shining like the stars

57

Lance hit the water hard, a loud splash that echoed through the cavernous hall. The water was shallow, barely came up to his knee when standing but it was enough that his head went under for a split second and his shoulders and back slammed into the bottom of the fountain. Miracle of miracles he didn't hit his head, but he was dazed enough that he didn't have a reaction when a strong hand grabbed him by his tunic and yanked him upright.

"Lance!" Keith said, and Lance looked up at Keith, bewildered. "Lance, are you all right?" Keith was down on one knee in the water, and he still had a good grip on Lance's tunic. "What the hell did you do?"

"Keith?" Lance croaked, and then put a hand on his own chest, fingers splayed out. He grabbed Keith's hand by the wrist and stared up at him, in that cream-colored tunic and his hair wild, and then yanked him down and toward himself. Keith's eyes went wide, surprised, as he landed against Lance, and he tried to push away and off him.

"What the fuck," Keith grunted. "What is your damage, man, do you even know what the hell is going on-"

Lance said, "shut up, I'm gonna kiss you," and surprisingly, Keith did, a quick angry blush gracing his features. He didn't pull away, though, even after the second, and third kisses, and when Lance put his hand back in Keith's hair he only shifted so he wasn't in danger of toppling them both back into the water.

When they finally parted, panting and out of breath, Lance looked down between them. "No holes, right?" he said. "I'm not bleeding out?"

"Why would you-?" Keith breathed, and put his hand flat on Lance's chest; the water soaking his tunic and making it cling to his thin frame. Then he seemed to remember something, and he shoved Lance with that same hand, flailing up to his knees. "Where were you?" he said, as Lance looked around and scratched his head, then spotted the column in the center of the fountain.

"That thing," he said, jabbing a finger at the ornately carved column. "Is a fucking memory core." He frowned. "But I wasn't in a memory, so... I don't know. Where's Allura, she knows more about this than anyone."

"She didn't enter the temple," Keith said, still kneeling in the water. "There's — I don't know what you did, but you need to come deal with this." Keith got to his feet in the water and turned, looking in the direction of the entrance to the temple's hall. Lance waited a moment to see if he would offer Lance a hand to his feet but Keith ignored him, and Lance huffed and got to his feet himself, only a little wobbly.

"I didn't do anything but get sucked into a memory core," Lance said, and bunched the bottom of his tunic and wrung it out as he waded across the fountain and stepped out. The water had been warm, and the air was humid but it was also with a touch of a chill. Keith however, had walked the breadth of the fountain, toward the memory core. "Hey, what the hell are you doing?" Lance said.

Keith put his hand on the column with only the barest hesitation. The nearly-invisible writing lit slowly around his hand, the same faint purple that they had seen on the ship, but in a different configuration. "It was blue for me," Lance said when Keith lifted his hand. "Well, it was glowing blue then I touched it and it turned yellow, I don't have any clue what any of this means."

"You never have a clue, period," Keith murmured, but he was staring at the column, then looking down at his hand. "You said it didn't take you into a memory, this time?"

Lance shook his head. "Nope. Not really at all."

"Hm," Keith said. Then he looked up, and narrowed his eyes at Lance. "So if you were inside the memory core," he said, then trailed off and shook his head. "Come on," he said. "We don't have the time to be messing around with this."

Lance stared at him as he waded through the knee-high water and sloshed his way out of the fountain. "I still don't know what's going on," he said as Keith stormed past with a purpose, then gave a little surprised yelp as Keith grabbed him by the wrist and yanked him after.

#

"Oh," Lance said, standing on the wide, shallow staircase that led into the temple carved out of the rock.

It wasn't quite daylight yet, but the sky was bright with the planet above. The skiffs had resumed their service, however, the crowd of alien tourists here to see the temple were all staying put on the landing dock, because in the large open area between the skiff and the temple sat the Blue Lion.

The others were arranged in front of it, as Allura had one hand on the sentient lion. "Blue!" Lance exclaimed in surprise, and the others all turned to see him being dragged rather unceremoniously out of the temple by Keith.

"Lance!" Allura said, sounding relieved, while Hunk and Pidge both tried to speak over each other and Shiro simply gave him a concerned once-over. "Why did you call the Blue lion?"

"I didn't," Lance protested, although he wasn't entirely sure that was the truth.

"Did you pass the trial?" Hunk said, at the same time Pidge asked, "what was the trial?" Lance shrugged helplessly as Allura gave him a scrutinizing look.

"Our cover's blown now," Keith said, standing beside Lance with his arms crossed. "Can we even do any more of these now, Princess? The Galra probably are on their way here right this minute."

"They don't like this planet's atmosphere," Lance said smartly.

"They have drone soldiers," Keith retorted, and Lance shut up. "Never mind the fact that they could trace the blue lion's flight path and it would lead them directly to the castle-ship."

"Coran will have already moved the castle," Allura said. She turned from the blue lion and glanced at Shiro, who had folded his arms and was frowning thoughtfully. "This accelerates things, I fear," she said.

"Lance will have to take the blue lion back to the castle-ship," Shiro said. "It's too dangerous for it to remain here."

"What? I'm not leaving you all alone here," Lance said.

"It's more of a danger to keep flying it around," Shiro said. "Even if by some miracle it didn't get picked up on the scanners, word is gonna get back to the Galra that the blue lion is here, so the others can't be far behind."

Lance scowled, but Shiro's face didn't soften. "Is that an order?" Lance muttered sourly.

Allura said, "I don't know if that's the best plan either."

"Why don't we have Lance drop us at all the temples?" Pidge suggested. "He can keep moving and watch out for trouble, and pick us up when we're through."

"Still ups the odds that we'll be noticed by the Galra patrols," Keith said. "It's probably safest for him just to get back to the ship and wait there."

"I don't care about being safe," Lance said. "I'm not gonna leave you guys unprotected." He crossed his arms and glared stubbornly at Keith, who ignored him, looking to Allura.

"It's not your safety, it's the lion's," Pidge said. "We can't let any of them fall into Galra hands, right Allura?"

Allura nodded. "They're all right, and there's no good option here."

"Uh," Hunk said. "Remember that thing about Galra patrols?" He pointed his finger at the sky, at a trio of small, dark-colored craft flying in formation. "I'm pretty sure that's one."