Archive of Our Own

The mission plan was simple. That usually meant it wasn’t going to be. 

Lance would have flaunted his “I told you so”, but his world had crumbled because of it, so he wasn’t really in the mood. 

The planet Velaran was dusty, pockmarked with craters and dead and dying shrubbery, steep ravines cutting harshly through its surface so deep that standing at the edge of one made you feel queasy. It reminded Lance of Tatooine, if Tatooine was mostly orange rock instead of yellow sand and its skies were stuck as a vibrant sunset. So, maybe not Tatooine.

Society wise, Velaran was pretty desolate there, too, to Lance’s dismay. Most intelligent life lived underground in a network of caves, the most humanoid being an almost rodent-like species that communicated with hand gestures and grunts. It reminded Lance of Earth’s sign languages, but while the aliens had the ability to hear, they weren’t able to use their mouths to form words. At least, that’s what Lance got from the brief explanation Allura provided as Coran communicated with the Velarans behind her. Lance was proud of the lockdown he had over his facial expressions as the team stood there listening to Coran squawk. 

According to Coran’s translation, the Velarans had spotted a small Galra facility in the middle of a ravine, with hundreds of glass tanks filled with a strange glowing blue liquid spread out on the land around it. The Velarans didn’t know when the Galra had arrived there, as they had only recently come out of hibernation, and watching from a distance didn’t give them any answers as to what the blue liquid was or why it was on their planet. They wanted Voltron to remove the Galra outpost and prevent whatever the liquid was from affecting their home.

The plan had been to sneak in, plant explosives, sneak out, detonate. Whatever it was the Galra were planning, it obviously wasn’t good, and shooting first and asking questions later had Shiro’s vote. Pidge was vibrating in annoyance, and Lance agreed with her, though for very different reasons. 

He wasn’t sure how he felt about the way Shiro led, anymore. The thought made him ache with guilt, but Shiro’s eyes were harder, now. 

“I don’t think an explosion is a good idea,” Lance had said, stepping forward after Shiro announced the plan. “We need to know what that blue stuff is, and to make sure that destroying it won’t have negative consequences.”

Pidge nodded, eyes alight. “I think getting a sample would be good. It can give us an idea of what the Galra are planning.”

However, Shiro was already shaking his head, halfway turned away from them. “No. We need to get this done as quickly as possible. The facility is small, so it’s clearly not a priority. We destroy it and go.”

Pidge huffed, and Lance felt a flicker of annoyance. Shiro wasn’t even looking at them. 

“What if we set off a chain reaction and hurt the planet?” he asked. “We don’t know what it is or what it can do. No doubt they have all the details in there, we find those —“

“The answer is no, Lance,” Shiro snapped, his glance searing. 

Lance frowned, crossing his arms. “We have Pidge, it wouldn’t even take that long. We should at least reconsider how we approach, it would be so easy for them to spot —“

“Lance, that’s enough,” Shiro nearly roared. Lance froze, mouth still open. The others shifted uncomfortably, eyes darting back and forth between the two. Even Pidge was silent, shoulders hunched awkwardly. 

Lance’s jaw moved before it snapped shut with a click. Shiro dragged a hand down his face, once again not looking at him.

“The building is too small to stay in there for long undetected. We need to get in and out as quickly as possible and take care of the problem. And,” Shiro finally turned towards him fully, frustration and disappointment hanging from his face, “we are approaching exactly how I said we would. Do not try to argue with me again.” 

Shiro’s eyes were steel.

A suffocating lump lodged itself in Lance’s throat, and he desperately willed his face to not flush in embarrassment. Glancing towards his teammates, he realized not one of them was going to step up for him. Hunk and Allura were looking down at the floor, and while Pidge was frowning at Shiro, she was hunched in on herself and silent. Coran’s back was tense, but he was scanning files about Velara’s recent history and wasn’t turning around. 

The only one who had the same alarm in their eyes that matched the feeling in Lance’s chest was Lotor, of all people. He stood a little ways off from where the rest of them were clustered on the castle’s bridge, arms crossed and face neutral, but he was staring at Shiro with a hardness he hadn’t before. Lance didn’t know how to take that, but regardless, the lost prince was also staying silent. 

“Am I clear?” Shiro’s sharp voice had Lance flinching again, his gaze snapping back to the black paladin. 

The twisting pain in Lance’s chest had him wishing that Keith was here, suddenly. It wasn’t an unknown wish, but the intensity of it at that moment left him breathless. 

“Y— Yeah,” Lance stuttered, voice faint. “Sorry.” Instinct had his mouth form the word sir, but he caught it before it could fall out. 

Shiro stared at him for a moment longer before turning to the others and continuing to bark orders. Lance tried to covertly wipe at his eyes. 

And that was that. 

They approached the facility on foot, their feet kicking up orange dust and causing a grainy film to cover their armor. They had left their lions a few miles back to help avoid detection, and Lance was missing Red already. Valera wasn’t a very windy planet, so the paladins had no reprieve from the suffocating heat bearing down on them. It didn’t take long before a thick layer of sweat blanketed their skin. Each of them had an explosive in a container at their belt, which definitely didn’t help with the nerves.

Lance stayed quiet at the back of the group, eyes darting around the valley and down at the ground to make sure he didn’t trip over a dead bush and eat shit. He had spotted a few reptile looking creatures skittering across the rocks as they walked, and every plant they came across looked weirder than the last. 

After… whatever that was back at the castle, the general vibe from everyone was tilted. Both Shiro and Lance stayed quiet, while the others made occasional commentary about the planet, alien flora, and the Altean version of Monopoly they had paused for this mission. The grasps for topics to talk about sounded near desperate, Hunk and Allura bouncing forced positivity between them like a beach ball with Pidge chiming in with support from the sidelines.

No one turned to Lance for the entire walk. He told himself he wasn’t upset about it. It wasn’t new behavior, anyway. 

Finally, the group stopped at a rocky incline that semi-circled the Galra facility, giving them cover as they paused. Pidge poked her head out from behind some sharp dunes, quickly scanning the area with a frown. 

“I can’t see much from ground level,” she said. “There sure are a lot of blue tanks, though.”

“We shouldn’t rush in without a better visual,” Allura said, and Hunk nodded. 

Shiro’s brows were furrowed, but Lance spoke before he could say anything.

“I’ll climb up.” He pointed towards the top of the incline, which was scattered with plenty of bushes and gnarled trees. “I have my sniper, I’ll scan the ground and direct you guys in case there are guards.” 

Allura shot him a smile. “Good idea, Lance. Be quick, I don’t like how open we are right now.” 

Her agreement settled something in Lance’s bones, and breathing felt easier for the first time since the castle. He smiled back and turned to begin his trek, but he glanced over his shoulder before he started climbing.

“Do not advance until I say so,” he warned, and at Hunk’s and Pidge’s thumbs up, he turned back towards the top of the incline. 

After the hours of tense glances and awkward silences, being truly alone felt like a blessing. Lance let out a shuddering breath as he climbed, and he briefly opened his visor to wipe away the sweat on his upper lip. The air had been deemed safe for them to breathe, but all the dust they kicked up made it difficult anyway. 

“Stupid plan,” Lance grumbled, kicking a stray pebble out of his path. He couldn’t see his teammates anymore, which was both relieving and anxiety inducing. “Stupid, dumb plan. Let’s just blow up the mystery liquid, no idea what it does, surely nothing could go wrong! What the fuck.” 

A really weird looking lizard skittered up a boulder and stopped to stare at him with one of its three eyes. Lance gestured to it exasperatedly. 

“Like, I get you’re the leader again, but we’re a team, man!” he cried at it, throwing his arms out. “We put our brains together and come up with something we can agree on! Why doesn’t he listen anymore? He used to be cool like that.” 

The lizard didn’t respond. Its tongue shot out and smacked over its own eye before it ran out of sight, leaving a little dust trail in its wake.

Lance scoffed, continuing on his mini hike. “Yeah, sure, leave. Run away. I would love to not have to deal with this, either.” His expression darkened as he neared the top. “I would love it if Shiro actually listened to me. If the others said something, anything. If Keith —“

His voice cut out. 

If Keith came back. 

It had been around two months since Lance had last seen his face, and a lot longer since they had actually talked one on one. His reports were dropped on them sporadically, and the nature of the Blade never had him sticking around for very long. The only way they could contact him was through Kolivan, but they were only supposed to reach out if there was an emergency. They had no access to Keith outside of official news and meetings, and most of the time they didn’t know where he was or what he was doing. He could be a planet away or on the other side of the universe for all they knew.

Lance hated it. He hated it so much. He hated not being a room away from his friend. He hated the dining table having an empty chair collecting dust. He hated the silence from the training room. He hated not seeing a flash of red out of the corner of his eye, not seeing that crooked grin, those purplish gray eyes, that sloped nose and sharp canines and shaggy dark hair. He hated not being able to make Keith laugh, to have that gaze on him as he cracked dumb joke after dumb joke in an attempt to hear that sound again. 

Lance hated that Keith made him fall in love with him, then upped and left without a single look back. 

Keith would have listened to him. He did listen to him. He considered every single one of Lance’s suggestions, all of their suggestions, and formed plans around them. Sure, it was rocky at first, but Keith was a fast learner. He listened, and he grew, and even though Lance could see how uncomfortable he was as the black paladin, he kept his head high and kept moving. He didn’t know how to just stop.

Until he did. Because he left. He left them. He left Lance. 

Whatever. What-fucking-ever. He had blue goop to stress about, and Keith was probably out there doing cool shit like saving the world. 

Lance reached the top of the incline, and he dropped to his stomach and crawled forward to get a better view over the valley and the facility below him. Positioning himself amongst a patch of scraggly looking bushes, he summoned his bayard as a sniper and hunkered down, putting his eye to the scope. 

Movement amongst the glass tanks of the blue liquid had him tensing, and he quickly zoomed in on it, turning on his helmet’s comms. Before he could alert his team that he was in position, he froze.

They were already there. 

They were already fucking there.

Shiro was in the lead, crouched down behind a tank and peering around the corner, Pidge shadowing him with her bayard out. Hunk and Allura were huddled behind a neighboring tank a little farther back, their heads on swivels and Hunk looking on the verge of a panic. 

Surprise, frustration, and rage bubbled behind Lance’s ribs. A quick scan confirmed that a couple Galra soldiers were patrolling the rows of glass tanks, and that the team had put themselves in a very precarious position for no reason. 

Lance had told them to wait. 

“I’m in position,” he said tersely. “I see you guys didn’t feel like waiting, though.” 

“Now is not the time for attitude, Lance,” Shiro said back, voice calm and controlled. “How many Galra are patrolling?”

Oh, now you want my help? Lance thought. He let it take up space in his mouth for a moment, the bitterness souring his tongue, before he swallowed it. It really wasn’t the time. 

“Two, from what I’ve seen so far,” he said, zooming out and broadening his visuals. “The closest to you is to the southwest, a few tanks away from Hunk and Allura. The other is closer to the building, but it looks like he’s gonna be intercepting your path, soon.” 

He had barely finished speaking when Shiro started to advance. Pidge sent a glance towards Hunk and Allura, clearly not knowing what to do.

“Are we engaging?” she asked. “I thought we weren’t engaging.”

“Shiro, we’re not in a place to rush in,” Allura whispered into the comms. 

Both Galra were getting closer. Shiro was about to walk right into the farthest one, and the other was a few turns away from spotting Hunk and Allura. Their leader made no sign he heard them, his prosthetic arm starting to flicker purple. If any Galra in the building happened to glance out of one of the many windows, they would spot him instantly. 

“Shiro, if you’re changing the plan, you need to tell us,” Lance demanded. He fought for this stupid plan, what was he doing?

“You’re to follow my lead,” Shiro replied coldly. 

The closer Galra was a single turn away, now. There wasn’t time to argue. “Hunk, Allura, get ready.”

The following fight was a bit of a blur, their wayward leader’s actions making everyone a little frazzled. Allura used her whip to get a jump on the Galra as they rounded the tank, the end wrapping around their gun and ripping it from their hands. Hunk opened fire at their feet, trying to avoid hitting any of the tanks with his weapon’s wide spray. The Galra darted around the bullets and pulled out a knife, but had to duck behind another tank when a shot from Lance hit them in the thigh. 

Hearing the commotion, the farthest Galra broke into a run and nearly slammed into Shiro rounding the tank, with Pidge coming up behind him. They avoided a plasma fist to the face and began to shoot, the bullets skittering off the back of Shiro’s armor. The force had Shiro stumbling, but Pidge quickly jumped to his defense.

Lance’s scope flicked back and forth between the two battles, firing shots when he could and trying to avoid hitting the glass tanks. Eventually, Allura had managed to knock off the one Galra’s helmet, and Lance finished them off soon after. It still made him a little sick, sometimes, when he had to take a life up close rather than shooting down faceless ships in Red. He knew they were killing people either way, but killing in person was always going to be hard. 

Better the Galra than his friends, though. 

Lance brought his scope back to Shiro and Pidge, both eyes lidded in focus. Shiro and the Galra were engaged in a violent dance, Shiro taking swipes at the Galra’s arms and face while the Galra stayed on the defensive, armor banged up and struggling with a limp. Lance aimed a shot at their hands still holding their gun, and they dropped it before lurching back, head swinging in Lance’s direction. Pidge took advantage of their momentary lapse, springing up from where she had been lurking and jumped on the Galra’s back, her bayard at their neck. 

Before Shiro or Lance could react, the Galra stumbled backwards and slammed Pidge against one of the glass tanks, throwing their whole weight against her smaller body. The back of her head cracked against the tank and her gasp of pain could be heard through the comms. Her grip slipped and she fell to the ground, head rolling against the rocks as the Galra staggered upright. 

“Pidge!”

Hunk and Allura were sprinting towards them, Lance was taking aim at the Galra’s head, but Shiro got there first. His glowing purple arm shot forwards, and the Galra didn’t stand a chance. They fell, their body hitting the ground and sending up a cloud of dust. Blue liquid from the cracked tank seeped out onto the sand, steam rising from where it made contact with the air. Allura helped Pidge up quickly, holding her tightly to her side as they shuffled away from the substance. Pidge’s head tipped sideways, but she stumbled alongside Allura and managed to stay upright, hand still loosely holding her bayard as it hung by her hip. 

Lance’s whole body was tense. “Is everyone okay? Pidge?”

“Splendid,” Pidge grumbled. “Like the tambourine monkey is going to town on my head.”

Hunk’s bayard remained at the ready, his body braced for another attack as he slowly made his way to Allura and Pidge. “We should head back.” 

“No.” 

Lance’s jaw clenched. Shiro had moved away from the Galra and was instead studying the blue goo as it dripped out of the crack in the tank. Flashes of Galra purple flickered along his arm, and he crouched down next to the slowly forming puddle. Lance couldn’t tell exactly what he was doing, but he honestly had enough.

“I’m with Hunk on this, it’s not safe right now. Pidge’s hurt, we need to go.” He zoomed out from focusing on his team and took in the Galra facility, unnerved by how dark and silent it remained. The fight had been quick, but it should not have gone unnoticed. They probably only had a couple of minutes at most before even more of today went to shit. 

“This mission isn’t complete,” Shiro said. “We have to follow through.”

Allura made an uncomfortable noise. “Shiro, I understand not wanting to walk away, but we are at a disadvantage right now. We will regroup when Pidge is healed.”

“We’re here!” Shiro snapped. Lance couldn’t really see them from his zoomed out perspective, but he could almost feel the others’ flinch. 

“Shiro…” Hunk said, voice tentative. “Respectfully, you’re kinda starting to freak me out.” 

“Ditto,” Pidge mumbled. Lance’s comms barely picked it up. 

“Shiro, we are leaving,” Allura ordered. “Pidge cannot fight. You will be putting her in danger.”

At that, there was a moment of silence. Lance only heard his breathing and the rapid thumping of his heart. 

“I…” Shiro hesitated, and the cold heat that had been in his voice all day was gone. “That’s… Pidge, can you walk?”

Pidge grunted. “Not, uh… no. Kind of. Not really.” 

Another tense moment of silence. “… Okay. Okay, we’re leaving.“

When Lance was younger, he noticed a pattern that horror movies tended to follow. Maybe it wasn’t that many, since, honestly, he didn’t really have the stomach for horror movies, but the ones he did watch tended to fall into this pattern. The stories liked to lure the audience into a false sense of security: the protagonists were safe, a scary situation was over, the villain was dead, hurrah. Everyone felt like they could take their first relaxed breath all movie. And then that’s when it all went to shit again, but usually worse. So, so much worse.

Within the shadows of the Galra facility, a glint of light flashed. 

Lance was zooming in before he fully processed what he saw, finger hovering over the trigger and mouth opening in a warning. 

“Team, there’s —“

A sniper. 

The barrel of their gun extended into the harsh sunlight.

Aimed straight at Lance.

He heard the shot a millisecond before he felt it. 

It burned. 

Liquid fire enveloped the right side of his face, dragging through his skin and burrowing into his skull. Something shattered with the blast, and the force yanked him backwards, his fingers scrambling in the dirt. Everything was white. Everything burned. Everything hurt. His throat hurt, maybe he was screaming. His hearing was whiting out alongside his vision. His face felt so hot but was also wet and it hurt so much. 

He was definitely screaming. He had to be. Nobody can feel this in silence. 

The ground was shaking. Or he was. He couldn’t tell where the pain ended and his body began. He knew he was on the ground, but that was as far as his knowledge went. He was on fire. 

Distantly, he was aware of an earth-shattering roar. He felt it above him and a million miles away at the same time. His body was not his own. The pain was happening to someone else. That was their body writhing against the rocks, not his. It couldn’t be his. He didn’t want it to be his. 

Red-tinted thoughts crowded his head, too harsh and not enough words. They were loud, so loud, and he sobbed as the presence panicked around him. He knew it was Red, knew she was scared, but in the haze of pain he just wanted her to go away. It was too much, too much, everything was too much.

Someone was shouting, their voice as panicked as Red. Hands grabbed Lance’s own, pulling them away from his face, and other voices started shouting then, too. His helmet was removed, and at that point he must have finally passed out.

The pain didn’t let him have his reprieve for long, though. It slammed into him tenfold, and he gasped back into consciousness. Sharp tendrils of fire rocketed into his skull, and when he instinctively tried to jerk away, something held him down.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” someone was crying, their voice wet. 

Lance tried to open his eyes, but more pain flared from his right side and he jerked again, his feet kicking against something. Voices were multiplying, overlapping each other and he struggled to understand what they were saying.

“Allura, his legs-“

“-in too deep-“

“The pod’s ready, but we can’t-

“Just get them out!” 

Lance was sobbing. There was a hand in his hair and on the left side of his face, holding his head down and rubbing circles against his cheek in what might have been an attempt to sooth him. Someone was talking to him, but he couldn’t make them out over the cacophony of everything else. The world was getting hazy again. He embraced it.

Lance let go.

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

Lance woke up.

It was cold. Really cold. He blinked, and the glass doors of the cryopod slid open with a soft hiss. He couldn’t feel his legs, and he stumbled forward onto even colder tile before warm arms caught him. 

“Hey, buddy. How are you feeling?” Hunk asked. Oh, Hunk. Lance loved Hunk. Hunk was comfortable. Hunk was safe. 

“Mh. Tired,” Lance grumbled, burrowing his face into Hunk’s shoulder. 

Hunk chuckled, but something about it was off. “We’ll get some food in you and then you can take a nap, okay? How does that sound?”

Lance frowned, awareness starting to trickle back in. He reluctantly pulled away from Hunk’s hold and found the rest of the team surrounding them. “Uh.”

Before he could say anything else, Pidge punched his shoulder almost a little too hard, then immediately followed it with a tight hug, latching herself around his middle. “Jesus, Lance, you scared me. Don’t do that again.” 

Allura was smiling, her hands clasped in front of her. “I second that sentiment. I’m so glad you’re okay, Lance.”

Alarm was building in Lance’s chest, at Hunk’s forced cheerfulness, Pidge’s suffocating hold, Allura’s relief. Coran was wiping at his eyes behind her, Lotor greeted him with a nod, and Shiro seemed happy but wasn’t looking him in the eye. It was Hunk’s tenseness that was throwing him off the most, and that’s when he realized something.

His perspective was skewed. 

After trips in the cryopod, Lance’s body usually tingled with numbness from the cold for a few minutes before feeling eventually came back. As he stood with his team, most of his weight was held up by Hunk as his senses came back online. He flexed his fingers, stretched his toes, and felt horror build up in his throat.

Something was missing. 

Pidge had pulled away, and the others went quiet, watching him with sadness in their expressions. With pity. His rising panic must have been evident.

“Lance,” Hunk said gently. “We got you.”

Lance blinked, then blinked again. The skin where his right eye should be was tight, and it pulled uncomfortably. He closed his left eye, trying to keep the right open, but his vision went dark. It shot open again, and his breathing picked up. He lifted his hand to his face.

“Careful, my boy,” Coran said, expression somber. 

Lance was still in the flight suit, but the gloves were off, and he gently prodded at his face with his fingers. The skin at his temple felt mottled but smooth, nearly plastic-like, and he followed it back into his hairline before it abruptly stopped. He returned to where he started and, with a shaking hand, felt towards the front of his face. It stretched a small way down his cheek and partway across the bridge of his nose, and he was no longer aware of the others around him when he reached his eye.

Or, what was left of it. 

There was no eye. His gaze flicked from side to side, and there was no movement underneath the lid. Or whatever it was now. Whatever he was touching just felt like melted plastic, warped ridges and rough scarring where his eye should be. It was gone.

His right eye was gone. 

What did he look like? Lance was almost ashamed that that was his first thought. Did he look scary? Ugly? Was his team forcing themselves to look at him, wanting to turn away but not wanting to hurt his feelings? Would he be able to see himself in a mirror again without flinching? 

His second thought had his throat closing up. 

Can I still shoot? 

The world was tilted, wrong. Just the thought of walking made him feel dizzy. Half of his vision was gone, how would he be able to perform well in a fight? To aim? His only worth was his stupid title of sharpshooter, how can he be their sharpshooter with only one eye? What was he without his right eye? His dominant eye? Would he stay on the team? How could he stay on the team if his only contribution was his aim and now he might not even have that?

His eye was gone. 

His eye was gone.

Someone pushed his head between his knees, and he abruptly realized he was sitting on the med bay steps. He was hyperventilating, what remained of his eyesight blurring with tears, and he gasped violently in a desperate attempt for air. There was a heavy hand rubbing circles into his back and the sound of hushed voices above his head. 

Someone unfurled his fingers, and something wet and freezing was dropped into his palm. Lance startled, his breath hiccuping as he lifted his head. Pidge sat in front of him, eyes wide and worried, cupping his hand with hers to keep the ice cube from slipping to the floor. 

“Hold it?” she pleaded. 

Lance’s throat spasmed. Hold the ice cube. Okay. He can do that. He can at least do that. 

Awareness trickled back in again, slowly. Hunk sat next to him on his left, still gently rubbing his back. There was a warmth on his right, and he turned to find Allura sitting next to him as well, holding a glass of water. She held it up to him, and he took it, but still felt her supporting it as he took a small sip. 

It was quiet, Lance’s shaky breathing being the only sound piercing the silence. He held the ice cube. He drank the water. He felt the stares of everyone in the room.

When the ice cube was mostly a puddle dripping onto the tile between his feet, Lance croaked, “What happened?”

Allura explained. 

Lance was lucky, apparently. The positioning of his body had him tilted away from the Galra sniper slightly, helping the shot avoid damaging his skull or brain. The unlucky part was everything else. The plasma laser had partly cauterized the wound, completely destroying his eye and searing his eyelid to near nonexistence. The shot had shattered his visor and a chunk of his helmet, embedding shards of glass and armor into the already damaged flesh and eye socket. His comms had cut out, but his scream had echoed over the ravine. Galra had started spilling out of the facility at that point, but the team was already booking it to Lance’s location. That’s when the Red Lion showed up.

“She was so pissed,” Pidge laughed, but it died quickly. Her heart wasn’t in it. 

“She went full scorched earth,” Hunk said. “She completely wiped out the Galra coming after us. When we got to you, she almost didn’t let us near you. She was standing over you, like… like a mama bear with its cub.” 

“Bear?” both Allura and Coran echoed. 

Pidge started to describe the Earth animal, but Lance tuned her out.  

Red? he thought, his mind reaching for hers. He could feel her, faintly, circling near the back of his head, as if she was trying to go unnoticed. Which, considering it was Red, was very strange. 

Talking to the lions was not something any of them could really explain. They didn’t use words, and images weren't really correct, either. They communicated with feelings and intentions, sometimes even memories. Blue’s presence was soothing, showing her care for him by bringing up memories of Varadero beach, running through the sand and drifting amongst the waves. She would prod him in certain directions, sending him the feeling of warm blankets when he needed to sleep, the smell of good food when he forgot to eat, and the sound of his family’s laughter when she wanted to cheer him up. Red was a little more direct with her care. She was sharper, blunter, straight to the point. She was a metaphorical slap to the back of his head when she thought he was being stupid. She shoved comfort at him like it was a weapon, almost like she was daring him to not accept it. Despite her roughness, he would always feel her eyes closely on him, making sure her efforts were well received. 

So, Red being somewhat in hiding was odd. Very odd. 

A sharp spike of anger pierced Lance’s heart, causing him to wince. It was ripped away just as quickly, leaving behind a buzzing franticness. 

Red, what’s wrong? he asked. 

Still, she hovered just at the edges of his consciousness, flicking so quickly between emotions he couldn’t grasp on to any of them. 

Red, please? 

A memory surfaced, and he immediately recognized the planet Valera. But the planet wasn’t the focus of this memory, not at all. Instead, Lance was given the disorienting view of seeing himself writhing in the sand, clutching at his face and surrounded by the shattered remains of his helmet. An overwhelming panic threaded through the memory, drowning out anything else that could be happening outside of this small body on the ground, twisted in agony. And Lance realized just how small he looked in this memory, because it wasn’t his own. It was Red’s. It was jittery around the edges, cracking and unstable. The only constant was himself, screaming into the dirt, and the blinding fear that was so strong it was suffocating. 

It lasted only a second, and when Red pulled the memory away, Lance took a moment to compose himself. 

I’m sorry for scaring you. 

He got the mental equivalent to a scoff. 

The attitude on this cat, seriously. 

I really am sorry. He frowned at the lack of response. Thank you for protecting me. 

Warmth filled his body then, and he shakily exhaled. Love you, too. 

“As lovely as this has been, I think I’m gonna go take a nap,” Lance said, interrupting whatever lion versus bear argument the others had somehow fallen into. They all looked at him, surprised, like they had forgotten he was there. Which, rude. Not for the first time, but still, rude. 

“You sure, bud?” Hunk asked, a hesitant smile on his face. “It’s almost time for dinner, I can make your favorites.”

The thought of food had Lance’s stomach rolling, and he looked away. Putting the glass of water down and slapping his thighs, he stood up, ignoring their clattering to help him. “Nah, thanks though. I really just gotta rest my eyes for a bit. Well,” he forced a laugh, “eye.” 

“Oh, here we go,” Pidge grumbled. 

Lance brought a hand to his chest in mock offense, even though his skin was itching to just leave already. “You expect me to not make jokes about my dire circumstances? It’s what I’m… eye-conic for.” 

On cue, he was met with a chorus of groans. 

He gave them his most dazzling grin. “Sorry, was that one too eye-palling?”

“Oh my god, leave!” Pidge shouted, covering her ears. 

“Too cornea?”

“Out!” 

Lance was more than happy to leave them all like that, smiles on their faces and shaking their heads at him like the past two days had never happened, like he was still whole. However, the facade slipped a little too much when he tried to walk and found himself stumbling, nearly shoulder-checking the pod and jerking himself in the opposite direction to avoid the collision. The world took a few moments to right itself again, but even then it still felt slanted, his surroundings warped. 

“Lance?” he heard Hunk from behind him. 

“Fine!” he said a little too loudly. “All good!” He started to walk again, paying close attention to where his feet were landing. He kept his back straight and head high until he exited the med bay, then rested a hand against the wall once he was out of sight and used its support to help him make his way to his room. He ignored the hushed whispers that faded the farther he went. 

When Lance got to his room, he didn’t move for a moment. He stood just inside the threshold, letting the door whoosh closed behind him. Everything was how he had left it the day of the mission to Valera: a bed hastily made, his journal shoved into the corner of his cluttered desk, dirty clothes spilling off his desk chair, and a pill bottle on his bedside table he had knocked over onto the floor and hadn’t felt like picking up. It was all the exact same, and he felt alien standing amongst his usual clutter. His usual life. 

He took a step farther in. The last time he had slept in that bed he had two eyes. The last time he had sat in that chair he had two eyes. The last time he had worn those clothes he had two eyes. This room did not know him with only one, with a scar that took up half of his face. 

Lance didn’t want to look in the mirror yet, so he turned away from the bathroom door and fell backward onto his bed, arms spread out. The ceiling was covered in photos he had pinned up, mostly featuring his friends and different kinds of alien life: Hunk posing with his first successful attempt at space cookies, a beaming smile on his face; a candid of Pidge twisted up in front of her computer in the most bizarre pretzel pose Lance had ever seen, caught off guard at the camera; Shiro napping on the couch, arms crossed and head tilted back with a line of drool down his chin and tuft of white hair sporting a little pink bow; Allura doing peace signs at the camera with a mouse on her shoulder mimicking the pose (Lance had taught them that, of course); Coran looking somewhat crazed as he approached the camera with cleaning supplies, the edges blurry in an attempted escape; Keith flipping off the camera with furrowed eyebrows, but his lips pulled into a grin, sharp canines peeking out.

Not many featured Lance, but enough did that it made him want to look away. Pictures of sleepovers with him, Hunk, and Pidge. A spa day photo he took with Allura. A selfie of him making fun of Coran’s new shirt when his back was turned, Shiro’s attempt at a stern expression behind him. There were plenty of group photos, but the only photo of just him and Keith was a surprise selfie, Lance having practically jumped on Keith’s back to get it. It captured Lance’s utter glee and Keith’s shocked confusion. 

Would he ever be able to face a camera again? He didn’t even know what he looked like yet, but he knew that the face staring back at him didn’t exist anymore. 

Lance’s throat ached, but he refused to cry again. 

“Fuck’s sake, McClain,” he hissed, pressing the heels of his hands against his face. He quickly slapped them back down onto the bed, feeling a roll of nausea at the gnarled texture on his right side. “Fuck.” 

He felt Red shift around him again, a soothing, almost purr like feeling traveling through their connection. He took a deep breath, then sat up and grabbed his pillow, shoved it over his mouth, and screamed. 

Fuck this fuck that fuck everything. Fuck Valera, fuck the Galra, fuck space, fuck Shiro’s stupid attitude lately, fuck Zarkon, fuck this war, fuck his friends suddenly remembering to care about him, fuck Keith for being gone, fuck him, fuck his stupid ass eye, fuck. 

Lance screamed, he cursed, he switched languages and screamed and cursed some more. He didn’t care if Red heard him, he didn’t care if the others heard him, he didn’t care if his mother back on Earth heard him. He screamed until he went hoarse, his throat catching and dry. Until he realized he had started to cry again, because of course. Of course he was crying again. 

Goofball, loudmouth, annoying flirt crybaby, that was him. That was all he was. 

His self proclaimed title of “sharpshooter” was a joke. He was the only one that actually used it. Now, he doubted he would ever be able to use it again. 

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

“¡Mierda!”

Another shot went wide.

“Damn it!”

Straight past the target and into the wall. 

Lance yelled, throwing his bayard at the still training droid, clipping its right shoulder. The wall behind it was peppered with bullet holes, some still smoking from the plasma laser. Only a few shots had landed, but none would’ve caused serious damage if it had been in a real fight. Not to mention if this had been a real fight, the enemy would most definitely be moving, not patiently waiting for Lance to get his shit together. 

Life on the castleship had been intensely normal since Lance stumbled out of the healing pod. Hunk and Pidge practically hung off his arms, dragging him to do who-knows-what in who-knows-where throughout the castle. Coran jumped at any chance he could to spout facts about random aliens and planets, including more details than necessary about the number of eyes the species did or did not have. Allura kept arranging bonding exercises for all of them to do, listening excitedly when Lance explained Earth classics like Truth or Dare or Uno. 

It was so incredibly normal, forcefully so, and it hurt when Lance realized that this had not been normal since before Keith had left. Since before Shiro came back. Since the team actually remembered to care about him. Hell, Shiro was the only one actually treating him normally, which was ignoring him unless it was to bark orders at him. Lotor mostly kept to himself or to Allura, so Lance didn’t know what his view on all this was. He didn’t really care, anyway. 

His friends remembered he existed outside of formation, but it wasn’t how he wanted them to. He wondered how long it was going to last, if he should enjoy it before the pity ran out and he went back to being overlooked. He wanted to enjoy it, but it made him so angry. 

He was tired of being so, so angry. 

The droid remained motionless as Lance stalked towards it, hands in fists. He’s had a few fits already, and he was sweating under his sweatpants and tank top. The droid eyelessly watched him scoop his bayard back up, and didn’t protest when he slammed the weapon into its face. It crumpled to the ground, but Lance had already turned away.

“End training sequence,” he growled, and exited the training room. 

The next week consisted of the same. Lance woke up, trained, got reminded by Red to eat, trained some more until he was too exhausted to stand, and passed out within the early hours of the morning. He showed his face around the others less and less, and honestly, he figured that was probably a win for them. He didn’t have a very pleasant face anymore, anyway. He was doing them a favor. 

Lance had eventually looked in a mirror a few days after the accident. It had been more out of habit than anything. He had just gotten out of the shower and was applying some lotion to help with the scar drying out when he looked up, making eye contact with himself in the mirror above the sink. It somehow looked worse than it felt, stretching from his temple to his cheek and the bridge of his nose. The end of his eyebrow was missing, the skin too damaged. His eyelid looked mottled and melted, an irritated reddish shade that would hopefully fade as it further healed. The lids wouldn’t even separate, fused together and a bundle of damaged and dead nerves. Lance hadn’t initially recognized it as him, even though logically he knew it was. Knew that it was his reflection, that it was him on the other side of the glass. It felt like someone else was staring back at him, another victim of this war, suffering from an injury that was distant from him, someone to feel bad for and nothing else.

Lance covered the mirror with a towel. He should ask Allura about an eyepatch. 

Nobody brought it up. Nobody mentioned it. Hunk had made some vague hints about talking to Lance about his feelings, but Lance played dumb and Hunk quickly changed the subject. He could feel the resentment for everyone brewing, and he hated it. He hated it so much, and he felt so guilty. For months he had wanted his friends to acknowledge him past surface level, for months he had wanted them to interact with him in more ways than just teasing him when they thought he was being stupid. And now that he had it, he could barely look at them. It felt fake. It felt wrong. Why did he have to lose a part of himself for them to remember him? Why were they trying to see him now when it felt like only part of him was there?

During the nights when he couldn’t sleep, when he stared at those photographs for hours, something dark would bubble in his stomach, sticking to his ribs like tar. It felt like anger. It tasted like hate. 

This was their fault. 

Valera visited him in his dreams, the red dust in his mouth and that blue goo in his veins. His team in front of him, leaving him, Voltron with only four. Shiro pushing them forwards, forwards, his voice ricocheting around Lance’s head. Do not try to argue with me again. Glass shattering, his hands reaching, but they were too far away. They’ve been too far away for a long time. 

By the end of the second week, Lance was in the training room more than he was outside of it. He had been making progress, gradually, but he still wasn’t even in the same ballpark of where he had been before. He had the droids attacking him now, and he got his ass handed to him more times than he could count. He ended each day covered in bruises, sweat dripping off his skin, his remaining eye sunken and tired. The more tired he was, the less he dreamed. The less the hatred choked him until he cried from the unfairness of it all. 

Fucking hell, Shiro lost an arm. Get over yourself. 

The voice sounded like Keith’s. Lance couldn’t bring himself to wonder if he would actually say that. He did his best to pretend it had sounded like his own. 

There hadn’t been word from the Blade of Marmora in almost three months, and as far as Lance knew, his little whoopsie hadn’t made any news. It wasn’t really important to anyone but himself, he guessed. He could still pilot. Red still wanted him, somehow. He had made his aim okay enough that he could struggle though fights with the rest of his team without necessarily being a handicap. He hadn’t gotten chewed out yet for slowing them down, but he supposed it was only a matter of time. The pity was bound to run out eventually.

He couldn’t just be enough. He couldn’t call himself a paladin of Voltron while just being enough. He had to be better, he had to be good. He had to be great.

Who was he kidding? Lance was just a boy from Cuba. He wasn’t enough even when he was whole. The least he could do was not be a flat tire. 

Which was getting significantly harder the higher he put the training droids’ difficulty at. If he wanted to hold his own during a real fight, he had to make the droids almost impossible, which holy shit. They sure were impossible. 

Lance slammed shoulder first into the ground, his feet knocked out from under him. A staff was in his face a second later, and the droid went still as a robotic voice announced from above, “Training sequence failed.” 

Shoving the staff away, Lance sat up with a grunt, panting heavily. He didn’t know what time it was, but he knew it was late. Hunk had tried to get him to come to dinner around an hour ago, but gave up when Lance insisted on forgetting English. Hunk was the hardest to shake off, considering they had known each other the longest and he knew how Lance got when he spiraled. But this was unknown territory. This wasn’t just a bad day, a bad week. This was permanent. Lance wanted him to stop trying. He had no problem ignoring Lance before. 

Getting to his feet, Lance put some distance between himself and the droid, readying his gun. He probably smelled disgusting, his tank top dark with sweat, but it wasn’t like the robot could complain. They could be nice company, actually, when they weren’t beating Lance to a pulp. 

“Start training sequence,” he said. 

Immediately, the droid shot towards him, staff swirling in its hand. Lance was able to fire off a few shots before ducking and rolling between the droid’s legs as it swung at his head. He popped back up and fired a few more at its back, then took advantage of its momentary stumble to send a kick at its knee. It rolled as it hit the floor and launched itself at him again, and he had to clumsily dive to the side to avoid getting whacked. 

Their dance continued across the training room floor, each successful hit from the droid’s staff bruising both Lance’s skin and his pride. He missed more shots than he landed, barely nicking the droid’s metal skeleton and having to scramble into a hasty retreat when what he managed to land didn’t slow it down. His shots always veered too far left, but knowing this and trying to correct years of muscle memory were two very different things. The droid never gave him a moment to recalibrate, and he hated that it was doing exactly what he programmed it to do, and so far luck and his teammates were the only reasons his momentary lapses hadn’t killed him on the battlefield yet. 

He needed to relearn how to aim. He was trying. But fuck, he was tired. He was so goddamned tired. 

“Training sequence failed.”

Again.

“Training sequence failed.” 

Again.

“Training sequence failed.”

Again. 

The droid’s injuries reset, but Lance’s didn’t. Brown skin was covered by mottled patches of blue, purple, and yellow. His legs trembled, his arms shook, and his skull was a rattling cage of rocks. He had discarded the tank top at some point, because fuck was it filthy. And his eye, god his eye. It burned. It throbbed. He was straining his remaining vision to its limit, but he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t afford to stop. Stopping meant failure. Stopping meant death. 

Maybe that was better than this.

The droid was coming at him again, and he had his sights set on its head. His finger twitched against the trigger. The tar climbed up his throat. It had to be right between the eyes. 

His vision shook. He pulled the trigger.

The shot grazed the side of the droid’s head, and it slammed its staff into his side then rammed its shoulder into his chest, sending him to the floor with a bang. 

“Training sequence failed.”

The ceiling was white. Most surfaces in the castle were. White with a murky greenish-blue glow, like the whole ship was sick. 

His home in Cuba was a warm brown, the dark wood accented by plant greenery and yellow lights and plush multi-colored carpets. His room was painted a dark navy blue, and was covered in vivid posters of action movies and the bright orange of Galaxy Garrison motivational quotes. 

His home was warm, it was dark, and it was cozy. It was safe. 

The castleship felt like a hospital. Like a morgue. 

It felt like he was already dead, and that this was purgatory. 

The droid remained motionless when Lance stood up, its staff limp by its side. If it could think, it probably knew where this was going. 

The butt of his gun slammed so hard into the metal of its face that it dented. It stumbled, and he slammed it with his gun again, sending it to its knees. Again, and it was on the floor. He followed it down, straddling it as he slammed his gun into its head over and over and over again. Every hit sent vibrations through his bones, but it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough, he needed more, he needed more. Throwing the gun aside, he started pelting the metal with his fists, his knuckles creating grooves in the damaged surface. Tears and spit mixed with red and he was screaming, his arms burning, his hands numb, his throat raw. His fists came down again and again and again, but it wasn’t enough, it wasn’t enough, he wasn’t enough. 

Again.

Again.

Again. 

It wasn’t the droid anymore. It was the Galra, it was Zarkon, Shiro, himself. His face, bloody and bruised and broken, burned and littered with shards of glass, a pulsing and gaping wound crawling across his skin. He drove his fists into that face again, and again, and again. 

And then he wasn’t. 

His fists swung, but there was a warm weight at his back, around his stomach and chest, and it pulled him off the nearly decapitated droid, its head pulverized to near nonexistence. It was dripping with blood, and it wasn’t until he looked down at his hands that he realized it was his. The sight of what he had done to them had his stomach lurching, but he wasn’t able to get a good look before his head was tilted up and then there were eyes. Beautiful, downward sloping eyes, with heavy purple bags and monolids and the stupidest longest lashes. A color that seemed to change every day, a hazy purplish gray, bright and blinding and quickly welling with tears and lined with panic. Eyes he hadn’t seen in three months. 

Lance’s throat wasn’t working. He opened his mouth, his lips cracked and stinging. Everything hurt, but it was okay. It was okay now. 

“Keith?”

For the first time in two weeks, Lance’s brain went quiet. 

“Lance,” Keith croaked, and his arms tightened around Lance’s stomach. That was Keith’s voice, deep and raspy. That was Keith’s touch, his smell. Keith was here. Keith was home. 

The strings that had been winding Lance tighter and tighter went slack, and he slumped backwards against Keith’s chest, head dropping to his shoulder. His hair was longer. It tickled Lance’s cheek, but he couldn’t bring himself to move. It didn’t seem like Keith wanted him to, anyway, as he clutched at Lance as if he was the one that had just upped and left and might do so again at any moment.

“You’re back,” Lance whispered. 

Keith didn’t respond right away, his eyes frantically darting across Lance’s face. He was still wearing that stupid Marmora armor. Lance hated that armor. He also hated how good Keith looked in it.

It was then that Lance realized Keith was shaking. His hands trembled against Lance’s sides, and his face was unhealthily pale.

“Lance,” Keith repeated. “You’re alive.”

Lance frowned, the blissful fog starting to shake loose. “I’m… Uh, yeah, I think so.”

“Lance.”

There were tears now. Keith was holding onto him like he might die right there. He was still scanning Lance’s face, wearing an expression Lance had never seen on him before. Like his world was both ending and beginning at the same time. Lance reached up and brushed a chunk of hair behind his ear, but it only made him cry harder. 

“I felt Red,” Keith choked out. His grip would have been suffocating if it wasn’t so stubbornly gentle. “I was — I was on a mission, and I felt her — her panic. It was so strong, she was so — so scared, and I knew it was for you, I —.” He broke, then, crumbling, and burrowed against Lance’s neck, holding him against his chest. “There was nothing else, and I didn’t know what — what had happened. I took one of our ships, but the comms couldn’t — couldn’t reach the castle, and —.”

“Keith,” Lance said. “Breathe, sweetheart.” 

Keith inhaled shakily, and Lance felt every second of it. His breath fanned across his throat, warm and real. Lance breathed with him, his hands covering Keith’s, holding his trembling still. Lance didn’t know how long they sat there, on the metal floor of the training room, a decimated training droid a few feet away their only company. 

His heartbeat had managed to slow to its normal pace when Keith moved again. He lifted his head up and flipped his hands around, taking Lance’s hands in his carefully. Lance chuckled, stretching out his fingers, wincing at the sting across his knuckles. 

“I really tore them up, huh?” he said. He really had. The skin had gotten completely shredded, but he avoided his gaze before he took in too much detail. 

Without a word, Keith shuffled back and got to his feet, and Lance almost whined when his heat disappeared from behind him. It wasn’t gone for long, though, as Keith quickly put his hands on him again, like he, too, didn’t want to be separated. He helped Lance up, holding onto his bicep and forearm, eyes never leaving his face. Wordlessly, he tugged Lance towards the exit. 

Keith’s face had gone monotone, with only his eyebrows and lips slightly pinched in emotion. Fondness tickled Lance’s heart. 

“Talking hard?” he asked. Keith gave a sharp nod. “Lead the way, samurai.”

As they walked, Lance tried not to stare. He really did, swear to god. But… Keith was here. Keith was here, holding his arm, leading him through the castle towards who knows where. Keith could lead him anywhere, and Lance would follow. As was their nature.

“Do the others know you’re here?” Lance asked.

Keith nodded and tugged him around a corner. Lance recognized the route towards the med bay. 

“We should throw a party,” Lance continued. This was familiar: Keith getting overwhelmed and going nonverbal and listening to Lance fill the air with nonsense until he felt okay again. “I know Hunk’s been baking a lot lately. He’ll be so psyched to make your favorites. You still have your secret sweet tooth? I’ve grown quite the alien candy selection I want you to try. And Pidge found another Earth game a few planets back, it’s multiplayer so we can all play. Some puzzle, fighting arena combo, I’m not sure. Never heard of it. Oh, dude, I gotta tell you about this one planet we were on a few weeks ago, the aliens there were crazy. They insisted they could tell the future from leaves and read our minds, they thought Hunk and Allura were engaged and would throw a fit if they stopped holding hands. I don’t think I’ve ever seen either of them that red, you gotta bring it up to them later —”

He kept up the stream of consciousness as they entered the med bay and Keith brought him over to a chair next to one of the beds. Lance sat and watched as Keith fluttered around the medical materials, gathering bandages and disinfectant. His hair really was longer, and he kept shaking his head to get his bangs out of his face. 

“They don’t have salons at the Blade?” Lance asked with a grin. Keith frowned at him, confused, and Lance mimicked his head toss. “Mr. L’Oréal.”

Keith rolled his eyes and pulled over another chair, plopping down in front of Lance close enough that their knees touched. He poured some of the disinfectant over a cloth and picked up Lance’s right hand, which had suffered most of the damage, and began to gently dab away the blood. Lance hissed at the sting but kept still. Keith was meticulous in his work and held Lance’s hand like it was sacred, and he looked up at Lance at every sound of pain. His eyes looked tired. Focused, but tired.

“Have you been sleeping?” Lance asked quietly. Keith kept his head down. He patted Lance’s knuckles dry and picked up a roll of bandages, looping it around Lance’s hand a few times. He ripped the rest of the roll off with his teeth, which totally did absolutely nothing to Lance’s nether regions, and tied the ends together. 

“Keith,” Lance pressed. Keith poured disinfectant onto a fresh cloth and moved to Lance’s left hand. He winced at the pain but kept his noises to himself. Keith was quicker with this one, as there was less blood to clean, and Lance waited until the bandage was tied off before speaking again. 

“You gotta take care of yourself, bud,” he said. 

Keith’s eyes shot up to meet his, and they were harder this time. “Have you?”

Lance frowned. “We’re talking about you right now. I haven’t seen you for, like, three months.”

Keith’s grip tightened around his hand, but not enough to hurt. “I haven’t seen you for those three months, either.”

“But you’re alone, Keith.”

“I’m not beating up metal droids until my hands fall apart, Lance!” Keith snapped. 

Lance scoffed. “Because you’re the king of healthy coping mechanisms.” 

Keith’s face was twisting, and Lance hated it. He hated that he was the one putting it there. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. Keith was back, and they were arguing. He didn’t want it to be like this. 

Keith closed his eyes and took a deep breath, and it was so clearly something Shiro had taught him Lance almost laughed. “I haven’t.”

“Haven’t what?”

Keith’s gaze was fixed on Lance’s bandaged knuckles. His thumb began to drag gentle circles against his skin. “Been sleeping.” He looked up at him, and the shadows of the med bay deepened the darkness under his eyes, making him look sick. “I thought you were dead, Lance.”

“Yeah, well… I’m still kickin’.” He grinned self-deprecatingly. “Almost in one piece, too.” 

Lance saw Keith’s eyes flick to the elephant in the room. “You seem pretty whole to me.”

Lance did laugh at that, but it wasn’t a nice sound. It clawed at the inside of his throat before falling out, and it died quickly in the air between them. “Didn’t take you for one to sugarcoat.” 

“I’m not sugarcoating,” Keith growled. 

“Sure,” Lance said. He leaned back against the chair and tugged his hand out of Keith’s, crossing his arms. It occurred to him then that he was only in his sweatpants and sneakers, and abruptly felt very cold and vulnerable. This wasn’t exactly what he pictured his first time being shirtless with Keith to be like.

“I’m not,” Keith said. 

“Fucking look at me, Keith,” Lance snapped. “The others barely can. They baby me on missions and do their damnedest to pretend that everything’s just peachy. No one talks about it, or, or asks how I’m coping with it. Hunk’s made a single mention of my general feelings while skirting around the main fucking point, but it was more — it felt more like he was just doing it to tell himself that he tried. Everyone tries to be so — so cheery. I spend most of my time now hiding from them because then none of us have to act. No one’s even —” He swallowed, blinking frantically. He laughed again, and he could feel himself slipping. “Do you even know what happened? Did they tell you?”

Keith was watching him closely, and damn can he hold a poker face. He shook his head slowly. “They asked why I showed up in a shuttle, and I asked where you were. They all kind of went… quiet, for a second, then Hunk said probably the training room, but…” His lips pursed as his eyebrows furrowed. “He said to be gentle with you, that you were healing from an injury. I was already running, so…” 

Lance wanted to hold his hand again. He dug his nails into his palms. “I don’t want gentle.” 

“Okay,” Keith said. “What do you want?”

What did he want?

He saw Shiro’s stone face and Hunk’s skittish eyes. He saw Allura’s forced smile and Pidge’s awkward attempts at comradery. He saw Valera, with its dusty orange rocks and vibrant skies, covered in rows of glass tanks and blue liquid that he never did learn the fucking purpose of. He saw Valera, the planet before Valera, and the planet before that, and on and on and on. He saw his room, and the photographs on the ceiling, a collection that hadn’t been added to in months. He saw eye rolls and scoffs and shaking heads every time he tried to open his mouth, to contribute to battle plans, to group conversations, even simply in passing. He saw their backs as they advanced without him with no intention of turning around. 

His eye burned. “I want an apology.”

Keith’s hands rested palms up, as if waiting for him to come back. “What happened, Lance?”

Lance broke. 

Everything poured out of him like a basin overflowing. He got it out, all of it, the ugly, the nastiness, the tar. His worth, his place on the team, how fucking lonely he was now. The hatred he can see in Shiro’s eyes sometimes, the ice that shoots out of his mouth. How Hunk was supposed to be his best friend, how Pidge’s jokes are so mean sometimes, how Allura scolds him for every compliment even though he hasn’t even jokingly flirted with her in months. How they never listen to him, how Shiro verbally beats him into the dirt, how nobody ever defends him when it happens. Everything on stupid Valera, how he tried so hard, how they left him. Shiro not acting like Shiro anymore, and the sniper ripping his world apart. 

And Keith listened. His eyes never left Lance’s face as he took it in, all of it, all of him. His hands stayed out, palms up, and there wasn’t pity in his expression. It was heavy, and it got heavier the longer Lance talked, but those palms stayed up. They never wavered. And when Lance had emptied himself as much as he physically could, when the only thing behind his ribs was his beating heart, he slumped forward, exhausted, and Keith caught him. He wrapped himself around Lance and held him tightly against his chest, his warmth slicing through the cold that had blanketed Lance’s skin. He held him as he shuddered, as he gasped against his neck, and Lance didn’t know how he still had any tears left in him to cry. 

But Keith was here. Keith was here. 

It could’ve been minutes, it could’ve been hours, but eventually Lance fell quiet, his breathing evening out. Keith’s arms were the only things holding him from falling to the floor, and he sunk his whole weight into his chest. 

There was a hand in his hair, brushing gently through the strands. The movements started out unsure, but when Lance didn’t say anything, Keith relaxed with the motions. 

“That’s a lot,” he said. 

Lance chuckled wetly, and it didn’t hurt this time. “Mhm.”

He felt Keith rest his cheek against the top of his head. “I’m not good with the, uh… emotional support stuff, but…”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Lance said, closing his eye. God, he was tired. But he felt better than he had all week. “This is enough.” 

“I’ll talk to Shiro,” Keith said. “I don’t know why he would be acting like that, but I’ll figure it out.”

Lance huffed. “I don’t need you to talk to them.”

“No,” Keith agreed. “Just Shiro. You’re gonna talk to the others.”

Frowning, Lance reluctantly pulled away from Keith’s comforting warmth. Keith’s hand slipped from the back of his head and rested against his shoulder. “I told you, they don’t listen to me.”

“Then make them listen.” The corner of Keith’s lips quirked up. “I’ll be right next to you.”

“Like a grumpy guard dog?” Lance joked. 

“Sure,” Keith said, rolling his eyes. “If they try to talk over you, I’ll bark at them.”

The laughter that burst out of Lance’s chest surprised both of them. He quickly covered his mouth, eyes wide, but Keith was grinning at him. 

It was strange, how just an hour ago he was crumbling to pieces in front of an emotionless droid, cold and alone and so, so angry. The feeling felt so far away. He knew it wasn’t gone, not yet, and he might find himself there again at some point. But for now, it was distant. For now, he was safe. 

Keith was still smiling at him, and it was doing things to Lance’s insides. 

“Thanks, Keith,” he murmured. 

Keith’s lips pursed, and he dropped his gaze to his lap. He was quiet for a moment before he looked back up at Lance through his bangs. “You called me sweetheart, earlier.”

Blood rushed to Lance’s face so fast he was surprised he didn’t black out. Keith giggled, the son of a bitch. 

“O–Oh,” Lance choked out, voice cracking. “I did! Interesting.”

“Interesting,” Keith hummed. 

He was still looking at Lance, like, like that. Lance had held this torch for years, accepting he was going to carry it alone for as long as it burned. And now Keith was looking at him. 

Lance licked his lips and was hyper aware of Keith tracking the motion. “Is that… okay?” 

Keith’s cheeks were definitely pink. Lance was 90% certain. “Yeah.”

Holy shit. “Alright. Cool.”

“Cool.”

The air was heavy, the tension clinging to them like humidity during the summer. Keith was still holding on to his waist and shoulder, hair in his face, and everything in Lance’s body wanted to fall forwards into him again.

The tension was cut by Keith’s eyes squeezing shut in a big yawn.

“Jesus, your teeth are sharp,” Lance muttered. 

“Galra,” Keith reminded, blinking tiredly. 

“Let’s get you to bed, sleepyhead.” When Lance made to get up, Keith’s grip tightened. Lance frowned. “It’s late, bud.”

“Can I — can I stay with you tonight?” Keith asked. 

Oh holy shit, again. “Stay with me? Like…”

“To sleep,” Keith said quickly, and both their cheeks were matching flames. “The last two weeks were — um — you — my bed hasn’t been touched in months, so I thought —”

“Relax, mullet,” Lance said, and swiftly pulled Keith to his feet. “I don’t feel like being alone, either.” 

Keith let out a breath. “Okay. Cool.”

Lance smirked, doing his best to muffle his internal freak out. “Cool.”

The walk to his room felt longer than it probably was, and his heart had done a few rounds of pole dancing by the time they made it to his door. He didn’t let himself hesitate before he punched in his code and stepped inside, Keith following behind him. The only light came from the faint blue strips where the walls and floor met, and the rest of the room was dark with shadow. Lance was kind of glad for it: he hadn’t exactly left it in a state fit for guests. 

“Here,” Lance said, walking over to his dresser and pulling out a T-shirt and shorts. He couldn’t really tell which ones they were, but they were clean, so they had to do. He turned to hand them over, then paused. “You have underwear on under that, right?”

He heard Keith scoff. “Yes, Lance, I have underwear on.”

“Clean?”

Silence. Lance scrunched his nose as he fished out a fresh pair of boxers. “Eww.”

“I was in a tiny shuttle for two weeks!” Keith cried. “I didn’t exactly have access to a washer and dryer!”

Lance let out a horrified gasp. “No shower?” 

With his eye adjusting to the darkness, he saw Keith shift awkwardly. “I had water I could splash my face with.” 

“Keith, oh my god.” Lance chucked the clothing onto the bed and grabbed Keith by the shoulders, steering him towards the bathroom. “Minimum of fifteen minutes, Keith. Fifteen minutes.” 

Keith squawked but didn’t put up much of a fight, letting Lance direct him through what bottles to use before he closed the door. Lance stood in the darkness until he heard the shower turn on, then darted around his room and hastily cleaned up the best he could, throwing dirty clothes into the hamper and food wrappers into the trash. He even made his bed, which in hindsight felt kind of ridiculous, considering two twenty-year-olds were about to squeeze into it. By the time the water shut off, Lance’s room was cleaner than he’d seen it all month. 

Keith opened the door, and Lance’s brain screeched to a halt. 

Right. The clothes. The clothes that were still on the bed. The clothes that were very much not on Keith’s very naked body right now. One of Lance’s fluffy blue towels hung from his waist while another was being ruffled through Keith’s mop of dark hair. A few water droplets trailed down his chest and hips, and Lance’s throat was very, very dry. There were scars, too, more than he would’ve thought. A pretty gnarly looking one on his shoulder that hooked across his collarbone, which he was pretty sure happened during those Blade trials. But there were newer looking ones, too, scattered across his arms and sides. 

By the time it occurred to Lance he should probably say something, Keith was already smirking at him. Scowling, Lance threw the fresh clothes at his face and stalked past him, ignoring his laughter as he shut himself in the bathroom. Luckily, Alteans had mastered the art of waterproof bandages, so he didn’t have any worries there. He started getting ready for his own shower, the water still warm and condensation sticking to the walls, and was going through the motions of getting undressed when he looked up and made eye contact with himself in the mirror. 

Keith had taken the towel covering it down. 

Lance went still. He looked like a mess, with heavy purple under his remaining eye and hair sticking up wildly with dried sweat. His lips were bitten and cracked, and his whole being screamed exhaustion. The overhead bathroom light made the gnarled texture of his scar cast shadows across the rest of his face. The lines were jagged, uneven, and stark. 

But his cheeks were flushed, and the corner of his lips had been curled upward before seeing the mirror. He looked exhausted, yes, but also… content. 

There was only one towel remaining in his bathroom, and Lance wasn’t sure if Keith had done that intentionally or not. He might simply not have been thinking about it, seeing a towel and just grabbing it. One for his body and another for his hair, which he definitely had a lot of, so it made sense. But Keith was also more observant than Lance gave him credit for, sometimes.

The Lance in the mirror was still looking back at him.

You seem pretty whole to me. 

Lance swallowed, then turned and hurried through his shower routine. Keith was waiting. 

When he was done, he turned off the light before opening the door and beelined for his dresser, not wanting to give Keith a show any longer than he had to. Sure, he’d been shirtless the entire time earlier, but after seeing himself in the mirror he felt more raw than usual. 

“Lance?”

“Jesus!” Lance yelped, ramming his knee into his dresser. He turned to his right to find Keith a lot closer than he had thought. “That’s my blind spot, man!”

Guilt flashed across Keith’s face. “I… didn’t think about that. Sorry.”

Lance waved him off, fishing out some clothes to change into. “S’fine. Now turn around, perv.”

Keith huffed but did as he was told, heading toward the bed. “Do you want the wall or the end?”

Lance tended to sleep on his back, which left his right side to be the majority of what Keith would see if he had the wall, so… “I’ll take the end. Just don’t kick me off.”

“No promises.”

“Dick.”

After getting dressed, Lance turned and found Keith already getting comfy under the covers. Keith was in his bed. Holy shit Keith was in his bed. There was currently a cute boy in his bed. Keith was in his bed! 

A flash of nostalgia had Lance remembering how often he used to complain about Keith behind his back and to his face in the early days of Voltron. The thought of implanting this image of Keith, curled up on his side with his hair splayed out over Lance’s pillow, into his younger self’s brain and gloating, This is your future, fucker, get ready, had him huff a laugh under his breath. Considering he had been in huge denial about his feelings back then, he wasn’t sure whether his past self would’ve raged or passed out. 

He must’ve been standing still for a little too long, because Keith made an inquisitive sound and sleepily stuck a hand out from under the covers toward him and gestured weakly. “Laaance.”

Oh, what the fuck. Lance banished all trepidation and dove onto the bed, causing Keith to bounce a little. Laughing, he reached out and grabbed Lance’s arm, tugging him closer as Lance wiggled under the covers. Oh, what the fuck. 

“You gotta give my heart a break at some point, sweetheart,” Lance said breathlessly. 

Keith hid his grin into his pillow, but his eyes still squinted at Lance happily. “Nah.”

Something in his stare had Lance going quiet. The unabashed glee, the contentment, how there wasn’t an ounce of hesitation. There hadn’t been all night. Lance could count on one hand the amount of times Keith had actually looked away from him, from his face. He stared at Lance like there wasn’t anything else he would rather be doing, taking in every single thing and cementing it in his memory. His eyes hadn’t skittered away from him, his smile was never forced. He looked at Lance like he enjoyed what he saw. 

“Keith?” Lance murmured. 

Keith shifted, and Lance was pretty sure he was a little closer than he had been before. “Hm?”

Purple-gray eyes. Monolids. Sloped nose. Cupid-bow lips. “What do you see?”

Those eyes blinked. “See what?”

Lance began to fiddle with a loose string on the blanket. “When you look at me.”

A considering look passed over Keith’s face. He thought for a moment, chewing on his bottom lip with those sharp-ass teeth. “I see Lance.”

Lance looked away. “That’s not what I —”

“I see Lance,” Keith repeated. His hand came up and gently held Lance by the chin. “Dark skin, darker hair. It’s short, but it’s gotten longer. Sharp features, especially your cheekbones and browbones. Thin eyebrows. Your nose is kind of pointed. Your lips are thin, and they suit your face. An upturned left eye, a dark blue. A scar on your right. Freckles. Big ears. A strong jaw.” He shrugged, dropping his hand. “I see Lance.” 

Lance stared at him. His whole body felt overheated. “That was very matter-of-fact.”

“It’s what you look like,” Keith said simply. 

“And you’re… okay with it?” Lance asked, voice quiet. 

Keith studied him, the whites of his eyes glowing a soft yellow in the shadows. He didn’t say anything for a long moment, and Lance thought maybe he hadn’t heard him. Then Keith shifted again and sat up on his elbow, hair hanging in his face as he hovered over Lance. Lance felt petrified as Keith leaned closer, heart jackhammering against his ribs. 

Then Keith leaned even closer, and pressed his lips softly against the rough skin of Lance’s right eye. 

Oh.

It was a light pressure, and Lance could barely feel it, but he felt it enough. Keith leaned back slightly before pressing another kiss to his cheekbone, and then another towards his temple. Lance could feel himself shaking, and he brought his hands up to hold on to Keith’s shoulders, fingers digging into his borrowed T-shirt. He felt Keith pull him even closer by the waist, thumb rubbing circles into exposed skin. His lips were gentle, pressing feather-light kisses over the entirety of Lance’s scar and where dead skin met living. 

By the time Keith pulled away and lowered himself back onto the pillow, Lance felt completely and utterly wrecked. He blinked his eye open, which he hadn’t realised he’d closed, and found Keith watching him with a small, tired smile. His arm was still around Lance’s waist, and Lance’s hands rested against his chest. He felt cocooned, warm and comfortable and safe. 

Lance released a shuddering breath. “You’re gonna kill me, I swear.”

Keith huffed a tired laugh. His thumb was still rubbing those distracting circles. “Do you get it?”

Lance knew they were both about to pass out, but he didn’t want to yet. He hummed, shuffling closer. 

Keith was doing his best to keep his eyes open. “It’s you.” He yawned again, sharp teeth glinting in the low light. “You’re you. You’re Lance. It doesn’t… it doesn’t matter what… It does, but… it’s all just you.”

Watching Keith go under was making Lance start to drift, too. “Go to sleep, mullet. You can state your thesis in the morning.”

Keith sighed, having given up the fight with his eyelids. “Mhm… Call me sweetheart, again.”

Warmth, safety. Love. “Goodnight, sweetheart.”

“Mm… Goodnight, Lance.”

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

The next day, Keith didn’t waste any time. Lance woke up to Keith bringing them both breakfast (which totally didn’t make him swoon, absolutely not). They ate in bed and Keith talked about his travels with the Blade, definitely downplaying the danger and looking sheepish when Lance called him out on it. After they finished, Keith made him promise he would stay in bed for another hour (“Don’t give me that look, I know you’ve been pushing yourself too much.”) (hypocrite), then left to talk to Shiro. The nerves made Lance itchy, not knowing how Shiro was going to respond. It would have been easier to predict before this weird personality flip, but now?

Lance had no idea. But he knew Keith was tough, and that Shiro loved his little brother. 

When Keith came back, he seemed thoughtful. He had been gone for over half an hour, and Lance wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. 

“What did he say?” he asked nervously. 

Keith sat down next to him on the bed, fiddling with an infinity cube Hunk had made him ages ago that he must have picked up from his room on the way back. For Keith, that wasn’t necessarily bad, just that there were a lot of thoughts going on in his noggin, and it helped him regulate. 

“Most of it was getting him to admit that there was a problem,” Keith said, eyes fixed past Lance. “With himself. And that he’s known he hasn’t been treating you fair, or anyone, really. But something in his brain doesn’t let him stop, or, or realize it until after the situation has passed. He still didn’t want to tell me about when he went missing, he said that he didn’t really remember, but I know he’s hiding something.” The cube flipped over and over in his hands. “There was more, but he wants to talk to you.”

Lance’s stomach plummeted to his toes. “Talk? To me?”

Keith looked at him then and gave him a reassuring smile. “Nothing bad. He wants to hear it from you, and to apologize properly.” 

Alright. That wasn’t nearly as reassuring as Keith probably thought, but alright. “Right now?”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Keith said. “I told him I wasn’t sure how soon you would be okay with that, and he said he understood, but that he was going to be in his room for a few hours anyway.” 

Shiro was somewhat waiting for him. Okay, that was fine. Cool cool cool. 

“Might as well rip the bandaid off,” Lance muttered. 

And that was how he found himself in front of Shiro’s door, ramrod straight as if at attention, as if he could already see him. He never used to feel like this around Shiro, like he was Iverson or some other commanding douchebag at the Garrison that would snap at him for being anything short of perfect. He was snapped at a lot. 

He raised a fist in one solid movement, then went still again with it hovering in the air. He thought of Keith’s warm eyes, his sharp toothed grin. He took a breath and exhaled slowly. 

Lance was going to shit himself.

He knocked on the door, twice. 

There was movement on the other side, and he spazzed his hands out by his hips for a moment to calm himself down. He was still in his pajamas, fuck. Keith had been too, it’s fine. 

It’s just Shiro. 

The door slid open with a hiss, and there he was. His eyes were tired but alert, and he gave Lance a small smile. “Hey, Lance.” 

“Hi, Shiro,” Lance croaked, and winced. Good start. 

Shiro tilted his head back toward his room. “Want to come in?” 

Lance nodded, and Shiro led him in. He walked over to his desk chair to sit and gestured towards the bed. Lance sat, shoulders slumped and hunched over his knees. Shiro’s room was rather predictable: everything was neat and organized, the covers on the bed tucked in and without a single wrinkle, spare shoes lined up next to the door. The only thing that wasn’t in an orderly fashion was what looked to be a journal on the corner of his desk. It was thick and clearly often used, with creases in the binding and loose or added papers sticking out haphazardly. It was the only pop of personality that Lance could see except for a single framed photograph on the nightstand. It was a picture of all of them. 

Lance remembered taking this photo. It was during the early days of Voltron, when Hunk and Lance had managed to convince the others into a sleepover in one of the common areas. Coran had set the old Altean camera up and put in on a timer, and they had all clustered together on the couch. Lance had said some stupid joke right before it flashed, and the photo perfectly captured everyone’s laughter or looks of amused exasperation. 

And here it was, framed in Shiro’s room, on his nightstand, tilted towards the bed so it was the first thing he saw in the morning. 

Lance’s throat tightened. 

“It was simpler, then,” Shiro murmured. Lance looked up to find him gazing at the photograph. He looked years older than his actual age. “Do you miss it?”

Lance picked at a hole in his shorts. “Yeah.” 

“We were so hopeful. So naive.” Shiro leaned back in his chair, hands hanging between his knees. “Defenders of the universe? We fly giant robot lions, shoot down bad guys? I thought this was the answer. I thought this made everything the Galra put me through worth it. I knew it was going to be hard, and I knew we were diving into a war we really had no idea about. But…” He trailed off, and he pursed his lips. “I made myself think it was going to be okay. But then people started getting hurt. People started dying. It was so much bigger than I had thought. You guys were still kids when we started, you couldn’t even legally drink, and here you were. Killing.” 

Lance looked back at the photograph. Younger Shiro had his eyes squinted in laughter, posture loose and relaxed. His hair had gotten mussed up at some point, probably from Keith or Coran. 

“I felt responsible for everyone,” Shiro continued quietly. “So whenever one of you ended up in a healing pod, I thought it was my fault. I couldn’t… I can’t lose any of you. You’re my kids.” 

Lance looked back at him and was surprised to find his eyes glossy. Shiro ran his left hand down his face and covered his mouth for a moment, looking into the distance. 

“Lance,” he said. “Something happened to me, when I was missing.” 

A tone had shifted, and Lance’s skin prickled. 

“I don’t know what,” Shiro continued. “I can’t… remember. But I’ve felt different since coming back. I get in this… fog, sometimes, and I don’t really know that I’m in it until it’s gone, and I realize that how I acted during it was unacceptable.” His eyes met with Lance’s. “You’ve been noticing it for a while.” 

Lance shifted in his seat, unsure of how much to say. How does someone word yeah, you’ve been kind of a huge asshole in a less offensive way? But this was Shiro. And Shiro was talking to him. 

“Well… kind of, yeah,” Lance said. “You’ve been acting differently. But I figured it was like, PTSD or something.” 

Shiro frowned at the floor. “Maybe. But it’s not an excuse.” He leaned forward and clasped his hands in front of his knees, looking back at Lance. “Tell me how I’ve been making you feel lately. Please.”

It sounded genuine, and he trusted Keith. So he decided to trust Shiro again. “Um… Unheard, I guess. You kind of… steamroll everyone, but it feels like me especially. I can’t voice an opinion with anything. And, like…” Man, this was scary. “I get that I mess up a lot, and I know I still have a lot to learn, but… I don’t know. You scold me a lot more, and it makes me feel really… small. There’s nothing constructive about it anymore, and it, um, it hurts.”

Shiro’s face was neutral but open, and a small amount of confidence trickled into Lance’s chest. 

“The biggest thing recently was, um, Valera,” he continued. He saw Shiro purse his lips, and he quickly looked down at his hands still picking at his shorts. “I understand your reasoning behind your plan, but I don’t understand why I was beaten down so badly for trying to offer alternatives. It’s what we’ve always done. We… Your call is final, but we all contribute. And on the planet, you…” He had to swallow a few times to find his voice again. “I don’t know what happened there, but you stopped listening to us. You really — we were really scared for you, Shiro. But you… you’ve been… mean.”

It was quiet. In the past, Lance would pace around his room and rant at the walls, speeches filled with expletives and accusations and red hot anger. Actually sitting in front of Shiro, the anger was gone, and all he felt was sadness and shame. Shame, for not being good enough. Sadness, for not knowing how it got to this point in the first place. But it was out, now, and maybe not with every detail that had been soaked with the tears he had shed in private for months, but enough of it. The root of it. 

“I’m sorry.” Lance lifted his head, and the old Shiro was there. “I am so, so sorry, Lance. Keith told me some of it, but I really needed to hear it from you.” He brought his clasped hands up to his chin, almost as if in prayer. “You’re right, that is not how our battle plans work. I should have listened to you, should’ve taken in everyone’s opinions. I should never have treated you like that. For everything. I have been particularly cruel with you, and there’s no excuse. You’ve been amazing, and I’ve been very hard on you.” His gaze softened. “My actions directly resulted in you permanently losing your eye, and I don’t expect you to ever forgive me for it. But from the bottom of my heart, Lance, I’m sorry.” 

It was everything Lance had been wanting. 

Tears blurred Shiro’s image, the colors twisting and mixing together. His fingers dug into his thighs in an attempt to hold himself together, but it was like trying to scoop sand with a colander. The bed dipped next to him and then there was a hand on his back, rubbing soothing circles. The contact made Lance realize he wasn’t dreaming. 

“I will work on myself, and try to catch those fogs before they worsen,” Shiro said quietly. “I hope I can earn your trust again. You’ve done so well, Lance.” 

Their past selves in the photograph smiled at them. They could never be them again. But maybe they can come close. Someday. 

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

Keith was on a roll, and had everyone else gathered in one of the common rooms by noon. 

Lance was emotionally wiped, but he knew if he didn’t get it over with, the nerves would build and cause him to tear his hair out or something. He had managed to change out of his pajamas before Keith dragged him out of his room, sporting just a casual T-shirt and jeans. The shirt had the Jaws movie poster on it in faded print; Lance had stumbled upon it in a space mall and almost fell over.

Hunk, Pidge, Allura, and Coran sat on the couch opposite him, while Keith sat cross-legged next to him, his infinity cube quietly clicking. It was a comforting, rhythmic sound, and it anchored Lance in reality and out of his head. 

Lance and Shiro had talked for around an hour — well, more of Lance talking and Shiro listening. It had been easier with the initial meat of it out and Shiro’s mood properly gauged. He knew that there was probably going to be more talks, and that things weren’t going to be completely resolved right away. But with Shiro’s attention on him now, and Keith’s weight at his side, he felt hope for the first time in a long time. 

Now he just had to get this one over with, too. 

“Um… hey, guys,” Lance said. He glanced at Keith and almost snorted at the strength of the glower on his face that was directed towards the group in front of them. 

“‘Sup,” Pidge mumbled, picking at her nails. Lance felt a little bad — it was a nervous habit of hers. 

“Sorry for all this,” he said, looking down at his feet. “I don’t really know how to start.” 

“Pretend we aren’t here?” Hunk suggested, but it sounded like a question. “Keith just said you had something to talk to us about, I’m trying not to freak out, man, you’re not like, dying, right? Tell me you’re not dying.”

“I’m not dying,” Lance said. “It’s not that dramatic.” 

There were restless shuffles. Lance’s knee was bouncing. There was a rock in his mouth and he didn’t know how to speak around it. 

Click, click, click. Keith was silent except for his hands. Click, click, click. 

Lance breathed. 

What do you want, Lance? 

“Do you guys know that you’ve been hurting me?” he asked. 

Click, click, click. 

“Hurting you?” Allura sputtered. “Do you need a pod?”

“No, no, not like — that.” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “It’s — ugh. I don’t know how to — okay.” He slapped his thighs a few times and huffed.

Click, click, click. 

“We’re listening, Lance,” Coran said. His voice was more somber than it usually was, and Lance looked up at him, surprised. 

“Okay,” Lance mumbled. “Okay.” 

Hunk watched him nervously and fiddled with the end of his vest. Allura sat with her back straight, a frown on her lips. Pidge wasn’t looking at him at all. 

“Why have you guys tried to ignore what happened?” he asked. 

“On… Valera?” Hunk guessed, voice hesitant. 

“Yeah. I mean,” he gestured towards his face, towards the giant scar over his eye. “I’m walking around like Zuko over here, and nobody’s talked about it.”

He saw Allura mouth Zuko? But it was Pidge who spoke. “You haven’t exactly given us the chance to,” she grumbled. 

Annoyance flickered under his skin. “Everyone forced this fake positivity so much my teeth hurt. That’s not talking about it.”

“God forbid we wanted to make you feel better.” 

“You didn’t!” Lance snapped. “For months it’s felt like you’ve been actively trying to make me feel worse! I know I’ve played the part of the goofball, but do you really think that’s all I am? I’ve been degraded and ignored and then suddenly was thrown into a complete one-eighty, for what? Where was the care behind that? It doesn’t make up for anything!” He shook his head. “Okay, no, I didn’t want to get like this.”

“What are you talking about?” Pidge asked, the beginning of a scowl on her face. “‘Degrading’ you? Is teasing your friends degrading now?” 

“It hasn’t been just teasing,” he said, trying to stay calm, but he could see Allura’s frown getting deeper, Coran getting sadder, and Hunk’s eyes were bouncing between him and Pidge with his mouth firmly shut. 

“Lance, I’m sorry you feel that we’ve hurt you,” Allura said in her princess voice. “But we’re in a war, and everyone’s tensions are high. The Galra are getting stronger every day, and we can’t fall behind. This has to be our primary focus.”

“I know that,” he choked out. He had barely started, he had barely said anything. It always ended up like this, why did it always end up like this? 

“We need you to be with us, Lance,” Allura pressed. “Are you with us?”

He was digging his fingers into his thighs again. He wouldn’t be surprised if they bruised. “Of course I am. I train all the time, you know I do. I’ve been practicing my aim, and —”

“With your eyes closed?” Pidge joked. “Sorry. Eye. There, I mentioned it.”

Lance’s mouth moved silently for a moment. He saw the bloodied droid on the pristine white floor, his own bloodied knuckles, the split skin. “Not like that.”

“Ugh,” she groaned, dropping her head against the back of the couch. “Then I don’t know what you want from us, Lance.” 

“I want you to listen to me,” he said, but his voice was becoming weak. It always did. Coran had a considering look on his face, but this issue didn’t really involve him, anyway. Hunk still wasn’t saying anything, and had dropped his gaze to the floor. 

“Is that not what we’re doing now?” Pidge asked, voice flippant. 

“It’s not.” 

Lance nearly flinched, having forgotten that Keith was sitting next to him. The infinity cube had gone silent, and was being clenched tightly in his gloved hands. “I brought you guys here because Lance needed to talk to you, but you’re doing more talking than he is.” His dark eyes shot to Hunk. “Or, just letting it happen.” 

Hunk seemed to shrink under those eyes. Allura sat forward, lifting her chin. “This is a conversation, isn’t it?”

“Not from where I’m sitting,” Keith said. “Stop interrupting him and it might be.”

“We weren’t trying to,” Pidge said, but whatever fire that had been fueling her seemed to shrink alongside Hunk. 

Keith lifted an eyebrow. “You’re smarter than that, Pidge.” 

She looked at her hands and resumed picking at her nails.

There was blissful silence for a few seconds, and Keith nodded at him. “Go ahead, Lance.” 

Lance stared at him. It wasn’t until the clicking of the infinity cube started up again that he snapped out of it. 

“All of… that,” he started, “has been going on for — I don’t even know. I think it’s always been there, but it’s been worse, lately. I get scolded, or joked about in a way that hurts. And if I try to talk about it, you guys make me feel like I’m — like I’m overreacting, and being dramatic, and I feel stupid for bringing it up.” He looked up and met Allura’s eyes. “I’ve never let it get in the way of Voltron. The universe is too important. But isn’t having good team morale the whole point of Voltron? We literally can’t form the thing if we’re not in sync. Isn’t that the whole point of all of our team bonding exercises?”

Allura frowned again, but it didn’t feel like it was directed at him. “Yes. It’s important for everyone to be on the same wavelength.”

“So if someone is struggling, wouldn’t you need to figure out why and fix the issue?”

Lance could see the thought process behind her eyes. “That would be the best course of action, yes.” 

“This is the issue.” He gestured between himself and the group in front of him. “You wouldn’t tell me to just get over a broken leg or something. I’ve been fighting in this war for the same amount of time as you. Yeah, I make jokes, I play it up, but I’m not stupid, okay? Why do you treat me like that?” 

“You are anything but stupid, my boy,” Coran said, but Lance held up a hand.

“Coran, I love you, I’m not really addressing you with this,” he said quickly. “I just wanted you here to be in the loop. You haven’t done anything.”

“Oh!” Coran blinked. “Well, that’s a relief. I’ll be quiet, do continue.” 

Lance took a breath, drumming his hands on his jeans. The others were quiet, and their eyes were on him, now. He had their attention, and they were listening. It felt strange, like he was posing with his pants off or something. 

Click, click, click. 

He had his guard dog watching his back. He wasn’t alone this time. 

“I don’t want to be mocked anymore,” he said quietly. “I don’t want to be brushed aside and ignored when we’re planning missions. When I don’t understand the sciencey side of things, just — just explain it to me instead of rolling your eyes or laughing at me. We all have our strengths, I add to this team in ways you guys don’t, and I don’t look down on you for that. I wouldn’t even — it’s never even occurred to me to do that, because I know how incredibly smart you guys are.” He gestured to them individually, forcing himself to meet their gazes. “Allura, your leadership abilities are insane, and you do so well engaging with every planet we come across. Pidge, I honestly don’t even need to list it out. Your brain is fucking massive, you can hack a super computer with a toothpick. Hunk, your knowledge about space and mechanical shit can fill, like, ten dictionaries. And me?”

He brought his hand to his chest, seeking comfort in the dependable heartbeat. He shook the clogged tar in his brain off the facts, that underneath all the self doubt, he knew these things to be true. He knew with certainty. 

“I’m good with people. Put me in a room with a planet that wants to kill us, and I can have them joking and laughing and signing with the coalition in five minutes. I’ve done that. I’m our sniper, I watch your backs during battles. I have to watch everything. Have I ever let you down?” His breathing was shaky, but his voice was strong. “Have I?”

They were all staring at him, eyes wide. Even Keith, his infinity cube silent. 

“Never.” The voice was quiet, and it took Lance a second to realize it was Hunk that had spoken. He was gripping his vest like it might fly away, but there was resolution in the set of his brows, his mouth, and the corners of his eyes. “You’ve never let us down, Lance.”

“Then why did you leave me?” He didn’t mean for his voice to crack, but it did, and it was out. He hadn’t meant to ask that, really. 

Hunk’s face shuttered, different emotions flickering in and out of view. “Leave you?”

Lance’s fingers started to tingle, a sign of a panic attack. His knee was bouncing so fast he was sure he must have been creating a groove in the floor. “Why don’t I see you anymore?”

Allura and Pidge must have sensed that this wasn’t about them anymore, and remained quiet. Hunk’s lips twitched as he searched for his next words, but he hadn’t looked away from Lance yet. Hadn’t shied away. Lance latched onto that fact. 

“I… I don’t know,” Hunk said. What looked like distress was slowly taking over his expression. “I think I… Your presence is so — it’s everything. It’s so big. I never thought to… nurture it, I guess? Because I didn’t think I needed to. It was like — oh, there’s Lance. Lance will always be Lance. Happy, joking, loving Lance, y’know? Always —” He paused, and he looked a little sick. “Always there for everyone. Reminding us to eat. Putting Pidge to sleep. Making Allura chill out for once. Helping me get my mind off of — of everything. I guess I never thought that you might — might need help, too. You were such a constant, I forgot to keep looking for you.” 

Hunk suddenly dropped his head into his hands, covering his face. “Oh, god. I’m supposed to be your best friend, how could I forget to look for you? What kind of best friend does that?”

A part of Lance ached to jump to reassure him, but he bit down on his tongue. He didn’t want to do that anymore. 

No more hiding. 

“Lance,” Hunk croaked, and when he looked up at him, his eyes were glossy. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’ve been a shitty best friend. I’m sorry for every time I’ve — I’ve made you feel stupid, or unwanted. You’re not, you’re so not. You got into the Garrison, dude, their written test is so not easy. And you’ve shown us over and over how smart you are, like, your strategy skills? The way you can work a crowd? I can’t do that. I wouldn’t even know where to start.” There were tears now. Hunk was crying. “I love you. I love you so much, buddy. I’m so sorry I haven’t been showing you that. You’ve been the bestest best friend I could have ever asked for, and I… I let you down.”

Lance’s eye was stinging, and he could feel the comforting warmth from Keith on his left, who had shifted closer to him at some point. “Hunk…”

“I want to make it up to you,” Hunk said. “Lance, can I make it up to you? Can I come back?”

His throat wasn’t working. Lance tried to swallow, but the words couldn’t find their way out. Silently, he lifted his arms. 

Hunk was across the room in seconds, and then Lance was encased with the smell of oil and cookies and cedarwood. There was no space, no air, and yet one of the heaviest weights Lance had ever carried melted out of his bones and he could breathe. The room lost its chill and he hadn’t actually realized just how cold he was until he was in Hunk’s arms, the walls destroyed to rubble, and this was how it was supposed to be. This was how they were meant to be. 

“I missed you,” he whispered. 

Hunk tightened his arms around him. “I missed you, too.” 

Lance didn’t know how long they stayed like that, but the others remained silent the entire time. Hunk eventually shifted to the side and let Lance go a little so he could sit up and wipe his face.

“Sorry about your shirt,” he said. 

Hunk gave a watery smile and shrugged. “Sorry about yours.” 

Lance huffed a laugh. It was a genuine one, and it felt nice. 

“If I may speak,” Allura said. 

They both startled a little, and Lance wiped at his eye again before nodding. 

Allura straightened her shoulders and smoothed out her skirt, then met Lance’s gaze. “I agree with everything Hunk has said. You are of incredible importance to this team, Lance, and have proven your worth alongside the rest of us countless times. I see now what you meant about our treatment of you, and I don’t know where to begin apologizing for it. I, too, felt the same as Hunk — you have such a bright presence, and I learned to accept it as the standard and never thought to look too deeply. I didn’t notice when it had started to dim. I didn’t notice when I became comfortable treating you as less. It is unacceptable. I hope you can forgive me, and allow me a second chance to make up for all of my past mistakes.” 

“Jeez, ‘Llura,” Lance chuckled, “I’m not grading you.”

“But I want you to hold me to my word,” she said. “I never want to make you feel like this again. Tell me when I do, and I will listen this time. I swear on my life.” 

“I believe you,” he said, smiling. “Thank you, Allura.”

She fiddled with her skirt, looking between him and Hunk. “Is it… Can I…” 

Lance smiled wider, and he lifted his arm. “C’mere.”

She ducked her head and skurried over, resembling one of her little mice friends. She tucked herself into his side and wrapped her arms around him, daintier than Hunk’s but just as strong. Her perfume was a soft floral, and her hair was in his face, but just like his hug with Hunk, he didn’t want to let go. He had his friend back, and the relief had him sinking into her hold. 

When she did let go, she didn’t go far, making herself comfortable at his left. Lance glanced over her shoulder at Keith, and he was already looking at him, his eyes soft and a smile playing on his lips. 

See? he seemed to be saying. 

But they weren’t done yet. 

Lance found it hard to face Pidge. Little Pidge, who had entered this war so young, who was still so young, who sat curled up on the opposite couch, staring at her knees, and was ripping her bottom lip to shreds with her teeth. She was falling back into her sweater, her hands hidden in the sleeves, and she wasn’t looking up. Coran murmured something to her, and she curled even tighter into a ball. 

“I’m not good at this,” she forced out. 

Lance remained quiet. 

Pidge scowled down at her lap, and she wrapped her arms around herself. She opened her mouth, but it took a moment before she spoke. “Have my — Was I always hurting you?”

“No,” Lance said. 

She chewed on her lip some more. “What changed?”

Lance thought about it. Their relationship had always been one of ribbing and teasing, of Lance ruffling her hair and Pidge jabbing his ribs in retaliation. It was playful, and light-hearted, like a pair of siblings. But it had changed at some point, and while the behavior was similar, it had started to lack the warmth it used to, at least from Pidge’s end. And it hurt. 

“It started to feel like you meant it,” Lance said eventually. “You kind of… It became the only way you treated me, even when I wasn’t giving it back. That’s why these past two weeks have really freaked me out, honestly. I’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop, from everyone, and for things to go back to normal.” He rubbed the back of his neck, avoiding looking at anyone. “It’s why I’ve been avoiding you guys for the past few days.”

“Won’t hurt as much if you pull away first,” Keith murmured, and Lance hated that he understood. 

“Yeah,” he said. “Everything felt, um, fake, but it was still… nice. I hated it, because why did it have to happen now? Why couldn’t it have always been like this? When was it going to end? Why did I have to — “ He cut himself off, the emotions starting to thrum louder. With a shaky hand, he covered the right side of his face, feeling the jagged grooves and melted skin against his palm. 

“Lance?” Hunk said quietly. 

The skin was warm. Blood still pulsed through his veins. He held the remains of his face tenderly, but —

He shouldn’t think of it like that, should he? 

It wasn’t what was left of him. It was him. All of him. His skin, his blood, his bones. It was melted and waxy and stiff, but it was a part of him, now. It was as much of a fact as the shape of his nose and color of his hair. It was a facet of his face, and it wasn’t going anywhere.

He was whole. He was Lance. 

“... Lance?” 

He took a breath, reassuring and deep, and looked up. Pidge had uncurled from her ball and sat perched on the edge of her seat, eyebrows knitted in worry as she watched him. 

“I’m okay,” he said, and for the first time in a long time, it rang true. He dropped his hand to his lap, and his body relaxed. “I’ll be okay.”

Her lip wobbled. It only took a few seconds before her eyes began to well up with tears. 

Lance startled, and he scrambled to his feet and ran towards her. He saw her little hands reach for him right before he wrapped his arms around her, kneeling next to her on the floor. She was so small, so bony, like a bird, and Lance realized he couldn’t remember the last time he had seen her eat. He could feel her grasping onto the front of his shirt, and she shoved her face into the crook of his neck as she started to tremble. 

Pidge never cried often. If she did, she hid it well from the rest of them. Lance never wanted to be the reason for her tears, and his heart ached with guilt for causing this. Fucking hell, he made Pidge cry. He made little Pidge cry. He was such an asshole. 

“I’m sorry, Pidgey, I’m so sorry,” he said, holding the back of her head. “Please don’t cry.”

He felt her hiccup against his neck. She was a quiet crier, and the only sounds he could hear were her sharp intakes of breath. 

“Not — not your fault,” she mumbled. “I’ve been a huge jerk.” 

“But I didn’t want to make you cry.” 

“You didn’t,” she said, and she pulled away slightly, but she didn’t let go of his shirt. “I hurt you, that’s what made me cry.” 

“Pidge…”

She sniffled, then wiped her nose with her sleeve. “I’m… I’m sorry. I didn’t want to hurt you. I’ve…” She frowned at the floor. “I’ve been really mean.” 

“I forgive you, Pidgey,” Lance said with a small smile. He began to dab away the tears from her cheeks and was mildly surprised when she didn’t swat his hand away. 

“Why?” she asked. “I’d be — If I were you, I’d be so mad. I’d be so mad.”

“I was mad,” he admitted. “But I didn’t like it. It doesn’t feel nice, and honestly? I’m tired of it. Besides,” he grinned and pinched her cheek, laughing at her face scrunching up, “you’re too cute to stay mad at.” 

“Lance,” Pidge groaned, but she didn’t push him away. When he let her go, she dropped her head onto his chest, hiding her face in his shirt. “I missed you.”

He rested his cheek against her hair, holding her closer in his arms. “I missed you, too.” 

“Also,” she mumbled. “You do look like Zuko. It’s really cool.” 

“Cool?” he laughed. 

“Yeah, it’s cool,” she said, pulling away. “It makes you look badass.” 

“Trauma aside,” Hunk piped up from behind him, “you do look cool.” 

Lance hesitated. “I don’t know about that…” 

“Battle wounds were viewed with great honor on Altea!” Coran said. “They were often highlighted with makeup or fashion in order to make them a focal point on one’s person!” 

“But this isn’t — I can’t see,” Lance said. “My aim’s been off, my depth perception’s shit, and I keep slamming into corners so often my shoulder’s bruised as hell. I tried to pick up a glass of water yesterday and I sent it flying across the table. I have a headache half the time and I just want to give my eye a rest but I can’t. I keep trying to open my other eye before I remember it’s gone, and I still don’t know how to look in a mirror, and I…” 

His breathing was getting faster, and he knew he was doing it to himself but he couldn’t stop. He knew it was a part of him now, he accepted that, he was accepting that, but he didn’t feel the ground anymore and his hands were tingling and his eye hurt and he didn’t want it to. 

Then there was warmth next to him, and behind him, and arms were around him, and the world came back to him from the waves of static. He blinked, and breathed. They were all there, all his friends, holding him together as he sank back into himself. Pidge had slipped off the couch and climbed into his lap, Allura and Hunk were holding him on one side and Coran on the other, and he didn’t see Keith but he felt his chest against his back and his lips against his neck. 

Lance closed his eye and focused on his breathing, on the floor beneath him, the love around him, because he knew it was there, now. He felt it, real as if he could hold it in his hands. 

“I forget, too, sometimes.”

Lance didn’t startle as much as he would have yesterday. He felt the others look up with him, and there was Shiro, hovering a few feet away, looking down at his arm. 

Flexing his prosthetic fingers, he continued. “It was hard to work with, at first. I couldn’t write, or grab things properly, or feed myself that well. It was frustrating, because a part of my brain still felt it, and couldn’t understand why the movements weren’t going through. The technology really is incredible, but it was still wrong. It still wasn’t my arm, and I didn’t know how to live with it.” He looked up at Lance, eyes lined with years he hadn’t yet lived, and he smiled. “But I am. And you will, too. It’ll get easier. I promise, it will. You have a family in us, Lance, and we’ll help you the whole way.” 

Lance sniffed. “You’re all gonna make me cry again.” 

Allura patted his knee. “It is healthy to let your emotions out.” 

“Oh, I haven’t stopped crying,” Hunk said, and Lance looked and yep, he sure hadn’t. 

“We can help with training!” Pidge said excitedly, wiggling in his lap. “Killing yourself over it probably isn’t doing you any favors, anyway.” 

“Yes, time limits will be implemented, and no more skipping team meals, young man,” Coran scolded. 

“Aw, man,” Lance sighed, but his heart wasn’t in it. He felt like crying. He felt like laughing. 

Keith’s lips returned to the back of his neck, and Lance could feel them stretched into a smile. 

He was going to be okay. 

☆ ★ ✮ ★ ☆

The droid didn’t seem so scary, this time. 

It swung its staff at him and he nimbly dodged, darting a few feet away before firing a few shots at its back. It recovered quickly and launched itself back at him, and he danced out of the way, narrowly avoiding getting clipped in the shoulder. The droid used its momentum to swing its staff back around, and he wasn’t able to dodge the hit to his thigh, and fuck it hurt, even through his armor, but he gritted his teeth and stayed standing. Before the droid could attack again, he rushed forward and slammed his shoulder into its chest, causing it to stumble backwards. 

Now.

Lance aimed at the droid’s head, and fired. He held down on the trigger, and the first plasma bullet missed, but the second nicked the side of the droid’s head. The third rammed it straight between its nonexistent eyes, and it crumbled to the ground.

All the air was expelled from his lungs in a single breathless laugh. 

“Good one, Lance!” 

Keith ran past him in a blur of red and white, chasing after his own droid, his Galra blade long and deadly. They were doing a classic fighting drill, five paladins versus five droids, and the training room loaded in another enemy every time one fell until the training sequence was ended. Somewhere behind him, Hunk and Pidge were taking on one, while Allura had her whip wrapped around a second and was using it to whack the third. 

Shiro had chosen to watch from the sidelines with Coran, which everyone was surprised by. 

“I’ve been realizing some things, and was rightfully confronted on others,” he had said. “I’m not proud of my recent behavior with this team, and I have to reevaluate my place. I’d like to watch how you all interact on the battlefield for now, to help me with that.”

He had sent Lance a reassuring smile, and Lance had felt giddy when he returned it. 

A spot in the floor opened up, and another droid was thrown into the fight. It immediately targeted Lance, but Pidge darted in before it could reach him and sent electricity shooting up its leg.

“Thanks, Pidgey!” he yelled, and with both a nervous and excited ball in his stomach, he summoned his bayard in the form of a sniper. He saw her flash him a grin over her shoulder before making the droid chase after her in the opposite direction, giving him much needed distance. 

He steadied himself with his breathing, aiming the gun and bringing his eye to the scope. It still felt weird, having to tilt his head farther than he usually would. But it was better than it had been. And, he knew, it was going to get easier. 

It wasn’t really a secret that the training session was for Lance’s sake, but he couldn’t find it within himself to feel bad about it. Everyone had looked at him with such excitement and hope that he was able to push aside the image of the bloodied droid and agree to it with equal enthusiasm. He hadn’t been training with his team the past two weeks, too ashamed for them to see just how much he was struggling. The chaos of the real battles they’ve been thrown into helped him feel like he was hiding better, but nothing could be hidden under the stark lighting of the training room. 

As he watched Pidge distract the droid, keeping it in one place to make aiming easier, he realized that maybe that wasn’t really a bad thing. 

Lance had his team. He had his friends. He had his family. 

He wasn’t alone. Not anymore. 

He aimed, and fired. 

A chunk of the droid’s head flung loose as it lurched with the strength of the shot, and it clattered limply to the floor. ‘Dead’. 

Joy and relief washed over him in waves so strong he was sure his legs were going to buckle. 

A chorus of cheers echoed throughout the room, and he laughed, and laughed, and laughed. 

“Yes!” Pidge shouted, throwing her arms up. 

“Wooo!” Hunk cried, and Allura was bouncing up and down in glee. 

From the sidelines, Coran was also rejoicing, and Lance could see Shiro with a big smile on his face. Even Lotor, who had slipped in and joined them at some point, was clapping almost daintily. 

A small part of him felt like a child getting congratulated for walking, but he was honestly too fucking happy to care. His shot had landed. His shot had landed. 

On his left, he saw red dart into his field of view, and he quickly turned and met Keith’s grappling hug with one of his own. Their helmets clacked together, and Keith’s eyes were squinted in one of the biggest grins Lance had ever seen on him. 

“You did it,” Keith gasped, his breath warm against Lance’s lips. “You did it, I knew you could.” 

Lance didn’t know where his bayard had fallen, or how the fight was continuing around them, and he didn’t care. He held Keith tighter, closer, happiness filling his ribs to bursting and leaking out of every pore. 

Keith was here, Keith was here, Keith was here, and his shot had landed, and his team was around him, and they loved him, he knew they did, he felt it, as strong as the sun.

He didn’t know what would come out if he tried to speak, if there would be actual words or just meaningless noise. But he knew what he wanted. And he knew that Keith did, too. 

Lance wasn’t sure who moved first, or if it was at the same time, but Keith’s hand was holding the back of his helmet tenderly and was kissing him even more so. His lips were rough, a little salty from sweat, and lovely, and Lance sank into the feeling until the ground was gone and sound was muted and it was just them. Keith’s hair tickled his cheeks and his mahogany scent filled his nose, and while happiness didn’t actually have a taste, Lance figured it would be just like this. 

“Stay,” Lance whispered against him. “Stay with us. Stay with me.”

His scent, his touch, his lips. Keith was everywhere. Lance could die like this. 

“Okay,” Keith whispered back. “I’ll stay.” 

Lance pressed his smile to Keith’s, and it was a little too toothy to be a proper kiss, but it was perfect all the same. 

They weren’t interrupted, exactly, but it was the silence that eventually prompted them to part. Someone must have ended the training sequence, as there were no droids being flung around anymore. The rest of the team was clustered together a little ways away, giving them their privacy. It was Hunk that eventually snuck a glance over his shoulder, and his eyes widened when he saw them looking back. 

“So, uh,” he said loudly, getting the others’ attention, “when was this a thing? Has this been a thing? Are you guys, like — is this a thing?” 

Lance could feel himself starting to flush, and only felt a little better when he saw a matching one on Keith. 

“A ‘thing’?” he said, grinning. 

Pidge put her hands on her hips. “Congrats, happy for you, gay rights, yada yada — you couldn’t have planned that better?” She threw an arm towards the empty training deck. “Allura had to sprint halfway across the room to stop a droid from tackling you two! We hadn’t noticed that you guys, just, stopped! What the hell!”

Keith stuttered, ducking his head. “That’s — okay. Not our, uh… best timing.” 

“I have no regrets,” Lance said. Keith pinched his side, which wasn’t entirely effective through his flight suit, but Lance scowled at him anyway. 

“Is this a thing?” Hunk asked again. “Should I make, like, a cake? Cupcakes?”

Lance met Keith’s eyes. They were bright, and they stood out against his red cheeks. Keith smiled shyly at him, his thumb rubbing circles against his waist. 

“You in, sweetheart?” Lance asked quietly. 

Those eyes squinted in a grin. “You know it.”

Yeah. Happiness tasted just like this.