But I Wouldn’t Want to Be (Voltron: Klance)
Title: But I Wouldn’t Want to Be
Pairing: klance
Tags: script-style, written post-s3, some angst but not for long
Chapter: 1/1
Description: After a particularly trying mission, Lance and Keith have an honest chat, complete with awkward reasoning, emotional outbursts, and… a particular kind of tension.
L: “Why did you do that back there?”
K: “What…? Do what?”
L: “Come on, you know what I mean!”
K: “I, uh, really don’t…”
L: “You put yourself in direct line of fire. You almost got shot, like, lots of times!”
K: “I was just trying to protect the rest of the team, you know that.”
L: “Yeah? How ‘protected’ would we have been if you got mowed down in front of us by all of those sentries?”
K: “But I didn’t get shot, I made it out just fine-”
*Voices rising*
L: “That’s not the point, Keith!”
K: “Then what is the point?”
L: “You sacrificing yourself doesn’t help anyone! Okay? You… letting yourself get killed doesn’t… it doesn’t… ¡Maldito! How do I say this…?”
*Still loud and getting louder, slightly angry*
K: “What, Lance, what? How would me taking sentry fire intended for you… not help you?”
L: “Because… aughh, because then you would be dead!!”
K: “Yeah, and you’d be alive!”
L: “But I wouldn’t want to be!”
*Shocked pause*
K: “Wait… what?”
*Awkward silence, short pause*
L: “I… I wouldn’t want to be. Not if… if you were dead.”
*Pause*
L: “Look, I know I probably make it seem like, like I hate you or something, but I don’t.”
K: “How does that even come close to wanting to be dead?”
L: “Gaghh, would you just shut up and let me talk?! That’s not what I meant!”
*Pause*
L: “That time when we rescued Shiro and you didn’t remember me, that was when I decided to convince you we had been rivals back in the Garrison. I mean sure, I had been kind of… well, actually, I’d been really jealous of you and your skills and, like, I just felt like I would never measure up, like… I would stay a second-class pilot. And when I had the chance to make something of that meet-up with you, I took it. And then once we were in Voltron together I felt like… I felt like I had to maintain it, the rivalry. Because, well…”
*Looks at Keith*
L: “…It was something that made me feel like I had a place.”
*Pause as they hold awkward yet charged eye contact. Lance looks away.*
L: “And now, well, I feel like if you… disappeared, then I wouldn’t have a place at all. Then all the stupid bickering, which I’m always the one to start, would go away; all the scowls and dirty looks would go away, my ridiculous attempts to one-up you with stupid things. That would be gone. And even though I’m supposed to hate all of those things, because, like, ‘We're rivals’ and all, I’d miss them. I’d… I’d miss you.”
*Silence. After a long pause Lance looks up to find Keith staring at him. Lance takes this as something negative and tries to take back all of the emotions he just revealed.*
L: “Ahhm… mierda, I’m sorry for adding fuel to the fire, I uh… I feel like I just gave you even more reasons to hate me, um, sorry for-!”
*Keith cuts Lance off and steps towards him. They are now quite close.*
K: “Wait wait, no, you… you think that… that I hate you?”
*Shocked pause; Lance is unsure of how to respond.*
L: “Uh… I mean, yeah, like don’t you have every reason to? Like, especially now?”
K: “What? No way, I don’t hate you.”
*Keith pauses; he and Lance maintain a somewhat shocked eye contact.*
K: “I mean, sure, we’ve had our fair share of bickering and stupid arguments but like… I’ve never… never hated you. I, uh, actually don’t think I’d be able to hate you. And I did try to.”
L: “What? Why?”
K: “Well, because I thought you hated me!”
L: “But I don’t!”
K: “I didn’t know that! But that didn’t end up mattering… it never worked anyway.”
*Lance and Keith’s eye contact has not wavered; after a pause, Keith continues, his tone changing.*
K: “You said… you said that if I died to keep you alive, you’d want to be dead too.”
L: “Well, not exactly-”
K: “But that’s basically what you said, isn’t it?”
L: “Well, y-yeeaaahh that’s basically it but when you say it like that-”
K: “That’s why I did it.”
L: “Wha-what? Wait, what?”
K: “Your reason, it’s, uh… it’s why I…”
L: “Keith, what…?”
*Keith’s words are hurried, anxious.*
K: “If you were killed I wouldn’t be able to live, okay? If anyone is going to die on a mission it’s going to be me, because you can’t die, like you just can’t, I wouldn’t be… so I’d rather… I’d rather it be me… because… god, Lance, I just-”
*Lance impulsively and frantically grabs Keith by the shoulders.*
L: “Keith, oh my god, no, don’t you ever do something stupid to keep me alive, what did I just say to you, like, two minutes ago?”
K: “Ahh, I don’t know- I mean, I don’t, er, remember, um-!”
*Lance’s next words are said as if in one continuous, exasperated breath as he roughly pulls Keith towards him.*
L: “Oh-my-GOD-Mullet-head, I can’t live my life if you aren’t in it!”
*In the heat of the moment, all of Lance and Keith’s pent-up mutual pining, fear, exasperation, and love crash together into a passionate kiss. After about five full seconds, they pull away, left breathless.*
L: “Did we just, like, completely leap past rivals and land straight into boyfriend territory?”
*Between deep breaths*
K: “Lance… how can you say straight at a time like this?”
L: “Oh my god, true.”
K: “You wanna, like, revisit that?”
L: “Like, now?”
K: “Like right now.”
L: “Quiznack yeah.”
K: “Did you just use the Altean word for fu-”
L: “Yes.”
K: “Oh my god.”
L: “Oh you’ll get over it, Samurai.”
K: “Quiznack yeah I will.”
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