Corrupted
@ceruleanpaladin @redlionstar
What had their lives turned into? A few weeks prior their biggest worries had been exams and flight simulation routines. Now it was the fate of the whole universe that rested upon their shoulders. This wasn’t the time to let your guard down. This wasn’t the time to get sloppy. This was not the time...
To let suspicions go left unattended for too long.
Not even after what had been a successful mission to a planet plagued by a terrifying monsters. Even if the locals seemed to have trouble really agreeing on what had really attacked them. The leader of the people, the king of a grand city of what appeared to be very paranoid people had frankly been quite rude when Lance and Keith had been refused reentry to the city to show what they had found in that overgrown jungle. But at least they would be free of the sweltering heat and could return to the castle with the report of a job well done.
Hunk had met them when they landed. Seemingly acting a bit aloof and uncharacteristically quiet. Though he had just been through a rather nasty gastro internal ordeal during the mission itself. It was not at all odd for him to be a bit tired and wanting to be alone.
It hadn’t taken long before they could joke away the nasty find they had done in that jungle. Even poking fun of each other for how close Lance and Keith probably had come to join Hunk in those bushes. There had been a few other weird jokes too from Hunk’s side. Apparently finding a rotting corpse on a mission had made him take up a bit of a morbid sense of humor. Or the joke was that he seemed to call everyone Bob for a few hours.
And things had been good. For a day or two. They hadn’t had much to do. Apparently the whole Galra fleet was laying low or something. If what he was writing was anything to go after the whole situation was boring Lance. He had set off to join Coran on a planet for a while and come back with presents.
Which hadn’t turned out as he had expected and left the blue paladin more confused about his friend than anything else. That confusion was only made worse by Hunk giving Lance quite the scare just the day after. It wasn’t like the yellow paladin to be stealthy. And even if Lance was singing to himself at the time, he should have heard Hunk coming. That was when Lance had started to suspect that there might have been something else that was going on with Hunk. If there wasn’t then there had better be an explanation to all of this. Hunk wasn’t one to forget when someone messed with his food.
Hunk’s behavior was unsettling Lance enough for him to act upon it. But when Lance had gone to talk to Hunk about it, finding the yellow paladin in the hangar of the yellow lion and running tests, something had felt off. So off that Lance had smoothed over any intruding question and quickly changed the subject. But something about Hunk’s behavior had stuck out. It was as if Hunk’s body was trying to send out signals that he wasn’t aware of. Like a quiet plead for help.
Something that Keith had experienced only a bit earlier that day. While trying out a friendly sparring match, Keith had gotten the feeling that things were not quite as they seemed either. Catching Hunk acting out of character one moment only to go back to being himself the next. It was during this encounter that Keith too had noticed the strange message from Hunk. Only it had not been interrupted like it would be later when Lance saw it.
Feeling that he might be wrong. It might have been nothing. A day later, after routine training with all of the paladins, Keith had found Hunk smiling like his old self again. But when he asked him about it, Keith only got more evidence that something was terribly wrong.
It had been almost a week since their mission to the jungle planet. A whole week of Hunk acting strange. This time Keith was certain that something was wrong and he was going to do something about it. He needed back up. He found Lance.
What the two of them didn’t know. Was that they were running out of time.
