"I know you're worried about Lance, but you can't act out like this," Shiro starts once they are appropriately away from the team. "I don't appreciate you questioning me as the leader of this team, especially in front of the others. If you have a problem with something I decide, then you need to pull me aside and talk to me about it in private. You arguing with me in public affects how this team functions."
"What happened to 'never leave a man behind'?" Keith demands, his emotions swirling in his chest. He hates it when Shiro lectures him. He isn't a child.
Shiro huffs out a breath and presses a hand into Keith's shoulder. "We aren't going to leave him behind, Keith, but we can't risk losing contact with more members of the team. Instead of yelling at me and demanding the path you think is best, I need you to help me come up with constructive ideas."
Keith scowls at him. He knows he is being stubborn, but he feels felt sick with worry, with anxiety. He can't stand just hanging around waiting for something to happen or waiting for someone to come up with an idea. Patience has never been his strong suit. "If we're going to do something, we need to do something. The longer we dither around, the more likely it is that Lance is…"
Hurt, injured, dead, gone.
"I know." Shiro says. "I know, which is why we're gonna figure something out. It's possible Pidge has something in her tech arsenal that we can send beneath the electric storm to get us a reading and then come back up so we can assess what's going on."
They're both side stepping actually saying what could be happening with Lance. Neither of them wants to admit out loud that he might already be dead. Keith wants to cry, he can feel it at the back of his throat and under his eyes.
"He's gonna be ok, right?" his own voice is unrecognizable in his ears, tiny and broken. He feels embarrassed and desperate for comfort at the same time, like if Shiro will only say that Lance is going to come back to them, come back to Keith, it will be true.
The look in Shiro's eyes is sad, pained. He doesn't say anything, just pulls Keith into a tight hug.
Lance can't move. He expended the last of his energy dragging himself away from the edge. He is dizzy and sick, his head throbbing. Every one of his limbs is made of jello. At some point, he had thrown up in his suit. There is blood on the glass of his helmet and he doesn't remember how it got there.
The beach was his favorite place in the universe. He loved to lay in the sun, and play in the tide pools with his siblings and younger cousins, to surf with his dad when the waves were just right. When it stormed, he loved to go to the pier to look at the sea and feel the rain and wind against his skin. It was cool and refreshing. His mama always scolded him, saying he would get sick, but he didn't care. He wanted to stay out there forever.
The noise of the planet beneath him preparing to shake apart is louder in his head now, like maybe it isn't just the planet but himself. He had tuned out a lot of the white noise during the trek here, the clattering of rocks and the growl of split stone grating together. He can hear the laval hissing and spitting below. Ringing in his ears is a scream like he has never heard before, like the sound of a million frozen rockslides, sharp and haunting.
There are voices behind the sounds around him, the murmurs of his family, of his friends. He can hear Hunk laughing, can feel the phantom weight of one of his hugs. Pidge is telling him all about one of her new projects, her voice high with excitement as she rambles. Shiro is telling him stories of his days in the Garrison, way back when he was a cadet; he accentuates the story with his hands, voice thick with laughter. Allura is talking about her home, about Altea; she is regal and sharp and beautiful. Coran talks animatedly about the paladins of old, telling him stories of their adventures. Keith whispers stories about his past, the foster homes he lived in, his brief stint of being homeless when he was in that gray age in between being a minor and an adult.
Lance draggs ragged breaths of air, but it's getting harder, like there is a weight pressed against his chest. His throat is dry, and his lips are cracked, and his mouth tastes like bile. He lets his eyes blink closed. He needs to get up, to move. If he stays here, he'll die.
He doesn't move.
Lance continues to lie there, for how long he doesn't know, but when he blinks his eyes open there is a tiny green bot hovering in front of his face. It beeps at him, trilling in what sounds like worry to Lance's slow, slow brain. There is a lense focussed on him, and Lance knows without a shadow of a doubt that Pidge made this robot and sent it to him.
It churps at him again, moving closer to nudge at his helmet. In his mind, he sees his companions looking at him through this bot, seeing his miserable state. He thinks of how upset Keith must be, seeing him like this.
With strength he didn't realize he had, he drags himself up onto his hands, then onto his knees. "I'm coming," he rasps out. "I'm not giving up. I'm coming."
He crawls. Each motion forward is agony. His shoulder hurts. He can't move one of his ankles. He is dizzy and sick and he's not sweating even though he should be. Everything doubles in his vision, making the path forward hard to see. He keeps his eyes trained on the bot, his only hope. It bobs in his vision, cheering him onwards with tiny beeps and churps.
At some point, he thinks he hears an explosion. His head turns and off in the distance he can see one of the mountains has exploded into a geyser of lava. When had he made it outside? Hadn't he been in a tunnel? He can see Blue now, in the distance. He's so close. He's so close. He's so close.
When Lance makes it to Blue, the robot is gone. Blue is sitting exactly where he left her, still as a statue. His chest heaves as he fights for breath, and he thinks maybe he threw up again along the way but he can't remember. His hands - where the hell did his gloves go? - are severely burnt. He can't look at them, can't feel them. Devoid of strength, drained of all his willpower , he lays flat on his stomach at Blue's feet, helmet pressed into the stone.
Blue will keep me safe, he thinks to himself. Blue will take me home.
He pictures home in his head: his team around him. Hunk laughing, hugging him. Pidge with her bots and her brains and her witt. Shiro encouraging them all to be there best, to do their best. Allura, beautiful and charming and smart, teaching them the ways of her people. Coran, brightening his days even as he keeps them cleaning. Keith, head on his shoulder, smile in his voice. Keith's lips on his, wrapped tight in his arms. Keith, safe and sound and happy. Keith, training with him, talking with him, being with him. Keith.
Home.
Shiro walks into Blue's mouth by himself, while the rest of them wait anxiously. When Pidge's scout robot had brought back the footage of Lance, half dead with blood and vomit in his helmet, his hands gloveless and disfigured, Keith had lost his shit. If he was being completely honest with himself, all he can remember is the world going red. At some point, he might have punched Shiro in the face because when the world snapped back into focus there was a swelling welt across their leader's jaw, and Keith's knuckles were bruised.
It must have been ugly because even now Hunk keeps a soothing arm around his shoulders. It's comforting, in a way, but also feels like a restraint. On his other side, Pidge stands too close. Allura waits, her feet placed just outside of Blue's open maw, her hands clenched tightly behind her back. Coran is in the medical bay, frantically prepping a pod for Lance.
When Shiro comes out, Lance is limp in his arms. He has taken the liberty of stripping the tattered suit off of him, and all Lance is wearing is shorts and a tank top. There is blood on the back of Lance's head, dried in matted clumps of hair. There is a line of bubbled flesh on his right cheek, the skin around it red like fire. His hands… Keith can't look at them. They are worse in person.
"He's breathing," Shiro tells them, his eyes warily on Keith. "We'll get a full diagnosis when we get him to the med bay."
They all follow him, and Keith is suddenly grateful for Hunk's arm around his shoulder. He can't stop looking at Lance's closed eyes, his slack mouth. Wake up, he wants to say, but his voice is stuck in his throat. When Pidge slips her hand into his, tears fill his eyes. Hunk squeezes him closer and sniffs, telling Keith that it's okay if he needs to cry, he feels like crying, too.
The walk to the med bay is long and deathly quiet. Keith's heart thrums heavily in his throat and his eyes burn with misery. He wants to call back the past. Looking at Lance like this, half dead, severely injured, all he wants is to have him warm and alive and wrapped tightly in Keith's arms. He feels guilt simmering in his gut; he should have defied Shiro's orders in the first place. Maybe this never would have happened if he had just gone after Lance himself.
They enter the med bay and Coran turns towards them from where he had been tapping instructions into a pod. His face, which had been neutral when they walked in, crumples. "Oh, my poor boy," he murmurs, helping Shiro stand Lance up in the pod. The pod takes hold, and the clear doors slide shut. Coran turns back to the screen, sliding his fingers up along it to open a new panel.
"Besides, the, ah, obvious," Shiro starts, trying to sound neutral and failing. He opens his mouth to continue but stops.
"Four broken ribs," Coran recites, eyes flicking over the screen as it scrolls through data, "heat exhaustion, a severe concussion, dislocated ankle and shoulder. He'll make a full recovery, though he will retain some tissue damage across his cheek and on his hands."
"Will he still have mobility?" Allura asks, the only one of them who can keep it together enough to speak, though her voice is heavy and her eyes are full of mist. "How extensive is the nerve damage?"
"It is extensive, but I think that the pod can rebuild what was lost. He might have some numb spots, but I can't say for sure." Coran replies. "All we can do is wait."
There is a pause then Allura says, her voice shaking in ernest, "P-paladins, you are dismissed for the day. Please rest, you will need your strength." Bundling her skirts into her hand, she sweeps out of the room. Keith can't look at her face as she leaves; he knows there are tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Come on," Pidge says, tugging on Keith's hand. "We should get something to eat."
Keith doesn't respond. He follows willingly, but his eyes are on Lance until they leave the room.
They sit in silence at the kitchen table. Keith swirls his spoon through the space goo demurly, not hungry enough to eat but not mean enough to reject the food Hunk hands him. Hunk has this scrunched, miserable look on his face and Keith can see his lower lip wobble every couple of minutes as he tries to keep it together. Pidge, who is sitting across from him, keeps her head ducked. Her bangs cover here eyes, but her lips are tensed into a frown.
Keith is, of course, thinking of Lance. Images keep flickering through his head: Lance lifting weights in the training room; Lance cleaning his bayard with intense concentration; Lance poking fun at Pidge with a shit eating grin on his face; Lance unflinchingly trying Hunk's concoctions while they chat in the kitchen; Lance saluting Allura with a grin and a wink before strutting off; Lance leaning in to kiss him, eyes half lidded and full of longing.
"I'm sorry," Pidge says suddenly and Keith's head jerks up. "I'm s-so sorry." She repeats. Her shoulders are shaking, but she keeps her head tilted towards the table so Keith can't see her eyes. "I s-shouldn't have left him alone. I should have been there for him."
"Oh, Pidge," Hunk says, leaning into her space easily and wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "It's not your fault."
"He told me we should split up," she sobs out. Keith is frozen with fear. How is he supposed to deal with this? He is completely out of his league. "I knew w-w-we shouldn't have, but I did it anyways. I left him all alone down there."
There is something strange in Keith's gut, thick and dark and it feels like anger. He tries hard to process this feeling, looking at Pidge as she shakes with sobs and listening to Hunk try to sooth her with kind words. His fists clench in his lap and he takes in a slow breath through his nose. It's easy to blame Pidge, since she was supposed to be Lance's wingman. It's easy for him to think that if it had been him down there with Lance he never would have split off from him. It's easy for him to be angry with her.
He pushes it back and stands.
Lance wouldn't blame Pidge for what had happened. Lance would hold her close and make sure that she knew that it wasn't her fault. Lance would be compassionate and kind, like he always was. He would be supportive and gentle. If Keith can adopt even the tiniest smidge of that, maybe he can help Pidge feel better.
Circling the table to where Pidge sits, he gently rests a hand on her head. "It's not your fault," he whispers. "Lance won't think this is your fault, either."
She shivers and lets out a broken sob, but she nods.
It's late when Keith makes his way back to the med bay. Shiro had disappeared as soon as he had ensured the Hunk, Pidge, and Keith had eaten, and Hunk and Pidge had gone to their rooms shortly after that. At first, Keith meant to b-line straight for the med bay, but then he stops. Anxiety eats at his chest and he feels keyed up like a pot ready to boil over. He diverts last minute and goes to the training room instead. After beating the snot out of some of the training robots, he feels marginally better.
He steps into the med bay and is startled to find Shiro already there, standing in front of Lance's pod. He is still, eyes distant. Keith turns on his heel to leave, but Shiro's voice stops him. "Keith," he says, and his voice is so quiet, soft. A shiver run through him.
"How long have you been here?" Keith asks, still facing the door, his voice quiet to match Shiro's.
"About an hour," Shiro admits. "We should talk."
"You've said that a lot in the last few hours." It's so strange - it feels like an eternity has gone by, but in reality it has been less than 24 hours. A strange quaver snakes down his spine at the realization that Lance had kissed him so recently and now he's in a healing pod, barely alive, mutilated.
"I know." Shiro moves to sit on the floor, leaning against the wall directly across from Lance. He pats the spot beside him. "But we have at least two unfinished conversations to get through."
Keith sits silently. Shiro is clearly thinking, his dark eyes half closed as he gazes at Lance, serene in his pod.
"I'm sorry for punching you." Keith murmurs, glancing at Shiro's jaw. The swelling has gone down, but there will be a nice bruise by morning. "Did I say anything, um, particularly upsetting?"
Shiro smiles lopsidedly at him. "Nothing that is worth repeating. Allura hearded Pidge and Hunk out of the room pretty quick after the video started."
Keith winces. "I'm sorry," he says again. "I lost my temper."
Shiro glances at him, a teasing twinkle in his eye. "I think that's a bit of an understatement."
With a scowl, Keith grinds out, "I said I was sorry."
Shiro makes a flippant motion with his hand. "It's fine." he goes silent, considering. "I'm sorry, too, you know. For making the call that I did."
Keith turns towards him, surprised.
"I still think it was the right call," Shiro cuts him off, "but I'm sorry that this happened to Lance. I keep thinking about it, what we could have done better, if we could have prevented this. If I had sent you down with them, maybe, or asked if Coran would go along and assist."
Keith shakes his head. "There's no use thinking like that. It's already happened and done with."
"It's not done, though. Lance might never get feeling back in parts of his hands. He might keep a scar on his face for the rest of his life." He sighs. "But you're right. I just want you to understand that not going after Lance was hard for me, too, and this is what I'm actively working against." He makes an aborted gesture towards Lance, then lets his arm drop. "You're all so young. I don't want you to get hurt."
Rolling his eyes, Keith nudges Shiro's side with his elbow. "You're only seven years older than me, dumbass. That's not that much."
"It's enough," comes the reply, quiet and forlorn. "I'm eight years older than Lance, and almost ten years older than Pidge. I'm responsible for you guys. I never should have let this happen."
Any anger that Keith had been holding onto dissipates. Shiro is doing his best, just like the rest of them are. They had been dragged from unfortunate circumstance to unfortunate circumstance, and he had just been trying to make the best decision for all of them.
"It's ok," Keith murmurs, touching Shiro's shoulder with his fingertips. He lets his hand rest fully on his shoulder, and Shiro reached up to cover it with his human hand. They sit there like that for a moment in solidarity, before Shiro pats him once and pulls away.
"Technically, we have one other conversation we never finished."
Keith has been trying not to think about it. Between the agonizing worry, and then the terror the recording had brought him, he doesn't really want to think about Lance's confession. "Now's not really the time," he says, but Shiro interrupts him.
"I think now is the perfect time. Coran projected it would take up to two weeks for the pod to do it's work, so if we talk about this now you'll have plenty of time to figure yourself out."
Keith doesn't want to. If he avoids it, then maybe it will go away. When Lance wakes up, they can go on with their business like they used to, like nothing had ever happened. Like Lance had never kissed him, had never held him close, had never told Keith that he loved him. Then Keith won't have to worry about being distracted, or about becoming too attached. He looks at Lance's body, still and so, so broken. Tears sting his eyes.
That's the problem, isn't it? He's already distracted. Every moment Lance had been down there on that stupid volcano planet, he had been distraught, out of his mind with worry. He had been so upset when he saw Lance huddled and small on that recording he had punched Shiro in the face, because Shiro had made the call to keep Keith from going after him.
Lance is in love with him and Keith loves him back.
When had he fallen in love? How long have these feelings for Lance existed? Back at the Garrison, which seemed like such a distant memory now, Lance had been this eager, excited star. His energy had been so bright that Keith kept his distance; he didn't have time for someone like Lance, who was loud and brilliant and boisterous. Keith needed to focus, to learn, to be the best, to get the hell away from earth. That was his goal, back then, and Lance would have been a distraction.
It always circled back to that, didn't it? Keith had a mission, a goal, and Lance would distract him.
"I don't want to be distracted," Keith tries, hoping Shiro will have some kind of profound knowledge to share with him. "We have a lot of responsibilities and I can't focus all of my attention on Lance just because I, I love him."
Shiro shakes his head, a tiny, amused smile on his face. "You can control your actions, kiddo. Are you afraid you'll train less if you're in a romantic relationship with Lance?"
Keith considers for a moment. "Well, no. We do a lot of our training together anyways."
"What about when we form Voltron? Are you worried that being with him is going to change how you work together, or with others on the team?"
Scowling, Keith grouches out, "Can't you just give me straight forward advice already?"
Shiro laughs. "I can give you advice, but you won't like it."
Keith waits, levelling him a glare.
"Fine, I'll tell you what I would do." Shiro scoots around on the floor to face him fully. "If I were you, I would stop worrying about being distracted. I think that by not being with Lance, you're causing more distraction than if you would just be with him already. Besides," Shiro pokes him playfully in the shoulder, "from what he's said, and what you've said, it sounds like you're already together."
"We're best friends, " Keith emphasizes, just to be contrary.
"Not to mention," Shiro says, carrying on like Keith hadn't said anything at all, "you only get one shot at living." His tone has an edge to it. "And if you're in love with Lance and Lance is in love with you, I think it's worth a try. Sometimes you don't get a second chance."
Keith meets Shiro's eyes, and then looks at Lance. The realization that he could have lost Lance today for good, and he hadn't even told him that he loved him, rips at his throat. If he doesn't act on his feelings for Lance, will he regret it?
"What if he does die?" The question is out of his mouth before he thinks it through. "Won't it be worse losing him if he's my…" his throat closes before he can get the rest of the words out.
"That's something you'll have to consider," Shiro agrees, knowing what he means. "What we do puts us at risk. We don't know what's coming today or tomorrow or next week. Sometimes, we have to live in the moment."
Keith nods silently, his eyes boring into Lance's. He has a lot of thinking to do before Lance wakes up.
Lance is falling. He can feel the heat of the lava on his legs, hear the hiss of it as it bubbles and roils. He can hear his own screams, howls of clamoring ice and rock. Above him, he can see his own face staring back at him, blue eyes wide and horrified, blood spattering the glass of his helmet. He keeps falling and falling and falling and falling.
His viewpoint changes, but everything feels like a computer glitch. Static rings in his ears and periodically there is sharp feedback that feels like a screw being turned in his brain. He looks down at his hands - they are shaking and dark with blood. When he looks up, the Wolkian is towering over him, it's slit mouth full of jagged teeth.
"You let me go," it says, and tears fall like crystals from Lance's eyes. They hit the ground at his feet and shatter, sending a plume of ocean spray up around his ankles. "I would still be alive if you had just held on a little longer."
"I didn't mean to," his voice is loud and distorted, hazy and sharp all at the same time. He doesn't say it again, but he hears it over and over again like a recording. Each time he hears it, it's higher in pitch until it's almost a shriek.
The Wolkian's face changes suddenly, from teeth and fury to Pidge's face. Lance is frozen, tied in place. Water swirls around his ankles now, but it's boiling hot, steam rising up around him. His hands burn, and he can feel blood trickling off his face and fingers.
"How could you let me die, Lance?" Pidge asks, her voice contorted with anger. "You should have protected me."
"I tried," he gasps out, even though it feels like there is a hand around his throat. "I tried."
He blinks, and now it's Hunk's face. "You should have tried harder," he says, sharp and hard. Something stabs and pricks like knives across Lance's hands, across his cheek, in his stomach.
Hunks face shifts, fast and distorted, and now it's Shiro. "You failed the team."
I didn't mean to, I didn't meant to, I didn't meant to. It's a mantra in Lance's skull, sharp like stones against concrete.
Then it's Keith face, and the roaring gets louder and louder and louder as Lance looks into his face, those dark amethyst eyes framed by lashes so long, eyebrows lowered and pinched in anger, lips parted just slightly. With a pop, the sound stops and Lance keeps staring staring staring in the silence. He can feel the trickle of blood on his hands and the rush of the water over his feet, but there is no sound.
Keith's gaze is a weight on Lance's shoulders and he's sinking, sinking.
"If you love me, how could you let me die?" the question is a shout, and Lance is falling and falling and falling.
Lance's recovery takes longer than Coran had initially predicted. Instead of two weeks, like Shiro had told Keith, it takes almost 20 days.
Keith spends the entirety of those 20 days in a daze of thought. He trains with his bayard, he runs, he lifts weights. He talks to Shiro every time he has a new thought, and Shiro continues to assure him that he'll make the right choice. Hunk makes him eat, which he appreciates, while simultaneously being annoyed. He just wants to think in peace, or run himself so ragged he stops thinking for a while.
It goes like this: he thinks about Lance and how close they are and how Keith would trust him with his life. He thinks about how he wants to tell Lance everything, and how he wants Lance to tell him everything in return. He wants to spend dreamless nights wrapped in Lance's arms, wants to kiss him and cuddle with him during movie nights. He thinks about laughing with him, about having inside jokes that make their teammates smile and roll their eyes.
And then he starts to think about how it will affect their team and how it will affect his ability to fight.
From there it's a downward spiral. He starts to wonder what would happen if he lets Lance in and Lance starts to hate him. Keith can't pretend like he has it all together. He gets defensive quickly and he loses control of his temper. He has trust issues, and it's hard for him to accept affection. He's going to hurt Lance's feelings, he's going to push him away. He can't stand the thought of doing something to make Lance hate him.
He wonders what would happen if Lance dies, if one day he just doesn't come back from a mission. What happens then? What does he do, how do they carry on? Lance is such an important part of their dynamic. He holds them together, like glue. He pulls them close and keeps them there.
If he takes a chance and tells Lance he reciprocates his feelings, where will that road lead?
If he doesn't take a chance and lets it lie, where will that road lead?
When Coran announces that Lance is ready to be removed from the pod, Keith doesn't feel like he's gotten any further in making a decision. He has spent hours thinking, but apparently feelings are complicated.
Standing with the other paladins while Coran types commands into the pod is an anxiety inducing experience. He has missed Lance's company over the past twenty days - such long, long days. He wants to hear his voice. He wants to see his face while it moves. He wants to touch him, run his fingers all over him, make sure he's ok. In the same breath, seeing Lance awake again feels like a big deal and his heart thumps and his hands sweat.
"It seems like most of the nerves in his hands have been successfully replaced," Coran is saying as he types and scrolls through the information. "We will have to run a few tests to see if there are any differences that will affect his functionality." He taps twice in the same spot and the pod flashes blue for an instant before sliding open.
There is a pause before Shiro steps forward to catch Lance as he tumbles forward. Shiro steadies him on his feet, holding him up as Lance orients himself. Keith winces in sympathy; as amazing as the healing pods are, it is disorienting coming out of them. Lance has a dazed look on his face, his eyes blurred and far away.
"You're back in the castle," he hears Shiro murmur as he braces Lance across the chest to keep him upright. "You're safe and so is the rest of the team. Can you hear me, Lance?"
Lance blinks once, then twice. "Yeah," he says, and his voice is hoarse with disuse. "I hear you."
Keith exhales with relief, and he can feel the tension in the room drain away. The healing pods haven't failed them, not once, but hearing Lance speak offers them confirmation that he's ok.
"How do you feel?" Hunk asks, stepping closer.
If Keith hadn't been watching Lance's face closely he wouldn't have seen it. The tiniest flash of dread flares across his eyes, a look that makes Keith's heart beat hollow and his stomach twist. It's gone in an instant, replaced by one of Lance's lopsided grins. "Starving, buddy. Wanna make me up some of that delicious space goo?"
Hunk grins and Keith knows he didn't see that look. Wrapping both arms around Lance's shoulders, Hunk exclaims, "I'm so glad to have you back, Lance! We were so worried about you."
Lance leans into Hunk's arms, grinning. "Glad to be here, Hunky."
Hunk leads Lance towards the kitchen, one arm still firmly around the other paladin's shoulders.
Lance doesn't look at Keith once.