Chapter Text
The team had returned to the castle ship hours ago and yet Lance hadn’t moved a muscle since he landed Red in her hangar, everything ached, especially his back. He didn’t know why because he refused to check, he just died and didn’t want to see the damage he may have from it. The soft hum of Red’s presence filtered through his mind, obviously being the only reason that he wasn’t panicking. All he could do was stare at her control board in front of him, that was until he was startled from the back of his mind and from Red’s warm comforting aura. Looking up lazily he saw Allura standing out in his hangar, a worried look across her face.
“Lance! Please come out, we need to talk”, her tone was so matter of fact that he wondered if she even remembered earlier events. Staying quiet, he just watched, hoping she thought he was just asleep. “I know you can hear me, Lance.”
Groaning to nobody but himself and Red he sat up, hissing as a fiery pain shot up his spine and across his back. Biting his tongue, he placed a hand on the arm of his seat and pushed himself up. He wanted to cry. Red tried convincing him to just tell her the truth about how he couldn’t move properly but he ignored her with a quiet mumble of an apology. Lance stumbled as he walked, leaning on things to stay standing before he reached the ramp out. Forcing himself to stand without something to help him instantly caused him to feel light-headed.
“Hey Allura! What’s up?”, a strained smile spread across his face to try be seen as welcoming. He knew that she would already feel guilty for what happened and didn’t want her knowing he was still in immense pain.
“You know ‘what’s up’ Lance, we need to talk about how you…”, she slowly cut herself off before the word left her mouth, making a distasteful face at the thought of it.
“Died?”, he struggled to say the word himself without sounding like it was choked out of him, suddenly feeling distant he continued. “Don’t worry about it, just feels like I woke up from oversleeping!”
Liar. Red angrily echoed through his mind; she was right. It was the exact opposite, he felt as though he hadn’t slept or had something to drink for years.
“Well… I’m glad you’re okay. Tell me if you feel any leftover pains, can’t have any Paladins unable to fight.”, objective as always, although her tone gave away that she didn’t completely believe his lie, she turned to leave and only made it a few steps before glancing back at him, “Don’t tell the others. They don’t know and shouldn’t need to.”
Then she was gone within a second, and his heart panged with guilt. Keep this from the others? Hunk would be heartbroken if he found out I kept this secret, Pidge would be furious, Coran would force him to do a full examination, Shiro would scold him and Allura. Keith would… Lance doesn’t know how he’d react; they’ve been closer since he encouraged Keith to be the black paladin, but he doesn’t know if he’d be angry or worried.
Using his helmet to check the time, he learnt everyone would be asleep by now – well except maybe Pidge, which gave him the chance to grab some things from the med bay just in case. Staggering through the halls, leaning on the walls for support and stopping every now and then to make sure he didn’t throw up his breakfast, Lance eventually made it to the med bay. Making his way around the room slowly he simply grabbed a few things; a weird alien numbing cream called ‘Smeel’, some bandages and a few tablet-like medicines that he didn’t know the name of but knew they’d help him fall asleep tonight.
After another painful and fatiguing walk, the castle hallways eventually led him to his room, opening the door and walking through the messy room to the bathroom. It took all his mental strength to resist the urge to lunge onto his bed and just lay there for the rest of his existence. Locking the bathroom door and sitting on the counter of his sink he sighed. Standing was too tiring but after a short while of delaying the inevitable he had to stand up again, everything was too tiring, so he just needed to get it over with. Slowly he pulled off his armour, followed by slowly peeling the under suit off, nearly crying at the sting it caused. Lance stood in the middle of his bathroom in just boxers now, closing his eyes he turned so his back was facing the mirror as he prepared himself to look. He opened them and hesitantly turned his head to look at the mirror and gagged violently at the sight, his heart dropping at the horrid sight covering his backside.
Blood stained his back and lower side of his neck, deep wounds spread across his back like lightning, forcing himself to look closer he saw how some parts here and there were deeper or more jagged. He finally let out a small sob, the first sign of him breaking down since the mission. Glancing over to the shower it dawned on him, he needed to wash it before bandaging or his back would get repulsive, sticky and infected.
Slowly Lance got completely undressed and made his way to the shower and leaned on the door, if he was quick than he could be done sooner. Standing under the shower head he swayed, like at any moment he’ll pass out onto the floor. Raising his left hand to his mouth he bit into it, then using his free hand to turn on the shower and he immediately set it to a hot setting. He never knew much about first aid, but he knew fully well that to avoid infection with an injury it needed hot water.
Once the water hit his skin he screamed into his hand, biting down harder and harder with every tick that passed by. Water ran down his face, whether it was tears or the shower water he didn’t know or care. The screams of pain eventually stopped as his throat became scratchy and dry, turning his head to look over at his back he saw most of the blood had been washed off and immediately took the chance to turn off the shower.
Once he stepped out he dried off parts of his body the wounds didn’t reach and put some cleaner boxers on. Using the mirror to look at the damage again Lance saw how raw the flesh looked, skin around it obviously irritated from all the movement and water. He winced as he slouched slightly, shuddering as he felt the damage rubbing against itself.
After what felt like hours of hesitantly and excruciatingly applying the ‘Smeel’ cream and the bandages, Lance stumbled out of the bathroom. Flopping on his bed face first he let out a groan as the bandages moved against his back, this weird alien numbing cream better start working soon. He grumbled to himself, angry at no one.
Lance waited hours before he finally started to fall asleep, his body deciding the pain was enough to overpower the exhaustion. Right as he was about to slip away from reality and into his own little world the alarm that indicates a meeting went off, startling him to sit up right away out of instinct. Gasping at the sting that the swift motion left; he forced himself up and back to the bathroom where his armour was tossed to the side.
His under suit had dried up blood all over it but he still had to slip into it, followed by putting on his armour. Usually the tunnels they take to the lions would quickly put their armour on for them but Lance, obviously, was yet to clean his and put it away. He felt gross, his dried-up blood was harsh against any skin it touched that wasn’t covered by bandages. Grabbing his helmet on the way out and making his way to the control room, running at a slower pace than he usually would to avoid spilling his stomach out onto the floor.
He doesn’t know how long he took to finally arrive at the main control room but the looks on everyone’s faces told him it was long enough. Coran looked like he was ready to play a power point presentation to teach Lance of how to not be late, not that he’d know what one is though – or understand the joke. Pidge just had a bored look on her face while hunched over her laptop, Shiro looked somewhat disappointed. Hunk on the other hand; compared to the rest looked worried, they both knew fully well that Hunk had noticed how Lance was more tense than usual but said nothing.
“Lance. How many more times do you need to be told to get ready quicker? You’re somehow arriving later than before.” She scolded him, a look in her eyes told him that she really moved on from the last mission quickly, that didn’t hurt Lance at all. “I understand we may be tired from all the work we’re doing but there are more important things.”
More important than dying? He bitterly thought, he had to bite his tongue from saying it out loud. Not only will he refuse to take such a tone with the Princess just yet, but she had specifically said not to let anyone else know, maybe she just didn’t want any distractions from taking down the Galra.
“Sorry, sorry! I was asleep when the alarm went off and I hadn’t put my armour away yet!” He awkwardly smiled; it wasn’t an exact lie but also wasn’t the whole truth of why he took so long. “You can lecture me for the next thousand doboshes later, what’s the meeting about this time?”
He purposefully used the current issue as a distraction, so he didn’t have to be lectured, and it worked. They all turned back to the screen and he relaxed immensely, looking over to Hunk though caused him to be given a ‘we’ll talk later’ stare.
“Well, if you were here on time,” Pidge waved a hand towards to screen, “then you know that we’re nearly back to Lotor’s main ship, how he wants Allura’s help with the ship more and we may get more information on how the alliance will work.”
Oh, Lotor. Lance still didn’t trust the prince, and not just because he was Galran. Looking past the screen and out to the ships front window he saw the fleet surrounding Lotor’s ship, he doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to flying through a fleet that large with the lions, peace or not.
“Any word from Keith?” He let the slight sound of care slip into his voice, for a while now he’s felt closer to the other, and he liked him a lot and not in the friend way. He doubted Keith felt the same but it was fine, they weren’t soulmates anyways so nothing could happen between them if they wanted.
“Nothing yet, we’ve been informed by the Blade of Marmora that he should be back in contact in a few more quintants” Coran spoke this time, voice as energetic as usual. The rest of the meeting didn’t continue for long as they reached their destination, everyone made their way off except for Hunk who pulled Lance to the side in the Castle’s main hall. After making sure they were alone Hunk finally spoke.
“You okay Lance? You’ve been tense and apparently nobody has really talked to or seen you since the last mission.” Of course, he’d check to see if the others had talked to him, Lance only smiled at Hunk and gave him a pat on the shoulder.
“I’m fine buddy, just really tired, haven’t gotten a lot of sleep just yet”, Hunk nodded at that and didn’t push further even though his face clearly showed he wanted to, “Now, let’s go catch up to the others! Thanks for checking on me though Hunk.”
The rest of the quintant went by way too slowly for Lance’s liking, he stayed out of conversations a bit more than usual. He just wanted to sleep, and it didn’t seem like it was ever going to happen, what didn’t help his mood is how close Allura and Lotor were getting. To outsiders it might seems like he’s jealous, but it wasn’t that at all, something about Lotor didn’t sit right and he couldn’t call it out because he didn’t know what it is. I mean how does the son of an evil emperor just be all good suddenly, he was raised to be merciless and be the next Emperor if that day ever came, which it has.
When he and the team finally returned to the Castle of Lions, it was quite late – by Earth standards at least – and they were all exhausted. Which, while he’d never say to their faces, Lance counted it as a win because then Shiro can’t lecture him if he’s too tired to do the lecturing. Lance himself had reached a level of exhaustion and pain where he constantly felt like he was being dragged to through hell, and after making his way to his room he stood beside his bed.
Sighing with relief as he took his uncomfortable armour and under suit off and getting changed into much more comfortable clothes. His back ached as he reached his arms up when getting changed but he was too drained to care if he irritates it further, crouching down he picked up his discarded armour and under suit and threw them into a chute outside his room that led straight to the laundry room. I’ll just put them in the actual wash tomorrow.
Sitting down on the edge of his bed he grabbed the weird looking tablets he grabbed from the med bay the other night and swallowed them, regretting that he didn’t drink anything with them but he dealt with it. It took only a few seconds before he threw them and anything he’s eaten back up, right beside his bed with no warning from his body. He slid off the bed and crouched on the floor and he continued to cough and choke out the bile, sobbing whenever he got the short chances between to breath. Lance doesn’t know when he closed his eyes so tightly but after it stopped and he could shakily breathe again, he opened his eyes.
Looking at the mess in front of him was of course his previous meals but also blood. Lance felt sick all over again and used his bed to push himself up, the world swayed at the rather fast movement, and he flopped back first on his bed. Letting out a hiss at the action he just laid there, slowly passing out, but unable to ignore the fact he felt gross and horrid. Red filled his mind with distant reassurances he’d be okay, if only he could believe her. Eventually though he promised to her that if this happened again, he’d go to Coran the tick he could. A million thoughts moved through his mind, each one fading more and more as he fell in and out of consciousness.
One thought though didn’t fade one bit, didn’t quiet down, didn’t go away. In fact, it got louder and louder. Like a broken record, playing on repeat before he finally closed his eyes and passed out.
He may be alive, but he still felt dead.