A/N: Sorry this is late, work, work, cold, and work. I also joined a Voltron Parady Skit! So far we're calling it VVO but I'll keep you updated!

Chapter 8 Mission Accepted

When Keith broke the surface he had to expunge water from his lungs. It was something he would have to get used to, unless he did it before coming up. It made sense. He couldn't breathe in the air if there was still water in there. At least it didn't hurt as much if he had been fully human.

That was a wild ride. So that's what mermaids, er, Mers were like. Not what he pictured…considering. Then again, it was probably because they didn't know he was human. That might have made his day a little worse.

He noticed there had been a difference in the Mers between Lance and those jellyfish heads(thank god they weren't actually their heads). Lance looked like…him. As in, only half of him was scaled, and his eyes glowed in the dark. The others looked more…fishy. Maybe Lance was half human like him. If he hadn't been so full of himself and completely rude he would think about maybe seeing him again to ask more questions.

Was that a good idea though? Maybe he should talk to Shiro.

No, bad idea. Shiro would flip. He was already nervous about him going down alone, and after that Mer bit and attacked him… No, he would turn all "Dad" and start telling him he couldn't go.

Though, it wasn't like he could stop him; Shiro couldn't breathe underwater like Keith. But he needed to talk to someone. Maybe Matt and Pidge?

No, Matt would just tell Shiro.

But maybe he could talk to Pidge. They were like partners in crime. They did a lot of things Shiro and Matt would disapprove of.

Like setting bottle rockets off in the gym.

Or riding a go-cart through the halls.

Well, it was mostly him who did all the reckless stuff, Pidge just used him as her guinea-pig to test her inventions out on. He didn't care that he was the one who got expelled. He didn't want to bring her down with him, and it was his idea anyway. He didn't fit in that school anyway.

So more than likely she was going to hook him up with some gadgets or stuff to study all this new historical discovery. He could be a spy or something. It sounded kind of exciting.

So it was settled, he was telling Pidge.

—

"What were you thinking? You could have gotten hurt! There are sharks out there, ones bigger than your little pet that could actually eat you whole!"

"Don't speak badly of Lancey-Lance!"

"Lance, please focus. Or did you forget you're in trouble?" Rosa nervously swam back and forth in front of her defiant looking little brother. "This is bad, what if Mother finds out? She'll kill me!"

"Glad to know you're only worried about yourself."

"And she'll never let you take the trial again!" Okay, that was a little more concerning. "Hell, we don't even know if the Hunters will let you anymore!"

"Come on, I'm perfectly fine. No harm, no foul."

"What were you doing following those crazy Mers anyway?"

"Uhhh…" This was a complicated issue. He could tell her about their crazy little ploy to rescue some 'princess' but that would only make him look bad for following. "They, uh, said they knew a place to catch more prey for the trial."

Goddess, the more he thought about it, the more he berated himself for such a stupid decision? His impulsive tendencies really needed to be brought under control. This was getting too much. Why was he like this? Why was his brain against him?

"All the way over to the wall? Lance, that's all the way across the Arus Valley."

"Well, I didn't know I would go that far."

She gave him a look. "Lance."

He threw his arms up in exasperation. "Whatever! It's over! I failed the trial anyway, isn't that punishment enough?"

She looked defeated, even though he was the one who lost the most.

He thought back to the red Mer. He hadn't even gotten his name. Was he really his Glow? Why did the glow disappear? He heard sometimes Mer's Glow would call to them and they could feel a pull that would lead them to each other. Maybe that was why it all happened.

"I guess." Said Rosa, letting herself sink to sit on a smooth rock. "What am I going to do with you?"

"You could start by not telling Mom."

She glared at him but sighed in response. "Yeah, let's keep this between us. I'll make sure the Hunters know not to make a big deal of this."

He felt guilty. He didn't know why she always covered for him. He would do so many reckless stuff, and it wasn't like they were keeping secrets together. He was the screw-up, and she always covered. He didn't know why, and it made him feel so much more guilty for it. Maybe because they were the youngest? "So what do I do now? I have to wait a year to become a hunter?"

"You're the one who messed up."

Ugh, this was stupid. He crossed his arms and glared at the coral growing on the floor.

"Let's just sleep on it, okay?"

"Wait." He didn't know how to bring this up because he seriously didn't want to let on it even happened, but he wanted to know. "Is it possible your Glow is a mistake?"

She looked confused and concerned. "No, what do you mean?"

"I mean like…say you meet your 'Glow' and your scales get all glowy and stuff, but then it goes out…"

She switched to solid concern. "Well, that could be for several reasons. Why do you want to know?"

He nervously laughed. "Well, just curious because… I met two Mers who were Glows and it just made me more curious."

She switched to convinced, which was good for him, but sometimes it didn't mean she actually was. "Well, when you meet Your Glow, you both begin glowing, obviously, but it doesn't mean much except that you've met."

"What? Why?"

"Well, there's a…ritual, I guess? You might glow, but you still have to accept each other as your Mate. Nothing is set in stone, sometimes Mers don't mate with their Glow."

"Really? Why not?"

"Several reasons. Maybe they're already mated and wish to have only one. Maybe there are circumstances where they can't be together. Any number of reasons."

"Is that common?"

She frowned. "Not really."

"So how do you 'accept' them? Just say, sure, let's be mates?"

She chuckled. "No. It's usually sealed with a kiss. Sometimes there's a dance, sometimes there's not. It depends on the Mer."

"Oh…" So maybe when they rejected each other, they stopped glowing? "So if you reject them, the glow goes away?"

"Yes."

Did that mean he fucked up his chance? It wasn't that he didn't want to find His Glow, he just didn't want to be with him now. "So then I can't-"

"Lance McClain? Princess Allura wishes to see you." They were cut off when two Mer Guards appeared at the entrance to their home.

Lance and Rosa looked at each other in shock. Was it because of him leaving the trial? Or was it because of those Mers he helped?

Either way, this was not good.

—

The first thing he did when he got back to shore was text Shiro that he was going to Pidge's house. Shiro always left Keith's cell and a change of clothes for him hidden in the cave.

Shiro's reply was to be back before dinner. He was such a dad.

"So I wanted to talk to you about something." He said to Pidge as he headed back up the streets from the beach to his neighborhood. "Something you gotta promise you won't tell Shiro or Matt."

"You know you don't even have to ask." She said, her tone automatically going into a sinister mode. "What is it?"

He looked around to make sure he wasn't close enough to anyone to overhear. "I met other mermaids."

"You what! Are you serious?! On your first dive?!"

"Keep it down, you're louder than I am and you're not even on speaker." He hissed.

"Oh my god, get over here, I have so many questions."

And she did. "So what did they look like? Were they like the one that bit you? I didn't get to see it so I need to know. Could you speak their language? If they surfaced, could they speak ours? Were they malicious or friendly? Could they tell you weren't fully mermaid? What do they think of humans? Do they even know about humans? Why don't they come to the surface? Or do they and we just never see them?"

"You need to slow down because I didn't get any of that."

"Okay first, tell me what they were like." She said, pulling out a notebook. "Wait, tell me what happened."

"Pick one Pidge!"

"Start from the beginning."

He sighed. Ugh, she was all over the place and it was making him frustrated. He needed structure, this was getting on his nerves. "Well I made it down to the Sigsbee Encampment, but I didn't get all the way to the floor. The darker it got, the easier it was to see."

"Interesting." She was jotting down notes at lightning speed, almost as fast as when she typed. He knew he wouldn't be able to read it with her handwriting.

"I think it's because my eyes started glowing."

"Like bioluminescence?"

"I guess. Anyway, I saw another pair of glowing eyes and that's when I realized it was another mermaid-er-merman."

"Oh, so it was a guy?"

"Well, I think? He didn't have breasts."

"Interesting." More scratching on paper. "Did you talk to him?"

"Not at first. I didn't know if he would be hostile or not. I mean, the last one was."

"Right. What did he look like? Did he look like the one that bit you?"

"No. He kinda looked like me? Sorta. His upper half didn't have scales, mostly. He had more than me, and a lot more fins and his ears were webbed and the same color as his scales."

"Were they red or another color?"

"Blue."

"Hm. Wonder why your's are red."

Keith shrugged. "He had sharper teeth, like a shark's. I even think there were more than one layer."

"Yeah, yours just look like vampire teeth. Maybe because you're more human? He was probably born a merman."

"Makes sense." But why did he still have fewer scales than the one on the boat? Or the other ones he met? "We ran into other Mers."

"Mers?"

"That's what they call themselves."

"So you talked to him?"

"Oh, yeah. He was a conceited jerk, but otherwise pretty friendly." Oh, he forgot, they started to glow when they met. Should he mention that?

"So do you think they're like humans? With different kinds of personalities instead of just one specific trait? Like other animals?"

"I don't know. I just met the four."

"Tell me about the others."

"They were more like the ones on the ship; they had scales all over. But they had jellyfish on their heads. And one of them had octopus arms."

"Jellyfish heads? Is that normal?"

"They said it was to cover their faces. They wanted to hide their identity or something."

"Hmmm…" She jotted more notes. "I think you should go talk to them again."

"And say what?"

"I don't know, maybe find out why they needed to protect their identity?" She wrote down some notes. "Maybe they're looking for the mermaid you guys captured."

"You mean killed."

The room became as cold as the core of their bones. "Then you really should go undercover."

"Yeah, I guess. But what exactly are we trying to do?"

"First, just do reconnaissance. We'll come up with something from there."

"Are we telling Matt and Shiro?"

"God no, they would go ballistic if they thought the mermaids hiding their identities were looking for the mermaid you killed."

Shiro killed. Keith felt the need to reconfirm it in his mind because he already felt sick just thinking about it.

"And for Christ's sake, don't let them know you know anything about it."

"I wasn't going to." He deadpanned. He wasn't stupid. They were more dangerous than sharks; an apex predator with more intelligence. They could be too dangerous. "Anything else?"

"Keep the communicator in your ear. I'll make one small enough so they won't see it. We can record everything and you can interpret it later."

This was like a real-life mission. Something he didn't get the chance to do in the Garrison. He finally felt like he had a purpose. This was starting to fill a hole he felt in the pit of his soul. This was what he needed.

So why did he feel a nervous sickness in the pit of his stomach?

—

Lance wasn't looking forward to seeing the Princess. Not because he didn't like her because of course, he did, but because of the circumstances. He fucked up. He fucked up royally, and Royally was about to tell him just that.

He was glad Rosa came with him, but he was also ashamed because she was about to find out exactly why he screwed up the trial. He felt sick to his stomach. This was the worst thing he had ever done. Looking back, he wanted to smack himself over and over until he knocked himself out before making such a bad decision.

What was he going to do now? He would never be able to leave the Shoal again.

What was worse, Princess Allura wasn't the only Royalty there waiting for him. Her Advisor was with her, and the Queen of the East Mers who had migrated to join them for the trial.

"What exactly did you do?" His sister whispered to him. If his sister wasn't going to kill him, his mother sure was.

He couldn't even respond. He was going to be shunned by the whole Shoal. He wanted to go squish himself with a rock.

"Lance, we heard about what happened in the trial." Said Allura as they swam up. She looked surprisingly calm instead of disappointed.

Rosa gave him a look.

Lance spotted Hunk floating there with them, and he somehow felt worse. Hunk looked worried, so he didn't know if he actually knew what was happening or not.

"Can I ask what's going on?" Said Rosa, swimming in front of her brother.

"I'm not surprised he didn't tell you." Said Allura. "I'm glad he didn't, it would make this more difficult."

Rosa glared at him, and he sank back.

"Lance, buddy, what's going on?"

"I'll explain." Said the Queen of the East Migrants. "During the trial, Lance came in contact with three Mers of my Pod and they convinced him to help them find the missing princess."

The shock was more evident in him than his sister and Hunk. Wait, so that was real.

"Missing princess?" Whispered Rosa.

Allura nodded. "It's being kept quiet to keep their Pod calm, but yes, Queen Luxia's daughter Florona is missing."

"So wait, those Mers weren't crazy?"

There was a bit of silence. "If you thought they were crazy, why'd you follow them?" Asked Allura.

He couldn't answer. Luckily Rosa did. "Lance has an innate sense of compassion, and if he felt they really needed his help, whether he believed them or not, he couldn't say no."

That made a lot more sense than his buzzing head did. But it made sense. A lot of the times his actions spoke more about him than his thoughts, and when someone pointed it out the pieces seemed to fall into place.

Queen Luxia smiled warmly at him, and the sense of dread began to disappear. "The Mers you were helping are actually friends with my daughter, Florona. They took it upon themselves to go look for her, against my wishes. They shouldn't be putting themselves in danger. I was hoping you could help us."

"Wha…" His brain went blank.

"Wait, so you aren't mad at Lance?" Asked Hunk.

"Oh, we are." Said Allura. "But he's the only one that's been in contact with them, so we are hoping he can convince them to come back and let the Guard do their job looking for the Princess."

"So you're putting my brother undercover?" Asked Rosa.

"They'll trust him." Said Queen Luxia.

Lance was a little confused. "But I was captured and brought back. Won't they think I spilled or something?"

"We've got that figured out." Said Allura. "You'll leave the Shoal and say you escaped after finding out about the Princess, and we'll send Guards to 'capture' you so they will be convinced you're on their side."

"Won't they see through that?" Asked Hunk. "And why am I here?"

"You're a friend, it would make sense that Lance would recruit help. And you can keep an eye on him."

"Hey!"

"Sounds about right." Mumbled Hunk.

"I want to go with." Said Rosa.

"They are less likely to suspect friends helping instead of siblings. Especially since your family is with the council." Said Allura. Rosa frowned. "Lance, Hunk, your mission is to keep them from going to the surface and convince them to come back to the Shoal."

The two friends looked at each other. "Why keep them from the surface? Besides the obvious." Asked Hunk.

The two royals looked at each other. "That is confidential." Said Allura. "Just do as we ask."

"Rosa, we ask that you keep this secret. We don't want anyone knowing about this, just in case it gets back to Plaxum and the others." Said Queen Luxia. "This includes family and friends."

Rosa didn't like the idea, but she nodded. "Promise nothing will happen to my brother."

Allura looked remorseful when she nodded. "I know this is a dangerous mission for them to go into the open ocean, please trust they will know what to do."

Lance was filled with new excitement and determination. This was an actual mission. How could he say no? "I'll be okay, Rosa. Please trust me."

"I'll keep an eye on him." Said Hunk, but he looked more nervous than excited.

"Yeah, I'll have Hunk with me! The most cautious Mer in the Shoal." Hunk shot him a look. "I accept this mission!" Allura and Luxia nodded.

Lance had never felt so alive than in that moment. This was it. This was his chance to prove he was the best Tracker and Hunter in the Shoal. He could even become part of the Guard! Or a Warrior!

Lance was not going to mess this up.

Well, this took a long time, though I had half of it written right after I finished the last chapter sooooo, idk stuff happened, I had to make big changes, and I'm finally adjusting. I hope you guys like it!