DISCLAIMER

I do not own Sym-Bionic Titan. If I did, it would not have been cancelled due to lack of merchandise.

Special thanks to: Champagne and pomegranates, A Necessary Production, purpledragon6, BluldDreamer, and one other person that I can't find in my e-mail that started following the story. You know who you are.

So, this is just a little short suggested to me by A Necessary Production. Ilanca, and it's about their awkward drive home when Amy was at marching band and Octus was picnicking with Kimmy. Kind of funny, pretty romantic. The restaurant's name in Italian actually means 'food' :D haha. Read, review, and enjoy!

Chapter 12

"So, what are Octus and Amy doing, again?" Ilana asked Lance as they walked out to the grandma-mobile, an affectionate nickname for the boring old car Lance and Octus had fixed up around the time they met Mike Chan.

"Well, Amy's got marching band practice-" at this Lance made a face, and Ilana smiled- "and Octus is having a picnic with Kimmy. He's driving Amy home once they're finished."

Ilana thought about that for a second. "When can Amy get her license?"

"Well, legally, it'll be about another year before she can drive herself, but she's too independent. She'll probably march right into the DMV soon and pull some strings."

Ilana got in the car, strapped in, and looked at her guardian curiously as he started the car. "But how…?"

Lance chuckled. "You'd be amazed at the things she can do." As always, his eyes softened when he talked about her, and a soft smile appeared on his lips as he pulled out of the parking lot.

"Who would've thunk?" Ilana wondered aloud, using a common Earth phrase that she had picked up somewhere.

Now it was Lance's turn to look confused. "What?"

"The big, scary corporal has a soft side."

Lance blushed and looked at the road. "You don't know me as well as you think you do", he said softly.

A silence filled the car as the truth of his statement dawned on them both. They really didn't know each other. After a year of living together, being the only ones along with a robot that bore the responsibility of a planet, they only knew what they saw on the outside. They had barely scratched the surface of their painful pasts, and even the areas that weren't touchy had been avoided. Ilana shifted in her seat and looked at Lance with a new determination.

"Then tell me."

-o-o-o-

Of course, Lance had objected at first. Strongly. His past was a touchy subject, and while Ilana didn't know much about it, she certainly knew that he didn't feel comfortable talking about it. But something in her eyes, that desperate determination, made him feel like she had a point. They had been living together for a year, and they hardly knew who they really were. Sure, they knew the obvious, pointless things. Favorite colors, favorite foods, things that had developed since they had come to Earth (some of which, granted, were neither pointless nor obvious). But they really didn't know what made them them. Ilana had only heard vague reasons from her father long ago as to why Lance was so reserved, and Lance had absolutely no clue why Ilana was always so optimistic, even in the most negative situations. In short, they knew a little of the who, but no why.

So, after the umpteenth time of asking, as they stopped at a red light, when Ilana looked at him again with those desperate eyes and said "Please", he didn't resist.

Lance sighed. "Fine", he said under his breath.

Ilana's eyes lit up and she smiled broadly. As always, Lance grinned like an idiot at that smile. Someone honked from behind them. "Hey, buddy, it's a green light!" Lance blushed and turned his attention back to the road.

They got home and Lance walked to the kitchen, hungry. He took some Bisquick out of the cupboard, and started to make some fried chicken.

Lance focused intently on the instructions, trying to prevent Ilana from starting the conversation that they both knew they might regret. But Ilana wasn't one to give up. They both knew that.

"Start from the beginning", she said casually as she grabbed the eggs.

"Well," said Lance, "when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much...just kidding, just kidding", Lance said to a disgruntled Ilana.

The princess clarified. "Perhaps start a little later than that."

"Well, where do want me to start?" Lance was already getting impatient.

"The first significant moment in your life- besides your baby moments."

Lance didn't even have to think. "When Amy was born."

Ilana looked at him oddly. "You were two- how can you remember that?"

Lance shrugged. "It's not something you easily forget. Suddenly I was a big brother, and there was someone else in our family. Somehow I remember mom pulling me aside and telling me that I was going to have to watch out for her, though I think she didn't think I understood what she was saying."

Ilana watched in amazement as Lance continued the story without even hesitating at the mention of his mother. "When she got old enough to walk, I would take her everywhere. She learned quickly, and we would always play together. She loved Tyrenball- you know, Galaluna's soccer. My first day of school we all walked to the building, me and mom and dad and Amy. And her first day of preschool I was right by her side until she entered the door. We were always like that, inseparable." Lance's face darkened. "And then mom…"

The oven beeped, and Lance put in the battered chicken. Ilana set the timer and followed Lance into the living room. They plopped down next to each other on the couch.

Lance hesitated. Ilana lowered her voice. "What happened to her?"

Lance looked up with those dead eyes- the same he had used when he thought Amy was going to die, or whenever he was about to say something that caused him pain. He just turned himself off. "I don't know."

Ilana stared at him, dumbstruck. Wait, what…? "Then, what….?"

Lance sighed heavily, and Ilana thought she might have sensed something like disgust in it. "We were too young, too sad to question it. One day mom had gone out, and when dad came home from work and hung up his hat, he said that mom was gone. We never saw her again. He said she had died, and the few times we asked him how, he just turned and walked away. We couldn't even grieve knowing how our mother passed away", he said bitterly. "Her name…her name was Rachel."

Ilana sat there in complete astonishment. Lance's father wasn't turning out to be the great hero that the King had painted him. A great scientist…a brilliant mind…a terrible father.

"You pretty much know the rest up to Amy's…disappearance." Ilana remembered how Lance told her that they took their mother's loss pretty hard, and the story of Amy's kidnapping. "The funeral was kind of weird. I've blocked out most of it, but there are some parts I remember. Mom's family didn't come- I don't even think dad told them that she died. Instead there were a bunch of strange men huddled around dad, talking. He didn't even seemed sad that he had just lost his wife. He just worked more and more to get away from it."

"When Amy disappeared, the house became dead and lonely. Dad was still working late, and probably would've worked even more if it was physically possible. His love for his work dwindled, and it became more like a problem to solve than a job to have fun at. He used to love science… I would go to school, but I became more separated. I was never very social in the first place, but when mom died, and then Amy, I shut myself off completely. Even if the other kids had stopped staring and pointing at the kid who had just lost his two best friends, I probably would've still ignored them."

Ilana's eyes were starting to water. Noting this, Lance stopped double-checked the timer they had set for the chicken. Ilana grabbed a Kleenex and dabbed at her eyes. "No, don't stop, please. Continue."

"I… I don't want to make you cry", Lance mumbled , looking down.

Ilana smiled sadly. "Please?"

Lance sighed. "It was only about a year after Amy disappeared that dad went, too. I remember that the night before, dad had said he was on the verge of a breakthrough. I was too tired to notice, but looking back he seemed to be extra excited…and anxious. The next day during school, our political science teacher told us that today a great scientist was about to break the laws of physics. Then, looking at me excitedly, she said it was my dad. I was dumbstruck. I think she asked me if I wanted to tell the class a little about it, but before I knew it I was out of the classroom and running towards dad's work. There was one thing… there was just one thing that could've made dad so excited. That would bread the laws of physics. I remember thinking that he couldn't be trying…but he was."

Here the timer rang, and Lance went to take out the chicken, turn off the oven and put the dish on a cooling rack. When he came back, he continued. "I managed to speed past all the guards, and arrived at dad's laboratory right as he was about to step through the rift gate. I asked him not to. He just looked at me, and my last memory of my father was stepping through a portal to nowhere, saying 'everything will be alright'." Lance paused, and said darkly, "That's the last lie he ever told."

Lance looked over to see the tears streaming silently down her face, her horrified expression staring straight ahead. Never…never in her life had she heard something so terrible. Something so heartbreaking, so devastating. Within three years of his life a seven-year-old boy had lost his whole family, everyone he loved, and had been sent to a military school. And she had thought her story sad.

"Ilana…" Lance whispered sadly. He looked down. "I knew this was a bad idea. I'm….I'm sorry." He got up to go cut the chicken.

She grabbed him and pulled him back down on the couch, hugging him close to her.

This caught him so off-guard that he couldn't stop her. Before he knew what was happening, she was squeezing him with more strength than he thought she had, the tears slowing. He knew he wouldn't get away, and frankly, he didn't want to. So he just sat there awkwardly, and eventually he lightly hugged her back.

"I-I- I had no idea", Ilana hiccupped. "I thought you were just a grumpy old corporal, who blamed everyone else for his own reservation. I thought you blamed the world just because you got dealt a bad card. I thought-" she paused. That one shouldn't be said out loud.

Lance smiled sadly and moved a piece of hair back from her face. This was interesting…this was good. He needed to know all the bad things she thought about him so he could prove them wrong. He had to make her happy. "You thought?"

She looked down in shame. "I thought you were a selfish brat who had no concern for others and didn't even care about the fact that you had absolutely no one."

He had to admit, that one stung a little. The only reason he appeared the way he was was because he worked so hard to hold everything back- the grief, the pain, the anger. Sometimes the anger got away from him.

"But…that was before I actually met you", she murmured, her tears gone now.

And she looked up to see the most beautiful smile she had ever seen.

Who could have thought that such a moody boy, with so much anger, so much frustration, so much misery could have such a beautiful smile? The moment slowed, and Ilana could sense everything- his perfectly straight white teeth, his cologne that Ilana loved (considering she had bought it for him last Christmas), the way that his skin pulled perfectly over his cheekbones, curling around the edges of his slightly squinted eyes to form little laugh lines, how his bangs came down just slightly to shade his left eye… Ilana felt her heart flutter in her chest, and then start beating like a stamped of wild buffalo. Her breathing shortened.

Lance's reaction was similar. He saw her face go white when she saw him smiling. His heart surged and he felt lightheaded. It would be so easy right now, just to lean in and press his lips to hers. He almost thought she might kiss him back.

But he was scared. Like Amy had said. He was afraid of losing what he and Ilana had grown in the past year. But what, he thought, what if what we've been developing has been for this purpose? Has all been leading up to this? But there were too many what-ifs. He wasn't ready yet, and he knew that that was crucial. To be ready. He'd think things over tonight, and maybe sometime soon he'd talk to Amy. Because he couldn't control love. And that scared him.

"I'll go dish out the chicken", he said, getting up from the couch. He missed Ilana's look of disappointment as he went into the kitchen.

-o-o-o-

"So, what about you?" he asked.

Ilana looked up from her food, confused. Lance clarified: "Start from the beginning."

She blushed and, swallowing her food, said: "It's not as bad as yours."

"I would hope it wouldn't be. But something had to have happened for you to be so happy all the time."

Ilana looked down, and her voice dropped as she said, "I'm not, really. That is, I'm not really happy all the time. Sometimes I just miss home so much, I miss dad, I miss my people…I miss mom."

The 'm' word.

Ilana could sense Lance's curiosity. Which was understandable. Neither one of them talked about their moms very often- at all, really. And as Lance had uncovered his painful past, it was time for her to reveal hers.

She started with sad eyes. "Even though you would've only been three, I'm sure you remember the whole…situation…with the queen." Lance nodded. The whole kingdom had been in an uproar because the queen had suddenly vanished off the face of the planet. The Galalunian government had later said that Queen Elizabeth had been assassinated, and that it had been kept a secret because they had been hunting down the assassins. The whole kingdom had grieved, and the murderers were never caught.

"Well, it was a lie."

Lance reeled.

"While Galaluna has a great government, nothing is perfect. There were certain standards and procedures that covered an event such as what happened, and they were followed down to the letter. What really happened…is…" Ilana started sobbing. "She left us, Lance. One day we woke up and she was just… gone. Her guards had said that she was going for a walk … but she never came back. Our top scientists researched the area… including your father." Lance blinked. Yes, his father tended to come home extra late during that panic with the queen. "They determined that she wasn't kidnapped. She left…all by herself. With no reason. No note. No good-bye." She couldn't continue- her body was convulsing with sobs.

Now it was Lance's turn to embrace her. They stayed like that for a little while, until Ilana calmed down. Lance poked a piece of chicken on her fork and held it out to her. "Eat", he ordered. She took a couple of bites.

Silence.

"I'm sorry", he said quietly. His mother might be gone for sure, but at least she hadn't left of her own free will. That Lance knew of. They both had different types of grief.

"Me too."

After a while, Amy and Octus got home. Lance could tell that Amy and Octus had had a talk, because Octus seemed… thoughtful. When it got dark, Lance shrugged on his leather jacket and opened the door. Ilana came down the stairs. "Where are you going?" she asked quietly.

"For a walk," Lance replied. Ilana hesitated. "Do you want to come?" Lance offered.

Ilana smiled. "Let me put on some shoes. I'll be down in five."

-o-o-o-

They walked in silence. The dimly lit street seemed eerie, so they veered towards the park. They came across a bench and sat down. After a little while the night started to flicker. "Look", Ilana breathed to Lance. Lance looked up to see a meteor shower, silvery sparks flying across the sky.

They watched it for a while, and at one point Ilana rested her head on his shoulder. "Don't fall asleep," he whispered, and she smiled slightly. They had been doing that too much lately. Once it was over, they stayed on the bench for a couple of minutes until Lance noticed Ilana shivering. He looked at her with concern. "We should get you home. You shouldn't get sick."

"N-N-No", Ilana chattered. Lance frowned. "I want to stay here", she insisted.

He smiled in disbelief. "One moment", he said, standing up.

Ilana suddenly wasn't cold anymore- heat spread throughout her body as she saw Lance taking off his jacket. She was already warm by the time he draped it around her shoulders.

He sat back down, and she rested her head once more on his shoulder, and as her eyes grew heavier, she fell asleep. Lance chuckled quietly when he noticed this.

He picked her up and carried her home.

Awww cute! I liked this one. Thanks again to A Necessary Production for this idea.

No contest this time. Maybe next time, I'm not sure. But if I do have one in the future, just know: you can't be a guest to ask for the oneshot. I would have to be able to PM you.

Important things in the story: EDWARD'S HAT. This will become obvious in the future as to why it is important. Also, obviously, the jacket. So adorable! And how Ilana's mom just walked away, and how Lance doesn't know how his mom died. The last scene was pretty much copied from my other story, "Haircut".

Note- there are still more things about both of their pasts that will be crucial to the story that were not revealed in this chapter. MANY more things.

I am so amazed at all of the support that this story is getting. I have never gotten a single bad review (though I have gotten suggestions), and everyone that has reviewed seems to love it. People are enthusiastic! I'm so ecstatic! I love writing this- I pour in my heart and soul. And people like it! I just wanted to thank all of you who read this, and especially those who review. You are all so wonderful, and this story probably wouldn't exist without you. And, just to those who haven't noticed- I AM GRAMMATICALLY CORRECT! Punctuation, capitalization, and all of that stuff. Grammar freak, haha.

Please review- it really helps the updating process! I love you all (metaphorically speaking)! I hope all of you have a wonderful day!