Disclaimer: I don't own VLD!

A/N: Back to the Castle to plan! This chapter is Lance-focused with a half cup of Coran but the next chapter belongs to Hunk!


Chapter 4

"Can I see?"

Lance almost didn't hear Coran through the headphones. He looked up from his spot on his back on the floor and saw the orange-haired Altean hovering over him. He had thought that he was tucked away somewhere the others wouldn't find him, on one of the many unused floors of the castle. Lance actually wasn't entirely sure where he was…

"Um…" He sat up and pulled off Pidge's headphones, letting them hang around his neck. Did he still want to be alone? He wasn't sure. When Pidge had very kindly but firmly asked him and Hunk to stop hovering while she worked on decoding information from the vid, he had started wandering. Once he got tired, he stopped, which was how he wound up wherever he was.

No, he didn't really want to be alone.

"Or I can just sit here." Coran plopped down against the wall, his hands going around one knee. "Sitting here is good too."

For a few minutes, the two of them simply sat in quiet companionship, the only sounds coming from Pidge's headphones since Lance hadn't turned his video off. In his hand, vids were playing on his cell phone. Pidge had found a way to power the cells a long time ago, so they could at least look at old pictures and listen to downloaded music, even if they were otherwise useless pieces of old Earth junk.

To Lance, that cell was a link back to his life back on Earth. He had let the Alteans listen to his music, but he hadn't really shown them many pictures or videos. Or any really.

One vid that he had watched a hundred times since launching into space started playing, and Lance scooted back until he was sitting right beside Coran. He pulled the headphone cord out of the phone so Coran could hear and held the cell between them.

On the screen, Josie and Theo were making faces at the camera, obviously thinking they were taking pictures instead of recording. Josie put her hands on either side of her face and pursed her lips, blubbing like a fish, while Theo dragged his eyelids down and stuck his tongue out. Lance could remember taking that video while snickering to himself. Occasionally his muffled laughter was audible on the video.

"Did you take it yet?" Theo asked, "My eyes are getting dry."

"I'm a goldfishy," Josie said, waving her hands back and forth against her cheeks. "See?"

"These are great," said Lance's disembodied voice, slightly tinny from the cellphone's unaided speakers, "Yeeep, good pictures."

Theo frowned and leaned over, his head disappearing out of the frame. "You idiot, you're taking video!"

The frame shook as Theo and Lance battled over the cell phone and then the cell phone fell to the ground. It was picked up a moment later by Josie, who turned it toward Lance and Theo wrestling on the patio.

Her giggles were contagious, but Lance couldn't bring himself to smile this time.

The video came to an abrupt stop because Josie had turned the cell off. Lance could remember grabbing her and dragging her over so he could tickle her and Theo until they were gasping with laughter. Or at least until Theo accidentally kicked him in the face, starting a nose bleed and prompting their mother to start yelling at the three of them from an upstairs window. He wished he could remember everything better.

"They're as adorable and energetic as a pair of rendelmarker pups."

Lance leaned his head back against the wall. "How scared do you think they are?"

"I don't think it's going to do you or them any good dwelling on that," Coran said gently.

"I can't stop thinking about it." Lance looped his arms around his legs and drew them to his aching chest. "You heard Josie screaming right?" He was never going to get that sound out of his head. Josie, his pajarita, sweet and quirky and gentle and loving. Screaming.

"Lance…"

"And Theo's going to say the wrong thing to the wrong Galra and—" He couldn't finish that sentence, and he closed his eyes against the brutal, unwanted mental image. Theo was feisty and smart-mouthed and headstrong. There was no way he would be a quiet, compliant prisoner.

And the Galra were unforgiving.

His brother and sister were small and breakable and alone. They had no idea that anyone was coming for them. They probably thought he was dead, and even if they didn't, there was no way they could imagine that he was going to come for them, that he would do anything to get them back.

"Breathe." Coran's hand rested on his back, rubbing circles, and Lance gulped in a deep breath, filling his burning lungs. He hadn't realized that he was holding his breath. He was just so…angry and upset and frustrated.

"It's my fault the Galra took them, isn't it?"

Coran looked at him solemnly. "The Galra's actions aren't your fault."

"Coran."

The Altean sighed. "It isn't your fault. But yes, they were most likely taken to hurt you and lure you in. Which is why we must be careful."

"I don't care about being careful," Lance spat, leaning into his anger instead of his sadness. "I just want them back." He looked down his cell phone, turning it over in his hands. "Do you think they have the rest of my family? Or Hunk's?"

"Most likely not," Coran said after a contemplative moment. Lance was glad he didn't answer immediately, since it meant he actually thought about it. "The Galra probably think that taking the little ones was enough and left the others. It'd be easier, honestly, to take fewer prisoners. Though…I don't say this to worry you, but it does mean that they know where your home is."

"Yeah, I guessed that." Lance banged his head back against the wall. He was putting his family in danger by being out here playing space ranger extraordinaire. He should've found a way to get home ages ago. But he was helping the universe. He was doing something good. But was doing the right thing worth losing his family? He wanted to save the universe and his family, and he was going to have to figure out how to do that and quick. He tried to bang his head against the wall again, but instead he hit something soft.

"Ow." Coran pulled his hand away and gave it a shake. "Could you not do that anymore? It's hurting my head watching you do that, so I imagine it doesn't feel very nice."

"Right…sorry."

Silence dropped, but it wasn't weird or annoying. It was Coran who broke it this time.

"I had two younger brothers."

"Huh?" Lance lifted his head from where he had been resting his chin on his knees and looked at Coran.

The orange-haired Altean was a faraway look on his face, and all ten thousand plus years of existence bent his shoulders. "One was a healer. The other was a pilot in the Altean Galactic Corps." Violet eyes darkened. "I know a little of what you're feeling. Things happened to them because of my position…" Coran sighed. "It's easy to blame yourself is what I'm trying to say, but you can't take the blame for something others have done. Especially when it comes to the treachery of the Galra."

"But this wouldn't have happened—"

"If you weren't the Blue Paladin?" Coran said, raising an eyebrow. "No, perhaps not. But you are the only one in the universe fit to be the Blue Paladin, and as the Blue Paladin, you also have every tool and skill and connection available to take them back and make those quiznaking Galra pay for it."

Lance wasn't sure if he believed all that about being the only one capable of flying Blue, but he could tell Coran did. For his friend, he forced a weak smile. "That was a good pep talk."

"Back on Altea, I was a part time inspirational speech-giver in the lower presentational courts!" He leaned over and pointed at Lance's cell phone. "Now, if you don't mind, show me some more holos on that little device of yours?"

"Really? Okay…"