Confusing Carnations (Klance)

Ch 14: Guilt

Hunk spoke quietly, repeating himself, "He's in love with Lance."

An unbearable silence swept across the room. Everyone's eyes shifted to Lance and then to Keith, then to the floor. 

Lance looked at Keith, who was motionless and unconscious in the cryptopod, and clenched his fists, "How can I help him?"

Everyone turned their heads back at Lance, but Allura was the first to speak, "You're the one he's in love with, Lance." She spoke it as if it was self explanatory, which she thought it was. 

Furrowing his brows, he shouted, "I don't care about that! He needs our help right now!" He gestured angrily to the cryptopod Keith was in, "This is because he's in love with me so tell me how to help him! If I can help, I want to know how!" He felt exasperated, unbelievably angry with how everyone was acting.

Blinking slowly, Allura finally understood that Lance didn't know what Hanahaki was. "It's..." she started but hesitated, not finishing her statement. 

"Tell me!" Lance started, and all the sudden felt the urge to cry. "He needs our help and I'll do everything in my power to help, so just tell me what I can do!"

In all truth, Lance knew that he would go to the ends of the galaxy to help Keith right now. This felt soul shattering. He'd only recently realized how much he cared for Keith and he had planned on getting to know him better. The idea that Keith was in love with him, while shocking, did not shake his resolution to save him in the slightest. If anything, it only made his resolution stronger. Guilt ate at him as he looked at his blood stained clothes and at the comatose Keith. The idea that Keith was dying because of him was eating him alive. The literal blood on his hands burned themselves into his retinas. 

"Please tell me what I can do and I'll do it," Lance stated again, shifting his stare away from his hands. 

Pidge suddenly spoke up, emotionlessly, "Hanahaki is cured by the reciprocation of romantic feelings. Keith refused the surgical treatment when that could have still been an option."

Hunk suddenly spoke softly, in a false-hopeful tone as he saw Lance look wide-eyed at his shoes, "We can still try the treatment," Hunk tried to ease the tenseness of the situation, feeling sympathetic towards Lance, "It could still work."

Shiro was about to speak when Lance whispered weakly, "Could I be alone with him?"

Everyone in the room made their way out, understanding that Lance needed to process. They all felt terribly guilty about the situation Lance was in. 

Once the room was empty, Lance looked towards Keith. He sighed and stood in front of the cryptopod, face to face with Keith. Lance bit his lip before breaking out in sobs, bringing a fist to the glass of the pod, leaning his weight against it. Slowing sliding to his knees, he leaned his forehead on the glass. 

Lance looked like a wreck, not that it mattered since Keith wasn't awake to see it. After composing himself poorly, he spoke shakily, "Keith, you should have told me." He clenched his jaw, digging his nails into his palm, "I get why you didn't though."

"I've been such a jerk to you and I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, Keith. I'm gonna make it up to you, you hear me?!" Tears streamed down his cheeks, "I'm gonna make it up to you," he hiccuped through the crying. 

"This is all sudden to me," he tried to weakly laugh, "I'm not sure what I feel towards you but all I know is that I want to figure out how I feel. I want to get to know you and as soon as you get out of this thing, I'm going to, okay? That is, if you can forgive me for not realizing how special you are before this."

Hours were spent by Lance going in between sobbing and speaking before he eventually fell asleep at the foot of the cryptopod. 

Allura found him in the morning when she came into the control room. She sighed a bit, feeling terrible at the emotional agony he must be in right now, and covered him in a blanket before making her leave. 

Lance woke up groggily, looking at the blanket skeptically before shoving it off, and looked back up at Keith. 

Throughout the expanse of the day, Lance refused to leave Keith's side. 

A couple days passed this way as well, with Lance refusing meals and remaining stagnant by Keith's side. The only times he got up were to go to the restroom and eventually to change his clothes which were still blood stained. 

Please, Lance thought desperately, please wake up. 

I miss you, Keith.

Yeah, I totally lied in my last a/n. This chapter was not fun, lol. Though I have amazed myself in how I've gone from completely exhausted to a writing frenzy. Heh.