The Elder Arusian stayed with Lance, rubbing his back in a circular motion; the gesture was small, but it reminded the Blue Paladin of his mamá Cuca who would look after him when he was sick. During the time he had been busy hurling up his lunch, another Arusian had made its way over, seeming to be looking for Ulyseon. He could hear the Elder speak with them before they scurried off only to return moments later with a cup filled with what Lance assumed to be water. The Arusian gently nudge him to take the liquid, and to Lance taking a sip of some unknown liquid and swishing it in his mouth seemed better than to have bits of lunch hanging out between his teeth. It wasn't mouthwash, but it would do, for now, hopefully, no one would notice his bad breath, hopefully.

Lance took a deep breath, held it for five seconds, and then let it out. Ulyseon, waited for the teenager until he felt ready to return to the Arusian village, the Paladin followed behind the Elder and as they got closer, he could hear cheers coming from the center. The sounds of the Arusian cries for joy and excitement seemed louder than they had when they had first met them. The teen couldn't help but give a smile, happy that Voltron was able to protect them.

As he walked into the village center, Lance was surprised to hear Keith's voice asking of his whereabouts, Lance looked over to him and smiled telling him saying that he was with the village elder. It wasn't a lie, but Lance didn't feel close enough to the drop-out to tell him why he was with Ulyseon. Why should he tell someone he wasn't close to his problems, especially ones that he himself wasn't sure about?

And seeing a question he couldn't answer about himself is what scared him most.

.-v-.-v-.-v-.

As much as Lance looked forward to the party Allura had planned, there was a part of him that had no want to take part in the celebrations. The short rest he was able to get before the small aliens arrived didn't feel at all helpful, and the nap that he tried to take ended up in failure, as usual. All throughout the Arusian's little play, the Blue Paladin kept his eyes open, looking for the elder Arusian, he felt unsatisfied of how their conversation ended before and after the attack against the giant monster, so he kept an eye on the crowd looking for her. As the play was coming to an end he accepted, begrudgingly, that the elder did not seem to attend the celebration.

Lance looked around him, trying to find a reason as to stay, but the conversation he had with Keith and Hunk seemed to be the breaking point between reality and dream for him. He knew that Hunk didn't mean anything by what he said, but even then, Lance couldn't help but feel dejected. The thought of no longer being able to see his family was gut-wrenching. The Cuban let out a sigh, telling his friend that the nunvill was getting to him and that he just needed a few minutes to clear his head. He could feel Hunk's gaze on him as he left and his name being called faintly, but he didn't turn back.

The walk to the castle bridge felt long for some reason, maybe it was because he was taking his time, or it was because he was alone. What was the saying? When with good company the time is shorter? Time flies by? Whatever it was, a walk filled with silence was one that Lance didn't realize he needed until now. The sounds of those in the entrance hall were beginning to slowly vanish in the background the further he walked and the longer he thought.

Entering the bridge, Lance looked around to assure that he was truly alone. He had always said that he would rather be with a crowd than by himself but taking a moment in his day to just get away from expectations was something he enjoyed. The Cuban didn't have to smile awkwardly or put up an act in front of others, here he could just be himself, here he could sit back and relax. Lance took a seat in front of Shiro's seat and took a deep breath. He thought back to the sudden headache that felt more like a migraine; the Paladin had first assumed that the headache was a result of stress or lack of sleep, but he questioned this when it suddenly disappeared on the defeat of the mechanical beast. It didn't help that he was now worried over the dark cloud the elder Arusian claimed had gotten darker after his episode.

Lance groaned into his hands, wondering if he would get answers to the confusing events that have occurred to him and the rest of the team, if he would ever be able to go home, free from the worries of war and fear. He wondered what the Garrison had told each of their families of to attribute to their disappearance, how his family was taking the news that they may not see their son ever again. As he sat there, he laughed at himself in pity thinking that his family was right, he would one day be abducted by aliens if he joined the Garrison. In a way he was, but due to the actions of a mechanical Lion and a war that called for the use of said Lion and a Paladin to pilot her. There was a part of the young man that wanted to return home, not the Garrison, but Cuba, to the time before he and his family left because of the hostility. To the time he and his siblings would goof around at the beach and run through the square trying to beat each other to the ice cream cart. The Cuban wanted to go back to the bright blue-painted homemade from concrete. Back to the time when their neighbors would share some of their vegetables from their garden or would advise them of a vendor having cheap prices. Lance felt a sting from his head as he looked back to his childhood, but he ignored it as he heard the doors open behind him.

Looking up at the sound of Coran's voice, he saw as the elder Altean hopped down next to the Blue Paladin. The man looked at the young man with a worried expression written across his face before he spoke, "Mind if I join you?"

"How far away from Earth are we Coran?" Lance hesitated to ask this to the Altean. There was a nagging feeling in his gut that told him he wouldn't like the answer, but he had to know, he had to know why the planets were so far away from each other. Why the universe had the galaxies separated from one another, he just wanted an answer. Why was that so much to ask?

Coran pulled up a holographic map surrounding them, pointing immediately to the Milky Way before scrolling the map to where they were at. The blue eyes widened as they watched galaxy after galaxy being scrolled past. He watched spiral galaxies with their flat spinning disk and spiral arms; elliptical galaxies with their cigar-like appearance holding up to a trillion stars; the lens-like appearance of lenticular galaxies; and irregular galaxies with their misshapen form full of gas and dust nursing new stars. Seeing this, Lance immediately wanted Coran to stop, he didn't want him to continue going on any longer, the feeling of not seeing anything other than stars in the vast space they were in was heart-wrenching. The young man swallowed dryly, before he spoke up, stopping the Altean from finding their location, the Paladin no longer needing a visual demonstration of how far away they were from his home planet.

"Why are the planets so far away from each other Coran? I mean, I know why I was taught about it in at the Garrison, but why were they made to be so far apart?"

The elder Altean looked back at the adolescence in sadness, he knew the feeling that the boy was facing, the two were homesick. However, unlike the boy, Coran and the Princess no longer had a planet to return to, no people that shared their beliefs or culture, nothing of that sort. Lance and the other Paladins had a place to return to after all this, they had a chance to be happy when they saw their family, it was only a matter of time to see them again, yet, there was something about the way the Blue Paladin looked that feared something more. Coran remembered seeing the same expression when the Paladins had attempted the mind merging practice, the same look that seemed as if the boy had seen a nightmare. The Altean hadn't realized he had said this aloud until the Cuban let out a chuckle and muttered something under his breath in a language Coran was not familiar with. The translators must be off, the elder Altean thought to himself.

"I'm just a boy from the island of Cuba, the memories I have there are vivid and are engraved in my mind, but ever since we found the Blue Lion and fought against the Galra, my memories became muddled. Something I once thought was unforgettable became forgettable, even before all this, I would talk with my family and recall our time in Cuba, but it was almost as if all of them didn't share the same memories I did. I always considered we might have had different perspectives of those memories, but even the memories that were simple, such as where the best paletero was in the square, the same paletero we would always go seemed to change in location between my siblings. In my memories he was always near the gazebo, to my siblings he was either near the pharmacy, the candy store, or the pizzeria.

"Coran, I'm afraid of going home one day and not being able to recall details like this in my time in Cuba, at the Garrison, or here in space with all of you. Do you," Lance paused for a second, "do you think there is something wrong with my head?"

Coran stayed silent, allowing himself to think about what the boy had just said, "My boy, I cannot tell you if there is something wrong, but what I can say, that sometimes memories of the past are different for every individual. Sometimes the memories we thought we shared with others tend to not be so, but keep in mind, that the memories we do know about, the ones we are sure of, those are the ones worth keeping. Keep those memories close to you, what your family looked like, the last memories you had with them, treasure them until we get you all home."

Lance looked over at Coran before looking back up at the image of the Milky Way before them. If he were sure of one memory, it would be the feeling and smell of rain back on Earth.

"I miss the feeling of rain on my face, running in puddles, trudging mud into the house, and then having mom yell at me and nephew clean the mud stains on her floor."

"Rain?"

"Yeah, it's water that falls from the sky."

"Oh, we had that on Altea," started Coran. "Only it wasn't water, more like rocks. Razor-sharp and boiling hot, they could knock a hole right in your head if you weren't careful."

Lance laughed as Coran told him the story of too many close calls from the boiling rocks on the account that King Alfor just had to buy his favorite dessert to share with a younger Allura before they sold out. The former ruler of Altea could care less about using his position to sneak out of the castle, as long as the delicious and scrumptious kouzelný dort (1) was shared with the younger princess.

The two sat on the floor, sharing stories of their home planets, sharing memories that were dear to the two of them, from Coran's grandpop who built the castle, to Lance's sister who encouraged him to join the Galaxy Garrison. It seemed as the two of them had a family member who became their role models when they most needed someone. Lance relaxed for a while until he told Coran that they should return to the party before the others—namely Hunk—come looking for them.

Lance followed behind Coran as they made their way toward the mechanical doors when Rover, Pidge's new sidekick, entered the bridge. Lance thought nothing of it, until he saw no Pidge underneath the former-Galra drone nor anywhere near the mechanical pyramid. The Blue Paladin frowned for a second before stopping to look at Rover that was making its way ever closer to the giant crystal hovering over the bridge. The gentle green lights that the tech gave off soon changed to a bright red, and the slow beeps that it made began to pick up as soon as it reached the crystal. Lance's eyes widened as he realized what was about to happen, in a matter of seconds he thought back to Coran who had no protective gear on him, and immediately made his way to push the Altean to the floor as he received the force of the impact on his back. He felt as debris started to fall on him and the Altean, but Lance didn't give a second thought as he threw his shield over Coran to assure himself that he wouldn't be hurt from the rubble that was falling all around them. He could hear the man struggling to get up as Lance tried to block any more debris from hitting his head, he quickly yelled at Coran to stay down and to try to cover his head to lessen the impact of possible debris from injuring him. The Cuban sighed as he saw that the Altean listened to him before he tried to crawl his way toward the older gentlemen; however, Lance should have stayed in his place because he didn't see when one of the wires that held the crystal in place had snapped from its place and hit the Cuban straight in the head before he lost consciousness.

.-v-.-v-.-v-.

Everything around the Blue Paladin was blurry, from the blurry figures hovering over him to the voices that seemed to call out his name. As much as he wanted to fully open his eyes, his body and mind fought against the act. He could feel himself being lifted, and as he felt a pair of hands on his back, he let out a pain-filled groan. His back felt cold and hot at the same time, it felt bare and tender. Whatever this sensation was, Lance wanted nothing of it, and as those hands slowly and gently picked him up he once again succumbed to the feeling of sleep.

.-v-.-v-.-v-.

In his endless slumber, he could hear his name being called out, but for a moment, the Cuban frowned as he was called by something else. Growing up, he had been given nicknames from his family, bebo from his parents and grandparents, and little astronaut from his older siblings. However, this name that was being said with a cynical tone, sounded from a far-off dream. It was almost like a forgotten memory of long days past. But that wasn't right, his name is Lance, has always been Lance, so whoever this voice was calling for confused him with someone else because he is Lance McClain, a simple boy from Cuba.

Right?


Notes

(1) Kouzelný is actually Czech for magic cake.

So... How's everyone? Doing good? Great!