I always think about that one oost thag was shittin on rose for being mad at the astronomer for publishing her "lame outdated" observations of the stars and like NO ITS NOT ABOUT THAT HE STOLE HER POETRY YOU SICK FUCK!!! ...... I SEE FIRE INNNNN THE DARKNESS, RAGE AGAINST THE VOID
anywayz, it's only like 9pm for me but!!!!!!! happy new year to everyone who's reading this💕💓🎉🎉🎇🎆🎊 i hope 2019 treats all of us great and hopefully we can all heal... love u all sm, thanks for existing n for following me 😪💖💗💓💕💘
78 gave me some Klance vibes, so if the limit hasn't been reached yet that would make a cool drabble. :3
“You’re worth it.”
Lance expected his move to the red lion to come with a new set of responsibilities–especially after the speech Allura gave him about being Voltron’s right hand.
He wasn’t sure about it. Mostly because he was terrified he was going to screw up and disappoint everyone.
But Keith was falling apart, and Shiro was gone, and they were needed–so he took a deep breath and he stepped up.
Everything is different. He still talks to Blue, but she doesn’t talk back anymore. Red is stubborn and belligerent and takes a much different approach to piloting than he’s used to…and what he wasn’t expecting, out of all this, was to find out his time as a pilot of Voltron has an expiration date.
It goes like this: Shiro came back, and suddenly there were six paladins for five lions.
Shiro came back, and suddenly he was unnecessary.
No one said so. He just looked around and realized it. Everyone else had some way of being valuable without piloting a lion, and he’s just…Lance.
Shiro came back, and Lance was so relieved to see him alive, but there was a bitter taste in the back of his mouth and he thinks it’s because he knew that it meant he was going to fade into the background again.
It goes like this: they’re worth more than him.
It goes like this: they’re his family, and he will protect them at all cost.
They were storming a base. Lance was sniping, keeping the others from being overwhelmed by the sentries.
Simple mission to gather intel. They’d done the same thing about a dozen times now.
Except that every other time, Lance’s position hadn’t been compromised, and he hadn’t been forced to turn his attention away from the battle below in order to defend himself.
He’s still shitty at hand-to-hand.
“Lance, where are you? Pidge is almost finished, but about three dozen more droids just showed up. We need you here,” Keith says, and he feels a spark of guilt under his rib cage.
“I’d love to help you out, Keith,” he replies, pausing to duck under a swipe from the droid, “but I’ve got problems of my own at the moment.”
“What do you mean?” Keith asks, suddenly alarmed. “Lance, what’s going on?”
He opens his mouth to answer, distracted by the concern in Keith’s voice, and immediately regrets his lapse of focus when the droid lands a solid hit to his chest and sends him flying.
At least it gets him out of the corner he’d been caged into.
He scrambles to his feet, sprinting into the hall and firing back at the sentry as it follows after him. Unfortunately, he only manages to attract the attention of more droids, and as hard as he tries to shake them, it doesn’t go well for him.
The others are yelling at him over the comms, asking for an explanation.
“I’m fine, guys, just–” he breaks off to fire around the corner, pumping his fist in brief celebration when the shot leaves a smoking hole in the middle of a droid’s face, “–a little busy at the moment. My position was compromised.”
“If you need help, Lance, tell us. We’re pretty much finished here,” Pidge says.
“Yeah, bud. But, uh, don’t do that again. The not answering thing. You had me worried there,” Hunk rambles, voice high with anxiety.
“Kinda hard to talk when I’m running for my life,” Lance mutters, too low for the comms to catch. Louder, he adds, “Sorry, bro. I’ve got it covered for now; don’t worry about me.”
He maybe hates the universe. Just a little.
Mostly because immediately after he says that, a group of droids round the corner and send him scrambling for cover just as explosions start to rock the base.
“Uhhh, Pidge?” Hunk asks. “Weren’t the explosions start to happen after we were, you know. Gone.”
“Something went wrong, I got kicked out of the system!” Pidge growls. “Keith, we need to get out of here, now.”
“Lance, what’s your location?” Keith asks, and Lance cringes.
“Uhhh…kinda on the other side of the base. Hold on, let me see if I can change that.”
He swings behind a pillar in the hall, waiting for the droids to begin to pass him so he can shoot them down.
Just as he finally manages to get the droids down to a manageable level, another explosion shakes the ground under his feet, knocking him and the droids down. His bayard goes flying, sliding down the hallway until it bumps against the wall.
“Keith, this base is gonna be dust in about two minutes, and us too if we don’t get out of here!” Pidge warns.
“Not without Lance!” Keith insists. “Are you on your way, Lance?”
He’s not, but…
“Go head back towards Green, I’ll catch up!”
“Lance–”
“Keith, you heard him! We have to go!”
“Fine, but Lance, you better hurry!” Keith says.
Lance would say something characteristically annoying in reply, but he’s too busy trying to pry a droid’s hands off of his throat.
It’s not the first time he’s had to very aggressively face the fact that he’s useless without his bayard, but it might be the last, the way things are shaping up.
The base is shuddering, walls cracking under their own weight as their supports collapse, and Lance could swear the whole thing is starting to tilt, keeping him off balance and an even easier target for the Galran sentries.
Faintly, he can hear Pidge explaining what happened with the computer system to Hunk, and occasionally Keith chimes in with a question.
They’re fine. They’re on their way out.
Lance isn’t exactly sure what happens next. He just knows that one moment, he’s pushing against the droid that’s strangling him with all the strength he has, and the next, he’s hunched over, one arm braced against the wall–which is definitely no longer at a vertical angle–and he feels like he’s about to fall to pieces.
There are voices yelling in his ear, asking where he is, why he’s not answering, reminding him that the base is literally crumbling apart.
Blood is dripping onto the floor. His nose? Maybe. He thinks he’s bleeding from more than one place, but everything feels far away.
“Lance, answer us! Where are you?”
Keith’s voice.
He tries to take a step, but his leg crumbles under his weight and he has to catch himself against the wall.
“Just go,” he says.
“What? Lance, where are you?” Keith demands.
“Too far away for it to matter,” he replies, and his voice has never sounded so tired. “Get out of here.”
“No, Lance–fuck, where the hell are you? Tell me!” Keith orders, and there’s panic in his voice now.
“It’s not worth it, Keith–” Lance says, voice raised in vehemence, and then he closes his eyes and slumps farther down the wall. His bayard is clutched in his hand, although he doesn’t remember retrieving it. It’s redder than he remembers.
“I’m not worth it,” he finishes, voice quiet.
“Lance, what–no! Don’t even–ugh!” Keith growls, and Lance almost wants to smile. “I’m coming to get you. We’re coming to get you. We’ll tear through this whole base if we have to, timed explosions or not, so just–tell us where you are!”
He does smile at that, just a little. He squints at the flickering lights of the hallway, trying to remember exactly where he is. “Opposite side of the base from the control room, two halls off the hangar. But, Keith, really, I’m not–”
“Don’t even say it!” Keith snaps, and Lance can hear Pidge and Hunk’s chorused agreement. They’ve been oddly quiet, apparently content to let Keith say what they’re all feeling. “It’s worth it. You’re worth it.”
Lance laughs weakly, sliding down the wall until he’s sitting, clutching his middle, which suddenly feels like it’s on fire. “Now you say it, mullet. I’m flattered.”
“I’m gonna say a lot more as soon as we’re back to the Castle,” Keith threatens.
“You’re not allowed to be a reckless dumbass just because you fly Red now,” Pidge adds. “We get enough of that from Keith.”
“You gonna let that kinda disrespect fly, fearless leader?” Lance teases, breath coming shorter now. “Suppose you have to, since it’s Pidge. She’d eat you alive.”
“We’re almost there, Lance. Are you hurt?” Hunk asks.
Lance wrinkles his nose. “Probably.”
“Prob–what’s that even supposed to mean?” Keith complains. “Where are you hurt, Lance? Do you need a pod?”
“I have…no idea. Something hurts. So. Probably.”
“That’s not particularly reassuring, Lance,” Keith says dryly.
“It wasn’t meant to be,” he answers honestly.
There’s a pause, and Lance takes that as an excuse to drop out of the conversation. Breathing is hard enough without talking.
He can hear them arguing about him, on their way to pull him out of what will most likely be wreckage by the time they get there.
Their voices are fond, and he clings to that.
You’re worth it.
He holds on to that even tighter–folds it smaller and tucks it into the gap next to his heart.
You’re worth it.
He’s pretty sure he has a concussion, because his head feels thick and heavy and the lights are more like knives and his vision keeps fading in and out.
You’re worth it.
He smiles, and everything happens all at once–the base shudders violently, a sudden series of explosions finally sending it crashing, walls falling around him.
Someone shouts his name–”Lance!”–and he can hear them without the comms.
He wants nothing more than to stand up and answer them, but his consciousness falls from him completely before he can open his eyes.
