We're Going Home

25

"I'm leaving the team." Shiro said one morning. Things seemed to be going well. The team was all in the breakfast hall. Lance was healthy and vibrant, only seldom coughs spoke of the disease that had ripped his lungs apart. And his breakdowns had become increasingly seldom.

Hunk choked on a bite of food when Shiro made the announcement, but Keith was the first to speak up. "No, you're not."

"Look, I'm only a danger to all of us. I never know when Zarkon could take over. I mean, I could've killed Keith. He was really torn up when he got back. That was all me." Shiro retorted. "I don't know why we're even debating this."

"It's been weeks, Shiro. If you were going to flip and kill us all you would've done it by now." Allura pointed out.

"I have to agree." Keith looked pointedly at Shiro. "I mean Lotor even told me that you wouldn't attack until Lance was literally on deaths door. But Lance is perfectly healthy now. There's nothing to fear."

"Thank you, Keith. But I don't need your approval." She glared at him.

Lance narrowed his eyes at the princess. "I don't know if aliens even have buttholes, but you need to pull that stick out of your rear end." He snapped.

Allura gasped and put a hand to her chest. "Well, I never!"

"Guys!" Hunk said, finally managing to swallow his bite of food. "We're being irrational." He tried to calm all of them. "First of all, Shiro, you do not need to leave. This team needs you. And when it comes down to it, I know you can overcome Zarkon. Allura, Keith is just as pivotal to this team as you are. Galra or not." He usually didn't take charge like this, but with both Shiro and Allura being balls to the walls nuts, he had to step in. "Can we all get along?"

Allura sat down, keeping her glare on Keith and Lance, who were sitting a little too close for comfort.

Shiro stayed standing. "I don't think I should be here."

"We are just Spicolian movements from the final showdown with Zarkon. Once we win that you can go. We can all go home." Pidge encouraged him. She was excited to be able to donate all her time to finding her father, but afraid to leave the team. They were like family to her. "And we will need Voltron for that."

Shiro nodded. "After that, I'm leaving."

Everyone was quiet for a while. The realisation that once this was all over they could go home hit hard. Keith looked over at Lance and knit his brows. What would they do? Would Lance go back to the garrison? Or home? And Keith. Would he go back to his cabin?

Breaking the team apart seemed like the last thing anyone wanted to do. If they could just stay on the castle and fight off space monsters forever, it would be so much easier than facing whatever Earth was left for them on the terrestrial plane. And what if centuries had passed on earth? What then? Or no time at all. What world would be left for them to go back to?

"Good talk. I'm going to my room." Of course Lance would be the one to break the silence.

Keith lingered for a moment then followed him out. "Are you okay?"

"No." He said, turning around. "We're being honest right? I'm fucking terrified."

"Why?"

"Because, any number of things could have happened on earth. My Mamá, my hermanos, my Padre. They could all be dead. And I wouldn't know. I'm terrified to go home. And what am I going to have to show for the years I was gone? Who in the world would believe that I was out there saving them in a giant blue lion all this time? What if the Galra took Earth?" He slid down the wall and sat against it.

Keith didn't know what to say. He had nothing for him on earth. No one that would miss him. Earth was the last place he wanted to be. He bit his lip and sat down beside Lance. "We don't have to go home. You could come with me, and help me look for my mom."

"I want to go back. I miss the rain, and the oceans. I miss the beach with my family. I just, I'm terrified. What if none of that's there?" Then suddenly what Keith had said registered. "You're not coming back with me?"

Keith paused for a moment, like a deer caught in the headlights. "What do you want from me Lance? Earth had nothing that I want."

Lance turned his gaze to him, blue eyes wide and wet. "It has my heart."

Keith went silent for a long time. When he finally found it in him to speak he gently brushed Lances hair out of his face. "Than I have to go. Don't I?" He showed a small smile as Lance's turned towards him.

His eyes filled with excitement. "Oh Keith you're gonna love my family! You can meet my brothers and my sisters, and my little cousins. My Mamá will love you! And we can stay for Christmas. My family has the best Christmas. I can just imagine her now. 'Tch tch, too skinny.' And she's such a good cook-" Lance rambled on about his family and earth and his home.

Keith felt a strange foreignness to it all. He'd never had a family, and suddenly he was going to be a part of Lance's. But he didn't know how to act around a family, much less feel actual love from anyone but Lance. But perhaps he was wrong. Because ever since the day the Paladins united they'd been slowly building a family, and Keith was a part of that, even if Allura didn't want him to be.

Suddenly, his thoughts flipped to panic. "I can't meet your family, Lance."

"Why not?" Lance asked, as if he was blind.

"Look at me. I'm purple!" He gestured to himself.

"Oh. They don't know about aliens." He murmured. "That may be a problem."

"I can never go back to earth. They'll kill me, or experiment on me!" He wanted so badly to be the guy who Lance could take home for Christmas. Instead, he was a freak who fit in nowhere. The humans would shun him. The Galra hated him. His only hope was the Blade of Marmora.

Lance shook his head. "They'll love you just as much as I do. I don't have any doubt in my mind."

Keith opened his mouth to reply but his words were blotted out by what sounded like yelling and screaming in the next room. He stood up, his eyes wide and panicked. Lance was to his feet just as quickly, bayard ready. They ran down the hall, both trying to convince themselves that it couldn't be what they thought it was, yet preparing themselves for the worst.

Nothing could prepare them for the scene that awaited them inside the dining room.