Lance Alone

Part 10 (Lance)

Not too far from Earth, the salty old Captain bid Lance goodbye with a nod of his head and little else. Eager to get home, Lance jumped in the cockpit of his borrowed pod and launched it out the back, racing towards his beloved marble of a planet. The atmosphere started to burn up around the edges of his cockpit. Rich, beautiful atmosphere... the thing that made the plants grow, and brought all sorts of weather, the blue skies over his home... it wasn't long now, he was almost home...

Growing larger and larger beneath him was the Galaxy Garrison landing pad. It was wide open, baking in the hot desert sun, and the perfect landing spot for his craft. Besides, if he was going to become the guardian of Earth, then he needed to work with the Garrison. They could start developing an army of pilots... a flying police to protect the skies! The possibilities were endless.

He brought the pod to a stop (a perfect landing, as always) and opened it up, ready to smell the air that he missed so much.

Just as he stretched to take a nice breath of air, a gust kicked some sand up in his face, and he coughed to let it clear his lungs. Still, better than anything. He squinted in the sun, looking for the nearest building, when he saw three people shapes moving towards him. Their images danced in the heat radiating off the sand, but as they came closer, Lance recognized Iverson immediately, but not the other two adults moving towards him. But even Iverson was a welcome face after all he'd been through.

"Boy, am I glad to see you guys! You're not going to BELIEVE where I was!" he jumped out of the pod to greet them, but then noticed they were not smiling. The two goons on either side of Iverson were wearing... biohazard suits? They grabbed each one of his arms before he could even see what was going on.

"Lance McClain. I can't believe it," he sighed, "We thought you were dead."

"Well, I'm not--hey! What do you think you're doing?" The figures in biohazard suits were leading him away from the building, into a smaller tent set off to the side. "You can't treat a..." He had to stop himself short of saying "a paladin of Voltron", because they didn't know what that was. Everyone on Earth was so blissfully ignorant of the problems in the universe, right outside their front door. That's why he came back, to help them. Still, he got used to being treated like a hero by most everyone he met.

"We just need to run some tests. Make sure that you're not contaminated," one of the suits informed him.

"Contaminated? With what?"

"At least the aliens returned you all in one piece. We couldn't say the same for Shiro," the second suit told him. Inside the tent was an examining table--it look hastily set up, as if they constructed it while he was entering the atmosphere. "Why did they send you back? Is this some sort of message?"

"What? They didn't send me back! I came back on my own!" Lance finally pulled free of them. He wasn't in the mood for a physical, he didn't want to be treated like a lab rat--what kind of welcome was this? "I flew that pod here, borrowed it from the Castle of Lions--well, I guess I stole it, since I'm not sure if I'll ever give it back."

"Lions?" Iverson jumped at that word. "Like, big blue flying metal lions?"

"Now you're getting it!" Lance cheered. "Listen, just call up all the most important people here at the Garrison into one big room. I'll tell you everything."

"You're not meeting anyone until you've gone through a through decontamination," one of the suits procured a geiger counter, which he waved all around Lance--even under his armpits. Iverson slowly started to back out of the tent until it was zipped shut behind him.

"Hey! Why aren't you listening to me? Earth's in danger but don't worry--I'm here to save you!"

The two suits ushered him into a small corner of the tent, blocked off with a curtain. "Start decontamination level one."

Through the curtain, Lance could just make out one more thing Iverson said. "If that kid's here to save us, Lord help us all."

Then the decontamination shower rained down orange goo all over him, followed by alternating jets of cold and hot water. He howled in surprise and tried to jump out, but the medics kept him detained.