Recuperare

Awakenings

Lance had known pain, as it was something he was very accustomed too. But it had always surprised him how wrong he was. He had taken bullet shots amongst many, gotten severe and harmless concussions. All of this not including all the other side injuries he had acquired over the last few months.

Though waking up was not always the most pleasant experience. His head pounded as Lance came too, his fingers gently gripping the white sheets. Moving one of his legs over an inch, he tested his head once more. It was a battle, but Lance was able to move it slightly to the left of his pillow. His body screamed for him to go back to that blissful heaven of warmness and tenderness, but he knew that time wouldn't stop for him.

Lance scrunched up his eyes before opening them, a white light immediately infiltrating his cornea. He blinked once more to get rid of the awful glare, but nothing soothed the pain. His body tensed from the sudden flood of light, as the monitors went wild next to him.

"Lance, calm down. Open your eyes." A voice soothed nearby.

He hadn't realized how his eyes had closed, nor that he was convulsing.

"He's having a seizure!" Someone cried out, its voice hurting his skull. His limbs were having a field day with movement, as he felt something holding his tongue down.

The convulsing stopped

Lance felt exhaustion seeping into his bones and planned to leave his body behind for others to find. But a voice tethered to his consciousness begging him to come back to her.

"Lance, please stay with us."

Its voice sounded teary, and weary with worry. Lance wanted to comfort it; he really did. But nothing was listening to his subtle commands. He wanted to hold it, and whisper sweet nothings to its soft voice, but the pain was making everything far more worse.

"How is he?" Another voice, far different from the first, reached his ears.

"He's stable, but they don't why he had a seizure. I'm worried."

"He'll be ok."

"I know. How's Keith?"

Lance perked up at the name of his lover, but also became worried about Keith's health. Keith had also crashed with the same velocity, goes forbid, even worse of a fall. He tried to open his eyes even more, but his body was still too weak with exhaustion.

"He's...I'm scared Veronica. Keith isn't showing enough brain activity that shows he'll wake up. I don't know what to do with myself."

"I'm so sorry Shiro. Though I know that Keith is a fighter, he wouldn't stop until he wakes up. But until then, don't forget that we are all here for you."

"Thank you, Veronica."

Keith might not wake up? Lance felt immediate desperation to wake up at that point, his lover was hurt, far more than him. He couldn't handle it if Keith didn't wake up, he might just die at that point. But his body told him otherwise.

'Gotta wake up'

'Keith is hurt'

'KEITH IS HURT'

'He might not wake up!'

'WAKE UP'

'WORK!'

No command worked or had any effect on his movements. Instead, it only aided his exhaustion, and eventually laid defeated when Lance was consumed by darkness.

VOLTRON

It took longer to come back to earth than Lance would've liked. The worry from before was still playing a key part in his awakening. He had to see Keith for himself, had to know that his lover was going to be ok in a larger sense.

Time went far too quickly, and death was imminent. Especially in their field of profession. But Lance had hoped for a few good years with Keith, that's all he asked. He would give anything for things to be alright, for things to go back to how they were.

But life was not as giving as he hoped

VOLTRON

Three hours was what it took for Lance to flutter his eyes open. His mouth was quite dry, with his whole body feeling like a spark in a fire. Lance was quite permanent in his bed at the time, though it was far from being comfortable.

It didn't take long for him to realize he was in the Garrison hospital wing. The familiar smell ran up his nose, the colors blending with his memories. Every room had the same structure, color, and anything that could've been named. It was generic and simple, just like the Garrison.

Lance hadn't been in the hospital wing as much, which was a good thing, but also left gaps. There had been only two times that he had been admitted to the hospital wing, though he couldn't remember one of those times. He had hit his head in the simulation and woke up a few days later with a severe concussion. The other time was less mild, only resulting in a sprained ankle that healed quite nicely.

But he was getting ahead of himself. Placing himself in the past wasn't going to fix his original problem of being stuck in his head. It took his whole body to respond to the people in his room, his muscles tensing up from the lack of movement.

"Lance?" A person to his left started to move towards him. They reached out their hand to touch his face, but he moved before they could.

It was instinct to move away from strangers, if space taught you one thing, it would be that. Space also taught the heart to pound no matter the situation, or maybe that was the war. Regardless, Lance still moved his head to the left.

"It's ok, Lance. I'm not going to hurt you." Their voice reached his ears, its sweet frequencies soothing his tense muscles.

The voice sounded strangely familiar, though Lance still couldn't place it to a person. He hesitantly brought his face to their hand. The hand cupped his cheek, bringing a new sense of comfort that he had known, but forgotten.

A name popped into his fevered mind

"Veronica?" His voice rasped out, clearly lacking hydration.

Veronica smile. "Welcome back to the land of the living. Do you need anything?"

Lance didn't need to reopen his eyes to picture her frowning. He opened his eyes a few times to eliminate the awful glare of the sun. Looking over, he saw the familiar frown he had known for many years.

"I'm fine. All I need is you." It was a sentimental statement, but it rang true. Being unconscious was exhausting, and quite lonely. Plus, Lance was naturally a social person, and often needed those interactions to stay stable.

"How about I do you one better?" His sister grinned. "Would you like to see the rest of the family?"

"They're here?"

"Every one of them."

"Then, yes!" He prepared himself for the bombardment as his sister went to open the door. Once the door was open, everyone came running in. And all worries of Keith immediately faded away.