"Feeling any better?" Keith asked handing Victoria a paper cup of water. He'd thought about getting her a glass, but thought that he'd rather not give the girl ammunition.

"Would you?!" she weezed, "my…my own…my own…to think he kept a picture of…of…THAT…"

She had pieced together what picture Lance must've been talking about, but had reacting by throwing everything she could get her hands on across the room. She nearly hit Keith multiple times.

It didn't make much sense to Keith either. From what he'd seen and heard, it didn't make any sense.

then again LANCE didn't make any sense to Keith from the very beginning.

"Even so…" Keith said slowly, "reason or no, i'm sure he cares more about you. It took me longer and…well, actually Hunk had to point it out to me. But i'm sure you already know that Lance-"

"Oh stuff it Mullet," Victoria said, sounding so much like Lance and he had to turn and make sure it really was her, "you guys may be in on our family, but you all will never understand. Not really. I just don't understand WHY he would keep that…poison and actually CARE about it."

Keith shrugged.

"I'm not arguing with you," he said, "in fact you make all the right points. But we both know that with Lance, the rules really never matter."

"…damn…you're right…"

She sighed and drew her blanket around her. she was calming down slowly and Keith felt a little glow of accomplishment.

()

"What do we do…" Hunks bottom lip trembled slightly.

"…pray?…." Pidge had no idea. Science wasn't going to help with this one. Only a good old fashioned miracle was going to fix it.

In Hunks hands was a pile of tiny pieces of a shredded photograph. Lance had hidden his book in the vent. The picture had somehow gotten loose and when the fans were turned on for ventilation….well….the picture hadn't stood a chance against the ships air tunnels of death.

Without the mice's help…they never would have found it.

Allura and Coran tried to scan each piece so the could put them together, but it would have taken forever, there were just so many tiny pieces.

()

When they got back, Pidge peaked inside the twins bedroom only to find Keith sitting on the floor by Victoria's bed. the girl was telling him one of the many stories that she and Lance had made up together. Lance was nowhere to be seen.

she looked back at Hunk and shook her head. Together they entered the room and showed them what they had found.

"Lance is gonna get pissed…"

As angry as she had been, Vic looked like she'd do anything at that point to put it back together.

"I think i'll be the safest one," she said holding out her hands, "since he doesn't really remember you guys, he'll have no qualms attacking you."

"Would he really attack us over a picture?" Pidge asked and Keith almost glared at her.

"He chucked a book at Shiro, i think its safe to say he would."

"Allura said she'd try to piece together what she'd been able to scan, but we're not even sure if we have all the pieces."

"Jigsaw puzzle from Hell," Pidge sighed, "so what happened when this picute was taken that makes this so important?"

Viks face screwed up as she scowled. Keith leaned away slightly and felt only a little relieved that he'd given her a paper cup instead of a sold one.

"Nothing," she muttered, "literally nothing…it was the best day ever."

The paladins exchanged looks.

"…aaaaand that's bad?"

"Che," Vik sneered at them, "papa was scum. there wasn't a single day when he wasn't hitting mama or us. There wasn't a single day when he wasn't trying to manipulate and control our lives. Not a single day….except that day. For some reason he woke us both up before dawn and drove us all to the river. Lance and I really thought he meant to kill us and use the river to hide the evidence. But he didn't…instead he taught us how to fish. Not once that day did he raise his voice. He even laughed and…for the first time we could remember…he hugged us. He taught us how to build and start a campfire and how to clean and prepare the fish we caught. We were completely taken off guard, but we knew better than to ruin the opportunity and spoil the moment. Better to accept the gift and roll with it than to call it out and suffer."

Vik started to bite her nails as she glared at the end of her bed. The others kept quiet. That couldn't be all to the story.

"The next day it was like it never happened," Vik said her scowling getting deeper, "we actually thought we had dreamed it. It wouldn't have been the first time we had the exact same dream…twin stuff, ya know. but we had that picture. It was physical evidence that it had really happened. That we had spent one day with our father and hadn't been afraid of him once. Just once."

"why?" Hunk asked before he could stop himself.

"Hell if i know," Vik snapped, "it was probably a new idea for manipulation, i don't know! We hated him all the more for it! At least…i thought WE did…apparently I was the only one who hated that day the most!"

Keith didn't understand really, but he understood false hope. He also hated it and felt he at least understood her anger. So now the only question was why didn't Lance hate it?

"Lance is a romantic," Pidge said, "i swear most of his choices and suggestions are either what he saw in a movie, or what he created all by himself."

Hunk nodded, "that day was probably a life line."

Vik crushed the paper cup in her hand as she glared at them, "what?"

Pidge sighed, "if you'd just think it through instead of getting emotional, you probably would have figured it out a long time ago. Now this is just a theory and a guess, but you said that your dad was teaching Lance and you his…'trade' of sorts? Well, from what we know of Lance, he's a pretty tender soul. I honestly can't picture any sort of blood on his hands at all."

"I found out that he's quick to blame himself when things go wrong," Hunk continued and Keith snorted.

"Whatever," the red paladin said, "everything was my fault remember?"

"A front," Vik said before the others could, "the more he says something is not his fault the more he feels responsible for the outcome."

Hunk and pidge nodded and Keith was still confused. It seemed the three of them were now one the same page and he was still on block one. Pidge noticed his expression and shortened their explanation.

"He didn't want to believe that his father was all bad because he was being taught to be like him. If there was even a little good in the man, then there was also hope for himself."

Keith thought that through.

"There's smoke coming out of his mullet," Vik said grinning and Keith frowned at her. She was back to the way she was before she'd found out about the picture. It was true that after she had calmed down enough to think it through, it all made perfect sense. She had just been so angry about it, that she'd blocked out any other kind of reasoning.

"I'll talk to Lance about it tonight," Vik said nodding, "and i'll tell him about the picture."

They put the scraps in a ziplock bag and Pidge asked where Shiro and Lance were.

"Shiro sent a message and said they were going to be gone for a little while, didn't say where," Keith said.

They sat in silence for a while until Hunk asked about the story they had interrupted when they arrived.

()

Shiro had wanted to use this time to gain Lances trust. It had occurred to the man that he had never had to earn it. Lance had given his trust to him openly and freely; even Hunk had said that Lance had to warm up to him at first.

Shiro blinked at the brick red child before him. They sat in the ice cream parlor and Lance stared at his shake as though he might be sick. It had taken a long time, but Lance had gotten out what he'd wanted to say.

"Well," shiro said, "you can't expect memories to come back all at once. You said they were 'snippets', and that's good."

Lance shook his head, "…not…"

"Why isn't it good?"

Lance took a deep breath and focused, "…am…mm…am..bad?"

Shiro frowned. He was pretty confident at this point that he could understand the broken phrases pretty well, but couldn't grasp this one.

"…bad?" Lance asked again and pointed to himself.

"…no," Shiro said, not sure if that was the right answer, but knew he needed to answer quickly, "Not at all."

Shiro watched the boy relax and sigh a little.

Lance, while he'd been freaking out about his missing picture began to get small flash backs to previous conversations with the people in front of him. It had scared him as he started to remember everything out or order.

To him, the fact that he was so close to others other than Victoria made him feel like a traitor. the snippets that he saw and remembered came with emotions and thoughts he'd had at the time as well. He felt as though he had ruined his relationship with his sister…his other half. It wasn't the picture he'd kept, it was the fact that he'd made friends.

At least, that is what he had thought.

Had he become a horrible person? was Victoria angry with him because he'd really become just like their papa?

Those were the thoughts going through his mind and kept needling him. Even after Shiro had told him he wasn't a bad person…he couldn't shake the feeling that he'd messed up big time.

()

Lance stared at the pile of the shredded picture on Victorias side table. The thick polaroid paper discolored and ruined on the rare piece that was large enough to see. Even if he'd been able to piece it together, the picture would be spoiled and not visible anymore.

"I really am sorry," Victoria said holding onto his arm, "Though i can't say i'm not a little…happy i don't have to look at it- but i'm sorry you're sad. I'm sorry you don't have it anymore."

He knew why she'd hated it, but it didn't stop him from being upset- no…he was terrified. It was his charm. It was his grounding evidence.

What was he supposed to do without it?

He pulled his sister close and held onto her. He was shaking and she held on tighter to him. They stood there, supporting each other like they always had.

"Lancelot was never his parents," Vic said, "neither are you. You have a round table downstairs that really cares for you and worries about you. They see you as one of them, not papa. let them be your reminder from now on…ok?"

Lance let her words sink in and thought about everything he knew about the group of "strangers-but-not-strangers" that they could hear through the floor.

"You're not ….not…angry ….with me?"

"Nope," came the simple answer.

()

Diner was outside due to the amount of people that were at the house. Layla had invited Hunks family over and they had brought their own contribution of the feast.

"I still think it would have been better to go back to the castle," Allura said shaking her head, "there's more room there."

"And be away form my own pots and pans?" Lance's mom laughed, "I think not!"

"Mama really loves her own kitchen," Vic said picking up a bottle of hot sauce and making everyone jump. When did she come downstairs let alone enter their view!?

"NO!" Mary grabbed Vic, "put that down! We're making pie!"

"A little spice in pie should be fine," Vic said showing a mischievous smile.

"Nooo!" Marco complained and he ran out of the kitchen as Vic tipped the bottle upside down.

Lance's hand came out of nowhere and blocked bowl from the sauce and expertly snatched the bottle away from his sister. Not a drop of sauce made it into the pie.

He then rubbed the sauce that spilled on his hand onto his other hand and held it up to Vic, who licked the sauce off his palm. He licked his other hand.

"I still think it would taste just fine," she shrugged licking her lips, "hot sauce goes with everything."

Lance shrugged, choosing to neither agree or disagree. He glanced around the room and froze. Everyone was staring at him. Frowning, he backed away and placed Victoria between him and the others.

"Feeling better?" Shiro asked. Lance shrugged and linked arms with his sister.

"Ah," their mother slapped his arm, "you know what the doctor said about that behavior. The last thing we need is for you two to go back to that 'inner dependency' thing, that we've just managed to get you OUT of!"

Victoria laughed and Lance rolled his eyes.

"The doc thinks the reason Lance didn't talk for so long was because i always knew what he wanted, so he never tried. Apparently a lot of twins who are really close suffer from it," Victoria explained as the mother dragged Lance away to have him help her set up the table.

"Seems a logical conclusion," Pidge said and waited for the rebuff, but it didn't come.

"Maybe," Vic said sticking her finger in the pie filling, and holding out a berry for her. Pidge shrugged and ate it off her finger.

The evening was cool, almost chilly, but the house had plenty of jackets to go around. The sky was clear and as the children made their way to bed, Coran cleared his throat.

"We really should be going soon," he said, his voice oddly loud as the many conversations lulled at the same time.

"That's true…" Allura said, regrettably.

"But," Hunk glanced in Lances direction, "shouldn't we…wait….a while?"

"I'm sure the Blades and other members of the Alliance are wondering where we are," Coran argued, "I'm not saying we have to leave right away…but we can't be away for much longer."

Everyone fell silent with their own thoughts for a while.

They were back home and not a single one of them felt any drive to leave.

"ok."

They all stared at Lance who scowled back at them all for staring. He shifted under their gazes and shrugged.

"Well," Shiro chuckled, "If Lance is ready to go, then we all don't have much of an excuse, do we?"