Chapter Text
Today’s training session seemed as if it would never stop. Shiro thought it would be a good idea to bump up the difficulty level and see how the team does. So now Lance was huffing, cursing the metal of his suit for being so heavy, and pushing through its wear on his bones.
Lance truly does try his best to pull his weight. He dodges every attack he can, and the ones he doesn’t, well he recovers quickly. He's just slower than usual. His regular vigor has been replaced by something more solemn. You can't fight with no more fight left in your gut, and Lance was starting to realize how hopeless it was for him to try to anyway.
He was still doing fine though, he had yet to be knocked out of the fight.
That is until he feels the blunt end of a spear smack him in his sternum, rattling his chest plate. The force sends his body to the ground with a sickening thwack. His metal armor causes him to slide across the floor on his back, skidding like a rock being skipped across a lake. Lance releases a groan as he comes to a stop on the floor. He waits for the bot that got him to come finish the job, his eyes squeezed shut, accepting defeat, and anticipating another hit.
But it doesn’t come. The tension in Lance’s face slowly dissipates, but he doesn’t open his eyes yet. He listens for the sound of metal feet hitting the ground, coming for him, but instead hears steel crashing into steel. Lance allows himself a minute to catch his breath, then lifts his head off the ground to look up and see who came to pick up his slack.
Looking down his chest, he sees a blur of black hair and red armor swinging a blade furiously.
Lance lets his head fall back on the ground and groans again. Of course it was Keith.
A brief alarm rings through the system, a sound the paladins had come to know meant the end of simulation signal. The motion of fighting dies out as bots fade back into the floor of the training deck. Lance props himself upon his elbows and looks up.
Keith. Ugh, Keith. He HAD to come show off. Lance watches as Keith approaches him.
“You okay?” Keith asks, stretching his hand out to Lance, urging Lance to let him help him up.
Lance instinctively rubs his sore sternum. He’s sure there will be an angry bruise under his armor when he checks later, but he tries to not let the pain show on his face. Keith eyes him with a concerned expression.
“Just fine, Mullet.” Lance takes Keith’s hand and accepts his help standing up. He holds his chest as he moves, the pain too intense to ignore.
Lance looks to Keith. If Keith felt as concerned as he looked, he wasn't saying anything about it. Lance couldn't tell if he was being quiet to save his pride, or to be a dick. He also can't decide which of those options pisses him off more. Lance looks away, smearing a scowl across his features and folding his arms across his chest. “Do I get a thank you?” Keith teases.
Lance rolls his eyes. “Thank you, Keith.” He says venomously. “Do you want me to tell you you’re my hero too?”
Keith laughs. “I wouldn’t mind that.”
“Shut up.” Lance bites. “Alright, alright.” Shiro chimes in. “Let's put a stop to this before you two are at each other's throats again.”
Lance shoots Keith a half hearted glare. Keith pretends to not notice.
“That was good work today guys. Slowly but surely we are cranking up the difficulty level on the simulations.” Shiro says.
Lance looks down. This praise doesn’t feel like it belongs to him. Hunk, Shiro, Pidge, and Keith can hold their own in the simulation. Heck, Keith can fight good enough for both him and Lance. Meanwhile Lance really wouldn’t mind if they toned down the difficulty just a tad.
Keith watches Lance out of the corner of his eye but still won't say anything. Lance takes a deep breath, trying to ignore him.
“I think now is as good a time as any to take a well deserved break. Let's call it a day.” Shiro says. He moves to Hunk, patting his shoulder and smiling at him.
“You don’t have to tell me twice.” Hunk says, grinning back at Shiro and pulling his helmet off his head. “The food goo has been calling my name for the last half hour!”
Hunk heads towards the exit with Pidge on his heels. They fall into comfortable conversation. Lance looks to Allura and Coran who are noticeably deep in in thought. Allura looks frustrated. Coran is offering her all of the reassuring looks in the world, but they don’t look like they’re helping her. They exchange glances, in a silent conversation that is not so subtle, they look to Lance.
Keith starts to follow Hunk and Pidge when Shiro stops him, grabbing his elbow.
“Keith, could I actually talk to you really quickly?” Shiro asks, shooting a worried glance at him, then pointing to Lance with his eyes.
“Oh, uh, sure.” Keith says, following Shiro's eyes.
Lance frowns. Whatever this was, he didn’t like it. He opted to leave before he embarrassed himself more, or worse, had to have a talk with one of them. Lance pulls himself out of the Altean's gaze and speed walks to the exit while Shiro steers Keith towards the group. Hopefully Keith can cover him so Lance can slip out before anyone notices.
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Keith watches Lance hurriedly leave over his shoulder, then turns back towards Shiro.
“What was that all about?” He asks, jabbing his thumb towards the door Lance walked out of.
Shiro sighs. “I was hoping you could tell me.” He says. “Lance seems to be going through something lately.”
“The boy has been homesick for quite some time,” Coran chimes in, “but I am getting increasingly concerned.”
“As am I.” Allura says. “He has the unfortunate habit of ‘throwing away the drill’ as Shiro says.”
“Throwing away the drill?” Keith asks.
“You know how he makes a little mistake, gets embarrassed, then lets himself get knocked out?” Shiro asks.
Keith thinks back to their session earlier. Lance did seem a little bit off. Hesitating to take shots, retreating when he had an opening to attack, letting Keith swoop in and deal some damage. Something must be up, normally Lance fought tooth and nail to one-up Keith.
“I guess he does do that.” Keith says quietly.
“Yeah.” Shiro says. “I’m not sure what’s bothering Lance but it's affecting his performance in training.”
“So what do you want me to do about it?” Keith asks.
Allura and Shiro exchange a concerned look. Shiro nods at her, signaling for her to take the reins.
“We were hoping you could try to talk to him about it.” She tells him.
Keith scoffs. “Me? Are you joking?”
Coran speaks up this time. “I think your approval means more to him than you might think, Keith.”
“He hates me, Coran.”
“He doesn’t hate you.” Shiro interrupts. “That's not productive to think that way. Besides, we all agree that you would be the best choice to talk to him.”
Keith rolls his eyes. “And why is that?”
“A conversation about a lacking performance might be particularly embarrassing coming from someone you wish to be romantically involved with.” Allura says, tucking hair behind her ear sheepishly.
Keith rolls his eyes again.
“As it would be coming from your team leader.” Shiro says.
"And what's your excuse?" Keith asks, turning his attention to Coran.
"My dear boy, I have already tried. Whatever is bothering Lance must be rather... personal. He did not wish to speak about it with me. Perhaps he could relate to someone of his same age and experience more." Coran says.
“I’m sure you can understand our perspective, Keith.” Allura says, moving closer to Keith, placing a hand on his shoulder to reassure him. “We only wish to not upset Lance further. Besides, this could be an opportunity for the two of you to grow closer.”
Keith groans and looks up at the ceiling, slapping his hands on his face and shrugging Allura off of him. “Trust me guys. I don’t want to fight with Lance. But a positive relationship is a two way street. We can’t have it if only one of us puts in the effort to drive on the right side of the road.”
“So why don’t you show him that you’ll put in the effort?” Shiro asks. “Maybe that’s the reassurance he needs to drop the whole ‘rivalry’ thing.”
"How would I even start, Shiro? It's not like him and I make small talk." Keith asks exasperatedly.
"You guys are roughly the same build, you could teach each other what you've learned. Spar together. You know, stuff like that." Shiro says reassuringly.
"Yeah. Okay." Keith says sarcastically.
The trio looks to him expectantly while Keith studies the floor. He thinks about Lance's performance that day again. He did seem weirdly down. Keith had been there when Hunk and Pidge confronted Lance for how he'd been acting. He gave them the most out of character response. The words ring through Keith's head.
"I'm fine, I just want to be alone right now." Lance had said.
It was completely and utterly unlike Lance to respond that way. To shrug his friends off and grovel. Keith wonders what on earth could be bothering him that much.
Keith returns from his thoughts and looks back to Shiro again, letting out a deep sigh. “Sure.” He says. “I’ll try to talk to him. But I’m telling you now, I think you’re all wrong. He’s not going to want to talk to me about anything.”
“But you’ll at the very least try?” Shiro prompts.
“I’ll try.”