anonymous prompted: Welcome Home, Voltron?

Voltron and related properties © Dreamworks
story © RenaRoo

Welcome Home

Leaning back against the domed window, Lance could practically feel himself falling through the far reaches of space. He stared upward, ignoring the glare of light against the glass and instead pretending that there was nothing but space at his back, and nothing but the vast reaches between himself and the billions upon billions of stars.

The image of Coran's computer racing through those very stars at hyper speed, desperately passing galaxy after galaxy in an attempt to impart just how far they all were from home was still at the forefront of his mind.

When he had poked around with the others, he hadn't seen too many reactions to the horrifying distances between themselves and everything they had ever known.

It made sense on a certain level. Pidge was looking for the majority of her family while they were out there. Hunk seemed to adapt pretty eagerly to considering them all family just like he had in the academy. Shiro had been in space so long and when he came back he hadn't exactly been treated with kindness for that short amount of time. And Keith…

"Keith was probably raised by mole people. How'd we know any different," Lance surmised with a grimace.

But Lance…

There had been family for him on Earth. There still was family for him on Earth. There were brothers and sisters and cousins and parents and abuelita.

And it wasn't like their departure had left Lance with a lot of time to write a note.Dear Mom and Dad, stopping in space on the way back from the store. Will write after saving the universe.

It made him more than a little sick to his stomach to think about what his family was no doubt going through without him.

He wondered if the listlessness settled deep in his bones had anything to do with the yearning.

There was almost no telling how long he had been like that, staring into space – whether it be in minutes or seconds or ticks – when he was finally interrupted.

"Lance?"

Surprised, Lance attempted to right himself, but the odd angle he had been leaning back at worked to his disadvantage. He spent the first few seconds wobbling and whirling his arms back until he could push against the glass of the window and finally plant his feet flatly on the ground.

Blinking a few times, Lance glanced around before finding himself staring directly at a less than impressed Pidge.

"What're you doing?" she asked, tilted her head to the side as she raised a brow.

"Don't you think the real question should be what you're doing?" he attempted, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket and doing his best to look back to his teammate coolly.

Pidge blinked at him a few times before glancing around then back. "Um.Standing here?"

Pursing his lips, Lance put a hand to his chin and nodded. "Uh huh uh huh, Isee. Well, your story certainly seems to check out," he replied, snapping his fingers and pointing toward her before attempting to walk around. "Stay out of trouble, kiddo."

"Hey, wait a second!" she snapped, grabbing one of the fingers pointing at her and forcing Lance to turn back around. "What were you doing?"

Lance rolled his eyes. "Yeesh, are you still on about that?" he asked. He was hoping she would take a hint and let go so he could go back to his usual shrug-off-the-shoulders routine, but as she didn't let go it forced Lance to look Pidge in the eyes again.

The younger paladin frowned, brows knit in concern. "If something's the matter, Lance, I hope you know you can tell me," Pidge offered gently. "You're one of my friends. Even back at Garrison. And that meant something to me, even if I didn't tell you guys enough at the time."

Lance huffed, stopping in his tracks. Throwing his hands out of his pockets he gave a bodily shrug. "Why is everyone always so intent about talking about feelings? Not that a manly guy such as myself has any embarrassing feelings to worry about. But for the rest of you, there's gotta be a chance of something embarrassing slipping out."

The commentary seemed to work almost too well as Pidge let out a frustrated noise and released Lance's fingers. "Nevermind. Forget I even asked."

"With pleasure," Lance snarked.

He stood his ground, watching as Pidge continued her walk down the hall when he felt a strong pang in his chest. He swallowed and crossed his arms.

"I mean, it's not really a concern on my part or anything. But… Pidge, do you… worry about your mom? Back home?" Lance asked.

Pidge froze in place, shoulders raised for a moment. Lance truly wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing at first but slowly, Pidge dropped them again.

"Yeah. A lot," she answered. When she looked back at Lance, there was something almost heavy to the look in her eyes. "We both wanted answers about my brother and dad. We both wanted them back more than anything… but if I regret anything… it's that I know she's going to be wanting the same for me now, too."

It was such a painful and honest answer, it almost took Lance's breath away. He rubbed his shoulder.

"There's always that stereotype with big families… that you get lost in them," Lance replied steadily. "That you never know your place or get enough attention. I guess I believed it for a while, too. But… Maybe I didn't. Maybe I've always known that my whole, big family loved me – each and every one of them – and that everything I did to be different, to not be like everyone else in the family wasn't really just for me and just to stand out." He looked at Pidge intently. "It was because of everyone, if Lance could be the best pilot at Garrison, well, think of all the crazy stuff they could do. We all could do." He smiled, mostly for himself. "And they were all so proud of that. They even believed that I really was the best pilot of the whole class."

When the long rant ended, it was left hanging there between the two of them. Filling the air with dead space.

More than a little awkward, Lance glanced off, rubbing at his neck nervously.

Oversharing wasn't exactly a new thing for him, but still.

The worst part was that the loneliness only ached his bones more once they were spread open and left bare.

"Just imagine how happy they'll be when we get back," Pidge suddenly spoke up. Lance looked at her, slightly mystified. "You're not just the best pilot – you're a paladin. You save the universe on the daily. And you'll get to tell them that every alien world you saved, every Galra ship you took down, it was for them. And everyone in the universe knew it was."

Lance nearly forgot to breathe with how strongly the words touched him. He looked at Pidge gratefully.

"Imagine how happy your mom's going to be," Lance offered back. "You won't just be bringing yourself back – but you're whole family! It'll be like… thegreatest welcome home gift anyone has ever given!"

Pidge's smile grew, wrinkling by her eyes. "You're right." She then amended, "We're both right." She then offered her hand. "Until then, we'll make this our home."

"Yeah," Lance said fondly, taking Pidge's hand. "Yeah, we will."