Chapter Text
Weeks after the first time, after Shiro has been gone and after the team has taken on their new roles, he sits in the Black Lion’s cockpit, marveling at the subtle differences since he was last there. The seat and console are closer, fit for someone with a smaller stature, fit for Keith.
Lance takes hold of the controls.
A feeling of guilt flits by the same way it did when he tried to become the new Black Paladin. Just as quickly, Black banishes it to the darkest parts of her sky.
Lance chases the feeling.
You’re not telling us something. Do you know what happened to Shiro?
She flings him back to the open blue.
He thinks of the team. Of Keith fighting his position, his heart, his sanity. Of Pidge holing herself up, burying her heart in cold technology. Of Allura unable to thrive because she won’t trust her team, her family. Of Coran sinking deeper into the past and his grief. Of Hunk trying desperately to bolster a team that’s determined to crumble.
Of how much more okay they would all be if Shiro hadn’t left them.
The dark of her sky creeps back in, turning to stars and nebulas and a space between spaces and suddenly there’s Shiro. Shiro who is alive and gazing up at his lion like she’s an old friend come to visit him.
I cannot bring him back but I can keep him safe .
Black’s essence trembles through him.
Take me instead , Lance proposes. It’s the same thought he had when his abuela died and he saw his mother felled with grief. He begged and begged and begged god to let him trade places so his mother could be happy again.
If he could trade places with Shiro, now, it would fix the team, wouldn’t it?
There’s a thrum through his being, a shifting of the nebulas, the catch of Shiro’s eye as he settles across from him.
“Lance?”
He nods. The tears in his eye twinkle away like stardust.
A trade. Your cub for mine.
Fire ignites. The sea laps at his sneakers.
Red and Blue shift into view. Three lions tower over the two Earthlings.
“What are you talking about,” Shiro asks Black. He looks back at Lance. “What’s going on here?”
Lance shakes his head. His proposal was rhetorical, something he said but knew was impossible.
Your quintessence will grant him passage.
You will stay with us, cub of fire and water and sky.
You will be safe with us until your time comes.
“Okay.” There’s no question that he’ll accept the offer.
“Okay? Okay what?” Shiro darts his eyes from one lion to another, from Lance to Black and back to Lance. “What’s going on here,” he commands.
Heat pushes Shiro away. The sea pulls at his ankles. The sky becomes a soft blue. Lance turns into a star amongst the far off nebulas.
Shiro wakes in the cockpit of the Black Lion. The seat shifts under him and the console stretches before him.
The team needs you, not me.
Lance’s voice echoes across space and sky and settles into Shiro’s skin, deep into his heart.
“They need you , too,” he whispers into the silence of his lion.