him, less than a foot away.
“Your stupid cropped jacket? Your mullet?” He asks, almost softly, almost tenderly.
“No.” Says Keith, rolling his eyes, folding his arms over his chest. “Y’know. You guys.”
Pink tinges Lance’s face, just a little bit, just enough so that he can feel it. “Including me?”
“Yeah. Including you.” Keith swoops down and grabs his bayard, then turns on his heel to leave, speed walking to the door. Lance follows quickly, after just a second of hesitation, and grabs Keith hand, turning him back to face him. Keith is expectant, maybe a little annoyed. Lance can’t really tell why. Keith is always the hardest out of all of them to read.
“I…” Starts Lance. Keith raises his eyebrows. “I love you too. Um. Dude.”
Keith looks down at their joined hands, staring for just a second, and then retracts his.
“Thanks.” And then he turns again, walks straight out the door, and is gone, his black hair trailing behind him, leaving Lance with an empty palm and a confused expression on his face.