#ambivalentlangst

Lance spent a lot of time with Keith after Allura. The farm was mostly quiet, as Lance wanted. He neededtime to grieve, but Keith always reappeared between missions. Every time, Lance somehow found himself welcoming him back with open, genuine arms.

He told Keith, when he asked, that he wasn’t exactly okay. “She just—she was family, Keith. I’m trying to move on, go through the motions, but it’s not working. I just want to see her again.” Lance stared into his hands, a few tears cradled in the joints of his fingers. “I want to be with her again, but that’s never going to happen. I don’t know what to do.”

Keith was getting better but still wasn’t comfortable with emotions, so Lance held back about the sleepless nights, the makeup he indulged in when he couldn’t bear the reminder of her in his reflection.

The marks stung, burned with how he’d adored her, had seen her end coming the moment she admitted to letting the entity inside of her. Lance was helpless to stop it all, in the end. He’d never been able to make her see reason, and it was even worse to know that even if her actions stole her away, they were what stopped Honerva.

(Allura had reasoned with the witch, but Lance wasn’t as sympathetic. He had piloted Red in the end, but Blue’s iciness never left him, not fully. Honerva was a monster. Lance would never believe otherwise, and for more than just Allura.)

Keith nodded. Lance had a house—more of a shack, really—separate from his family. He loved them, but they were too loud to be around all the time. He couldn’t handle constantly smiling for them, pretending nothing was wrong. Inside, the air was warm. “You don’t have to, you know. I’ve—uh—been talking to the Blades who’ve dealt with this. Krolia, especially. They say it always gets better with time, it’s just up to us to fill it.”

Lance’s hand came to cover one of the marks Allura had left him. When he was alone, he’d taken to picking at them. He loved them on her, but the blue hooks felt more like a disfiguration, a gruesome reminder than a memory of their love because they weren’t his.

Keith’s eyes followed the motion. “Is it weird, you know, having the marks now?”

Lance’s first instinct was to shake his head, and he did. “No, no. She left them for me, after all, whether she meant to or not.”

Keith didn’t look completely satisfied with Lance’s answer, which didn’t spell out a peaceful immediate future. Keith didn’t like not having answers and kept probing. “But?”

Lance stood, going to adjust the angle of picture hanging on the wall that didn’t need adjusting. “But nothing. It’s fine, Keith. She gave them to me. I’m not going to think about rejecting them.”

“Do you not want them, though? She would never have done anything to you if she knew you didn’t want her to.”

Lance shrugged, edging towards the door. “It’s fine, Keith. Leave it alone, please.”

Keith was suddenly there, hand on his shoulder. “Lance.”

“Leave it alone,” Lance all but begged, voice getting choked. He didn’t turn to meet his eyes.

“Lance, c’mon. Sit with me.”

Lance thought about refusing. He could go out into the fields, sit in the juniberry patch and ignore Keith until he gave up. Lance, for as good as he was at talking, had also learned the usefulness of the silent treatment. Instead, his shoulders slumped and he sat with Keith. He didn’t want to chase him off. The others visited, sure, his family was close by, but Lance needed a better reminder that he wasn’t alone, that there were others grieving alongside him, even if not to the same extent.

Keith arranged himself across from Lance this time, their legs touching in the limited space. Lance couldn’t find it in himself to mind it.

“How long have you wanted them gone?” he asked, blunt as ever. He was obviously concerned but didn’t seem all too sure about how to go about doing things.

Lance’s gaze was set on their ankles, the divots and curves of the their skin. “Since I figured out that they were there. In the moment, I don’t know. I didn’t realize. She was going off in her blaze of glory and I was—I wasn’t sure  I was going to be able to hold myself together long enough to leave, Keith. It was rough.”

Rough was the understatement of the century.

“It’s like I’m taking a part of her. It doesn’t feel right. The marks aren’t mine to have. They are—were—hers, and I’m just an imposter.”

Keith had to take pause. Coran established that Lance wasn’t really Altean, none of his biology had changed; he just had the marks. When he decided he was done, he began, tentatively, “And have you done anything about it?”

Lance shrugged. “Bought some foundation. It lasts for a bit, but it’s like as soon as they figure out they’re being covered, they make themselves known again. They start glowing, which doesn’t hurt, exactly, but it makes my face get warm. I feel them, then, so I don’t wear it too often. I scratch at them sometimes, when things get bad. I can’t even break the skin around them. It just gets sore.” His head dropped to his chest, tears threatening to fall. Granted, they were nothing Keith hadn’t seen already, but they’d never come like this before. “They’re stuck on there good.”

Keith winced. “And nobody else knows that they’re—that you’re not happy with them?”

A dull shake of Lance’s head. “It would break Coran’s heart. Hunk, Shiro, and Pidge are fine. They don’t need my drama. My family’s worried enough as is. I mean, Veronica was already nervous about me being out fighting, you know, a war. It’s just too much, Keith.” The admission was quiet, fearful. Lance was terrified that he would be told he was ungrateful, that he wasn’t respecting what she’d done for them.

Instead, Keith drew him into a hug. “We can get these off, Lance. She would never leave you without a way out.”

Lance got a lot of hugs—from his family, from his team, from Allura, when she was still around. None had ever felt as relieving as Keith’s in that moment, wrapped in his arms and being told he would help him fix it, that it was okay to feel like it needed fixing.

Keith wasn’t a touchy person, so the hug was over quickly. That did very little dampen the effect of the burden being taken off Lance’s shoulders.

“I know we’ve all been a little distant after this whole thing, but you’re not alone. You know that, right?” Keith asked.

In theory, Lance did. It was a little more difficult in practice. “Yeah, I know. It’s just hard sometimes.” He choked out a hysterical, teary laugh. “Thanks for stopping by. It’s—um—nice to not have to carry this kind of thing alone.”

Lance startles, head swiveling side to side before landing on Shiro, who pretends he can’t see the flash of light indicative of a bayard’s presence. His memories of when he wasn’t around are hazy and don’t lend him any answers when his mind races, wondering when Lance took on that kind of hypervigilance. Lance smiles, lips stretched unnaturally thin over his pearly teeth.

Shiro waves, though the action is uncertain, faltering. He’d come for some instant noodles after skipping dinner in favor of meetings with Garrison personnel, and his stomach was demanding to be filled. “Hey, Lance. What are you doing here?”

It’s just the two of them. The isolation, once so common in the sprawling grounds of the castle, bothers Shiro like a cat having its fur rubbed the wrong way.

Lance shrugs. “Couldn’t sleep. Needed to walk a little. Got tired of that, and ended up here.” Despite the clipped sentences, he’s forcing warmth into the explanation, doing his best to keep whatever is bothering him away from Shiro.

At least he doesn’t appear to be lying. Shiro makes himself think of that as a positive. He abandons his original quest, coming to sit across the table from Lance. “I get that. You doing okay?”

Lance starts in flippantly. “Nah, just couldn’t sleep like I—”

“Lance, you know that’s not what I asked.”

Lance’s mouth screws up, eyes darting back and forth in a frantic search for an escape. Shiro doesn’t like the feeling it gives him, knowing Lance doesn’t want to talk with him. When had that happened? Lance talks and talks and talks even when he shouldn’t, so why now is he stalling?

“Look, I know things aren’t the same, I’m not your black paladin anymore, but we’re still friends, aren’t we? You can trust me.”

Lance’s stare is quick to flit to Shiro, full of warning and a little bit of pain he doesn’t understand. Just as soon, it settles back on the table, a finger tracing a scuff in the metal of it. “Things just haven’t been sitting well with me, recently. It’s all been so much.”

Shiro nods. Okay, overexertion. That’s simple enough. “You know you can take a few days off, right? Go see your family, really be with them. We’re okay right now—none of us will blame you.”

Lance’s hands grip the table, stopping their fidgeting. One of the bulbs overhead is flickering a little. Shiro is way past thinking the effect it gives is ominous. Rather, the shadows it casts on Lance’s face just make him look sad.

“It’s not that kind of much.”

The words are spat at Shiro, tickets from an arcade game he hadn’t expected to do so well on. He fumbles for a moment, scooping them up from the floor. When they’re safely tucked in his pocket, he tries again. “Okay.” He thinks and decides that last time, he rushed into things. He goes slower, tries harder to understand. “Okay,” he repeats. “Then what kind of much is it?” Lance doesn’t usually talk like this, using phrases that dance around the mind and one has to consider the weight of. Shiro’s concern grows.

“I could handle it, was handling it. I mean, your—whatever it was, I guess—didn’t like me much, but I could handle that. Now, it’s just—”

A sound of frustration, hands flexing with it. “It’s not right. I know I’m where I’m supposed to be, but, I don’t think Keith really thinks so.” There’s an ashamed, almost fearful look that follows the admission like he’s waiting to be told off, to have Shiro not take his side.

Shiro and Keith have never tried to hide their closeness, and he hides a wince at how that’s coming back to bite him. “Go on,” Shiro encourages softly, wishing he was on Lance’s side of the table to comfort him physically.

“I know he’s stressed. He doesn’t like Earth much and he misses Krolia. Being the black paladin is a lot, anyway, but he—I don’t know. It’s probably stupid but it’s like—like, what? You think you’re the only one suffering? Before he left with the blades we talked,” Lance doesn’t say about what, “and I thought we were cool, but now he’s different. We’re supposed to be a team, and it’s not working like it used to. He’s not as nice, and I wish things could back to how they were.”

Lance looks up at Shiro, bracing himself to be told he’s wrong, that he’s exaggerating. Shiro can see it in the strain of his shoulders, that Lance has convinced himself it’s dumb. He mulls over what’s been said, allows it for a split second. He’s glad Keith has grown and, truthfully, he doesn’t know any of what’s been going on with him and Lance. He’s been gone. This gap in his knowledge, the lack of direction he’s left with, hurts more than he thought it would. He would like to think that Keith isn’t doing it on purpose. No matter what’s an accident and what’s not though, Lance is hurting. Shiro may not be the leader anymore, but he can’t allow that either.

He reaches forward, ignoring the painful jab of the table into his stomach to take Lance by the shoulders. “It’s not stupid, Lance. Anything that has you feeling like this needs to be addressed. How long has this been bothering you?”

Lance shrugs. Shiro doesn’t pry, just tries to sort out what to do. He’ll have to have Keith and Lance talk, definitely, and oh godwhat a mess that’ll be. He’ll have to ask the others if they’ve noticed anything strange there, but first and foremost, Lance. He’s sitting in front of him baring his vulnerabilities, expecting to be shot down. It’s a good thing Shiro’s always been good at defying expectations.

He forgoes actually getting up and going around the table between them, sliding over it to sit next to Lance in one smooth motion. Shiro can physically feel the stress leave Lance’s body as he slumps against him, head pressed into his chest.

“It’s not stupid,” he tells him again. They’ve never been all that close in the scheme of things, but that’s not going to stop Shiro from giving Lance the comfort he needs. He’s his teammate, his friend, his family.

Lance doesn’t end up saying anything more.