The most badass thing about Lance is that he's good with a gun. He's Team Voltron's sharpshooter for a reason, and that reason is that he can shoot down two drones and three sentries in only five seconds.
The sniper rifle in his hands can't hold a candle to the Galran cruiser headed straight for him, though, and as the ship inches closer and closer, he can't help but swear.
"… Lance?"
Veronica!
He drops down onto one knee, his back to his sister, then raises his rifle and starts shooting at what he recognizes as the ship's structural weak spot. He ignores the bruise that the rifle's kickback is causing to form on his left shoulder and focuses on pulling the trigger and scanning the cruiser for any sign of damage — not that there is any. Lance knows he's hitting his mark, but he also knows that the destructive power of his bayard is limited.
… and as the ship edges close enough for him to feel the chill of the breeze its engines generate, he loses the good angle he's had on its weak spot.
I guess this is it, he thinks as he glowers at the ship's blood-red designs, which seem to serve no purpose except to taunt him. He's got about twenty seconds before the highest ranking official on the ship decides to open fire, and about ten seconds after that before the energy shield built into his armor disintegrates from the force of the attack and leaves him defenseless.
He takes one last look at the cruiser that's overshadowed the sun, then lowers his rifle.
"Lo siento," he whispers, even though he knows he's got nothing to apologize for. He'd tried to contact Red, after all. He'd tried to protect Veronica and himself, and all of Earth. He'd tried his best, but…
"Heroes aren't meant to survive."
The answer Hunk had given Lance all that time ago, after Lance had demanded to know why he wasn't excited about getting promoted to fighter class, has never seemed valid… until now.
When Lance decided to join the fight against the Galra Empire, he was fully aware that he'd have to put his life on the line time and time again — and throughout his years as a paladin, he's risked his life several times, first for Coran and most recently for Allura. He'd simply been acting on instinct, but the facts that his death would have been sacrificial and that he'd have been hailed a hero helped him come to terms with his near-death experiences after the fact. It's only now that he's about to die, saving no one and leaving Earth short one Zaiforge cannon-destroyer, that Lance realizes that he never wanted to be a hero necessarily. He just wanted his death to mean something, and heroes… well, a hero is supposed to go out in a blaze of glory.
This, though?
This isn't an I'll-die-so-she-won't-have-to type of situation. He'd sacrifice himself for his sister in a heartbeat, but he can't. He'll shield Veronica from the brunt of the Galra's attack for however long he can, but once he falls, it'll only be mere seconds until Veronica meets her own demise. They're both going to die… and there's nothing Lance can do to change that.
… and if Lance were still who he was when he first became a paladin, he'd blame his and Veronica's impending deaths on his own incompetence and become paralyzed by the resultant insecurity. He's learned a lot from being on the front line of a ten-thousand-year-old intergalactic war raged by a hostile alien race equipped with technology more advanced than anything Earth's greatest scientists could have ever dreamt of, though, and the most important lesson of them all is that you don't always stand a chance.
You don't always win the fight.
The Galran ship hums, anticipating the launch of its attack. Lance closes his eyes.
"Lo siento."