What they don't know

Part 20

"Lance?" 

The sound of the voice alone was enough to make the alchemist stop in his movements, prompting a concerned glance from Matt as he did so.

Nevertheless, Lance smiled at the princess and the advisor stood pleasantly beside her, "Princess. May I help you?"

Lance liked to think that they got along fairly well in the end - all things considered. He hated the way he acted around her originally, couldn't riddle a single coherent reason for it, and spent most of their friendship trying to quietly make up for it. 

Back then, Lance's feelings had been admittedly messy. Caught between pining over his wayward leader turned Blade and trying to bury the crush he still had on the princess that worked so hard to be deserving of her place among them as a paladin (probably harder than they all did, if Lance was being brutally honest). And even then, as he struggled to kill off the last roots of his feelings for her, it had been due to a mixture of guilt, awkwardness, and self preservation as he watched her fall for the old Lotor.

Did this Allura feel the same way for her Lotor? 

Could she end up being hurt the same way he was sure their old Lotor was always going to make their Allura?

Whether or not they truly regarded each other as friends or simply comrades, Lance knew her expressions better than most. Save for their two black paladins, it was Allura and Lance that were assigned the most diplomatic missions. They knew each other's tells perfectly, knew the faces they made when they were hiding their frustration or sadness, knew each other's faces well enough that they were known to communicate silently with nothing more than a glint in their eyes. 

Lance recognised the trepidation in the cautious flickering of the princess's lips. She was a terrible liar and even worse at asking for anything she thought was too imposing. 

But, despite all the warning signs, Lance couldn't bring himself to feel unnerved around her.

Just guilty.

"Well, Coran and I," Her eye flicked to his cheekbones before jumping back to his eyes as a flush dotted her cheeks. Lance smiled in response, catching onto where this was going, "We were wondering... If it would not be too imposing to ask but..."

"You want to know about my heritage?" Lance finishes for them, setting aside his bowl of food goo (he had forgotten just how disgusting it could be sometimes).

"If it would be no offense," Allura restated, fiddling with her fingers - a habit that Lance distantly remembered her complaining about, calling it diminishing of her authority and a sign of a weak will to hungry diplomats. 

"It wouldn't offend me. In fact, I know very little of it."

Coran caught his gaze warmly, his own curiosity blanketed by an appreciation that Lance had missed. The eldest altean gestured to the door, "In that case, would it be suited to your leisure to run some tests. Just to observe the extent to which altean blood runs through your veins."

With a shallow smile, Lance joined them, offering a small wave in farewell to Matt, who shrugged, still grimacing over the texture of the goo. Beside him, Lotor offered a similar wave, apparently liking the food goo quite a lot if his third serving was anything to go by. 

Lance followed them down the hallway, the conversation stagnant between them. Truthfully, he had no idea what to say to them. They weren't his Coran or Allura but they resembled them so greatly. It was odd to think such a perfect replica could exist without a shred of it being true. 

Although he supposed it wasn't the first time he had come across such a thing. The clone should have been proof enough that a face and a body weren't the key components of a person's identity.