Chapter Text
“You cannot let her distract you.”
Keith had said these words slow, and measured. Each so heavy, and so true, that it hurt to hear.
Never mind the fact that a few months later, he tells Lance to just go for it. And then when Lance tells Keith that he’s actually going on a date with Allura, Keith tells him, “Good job”—like he’s Lance’s…. coach, or his teacher, or something, what the hell, Keith… whatever. He’s trying.
“You cannot let her distract you.”
Hearing that—from Keith, specifically, their erstwhile Black Paladin—absolutely killed.
Almost as much as his own response did.
“I won’t.”
Because Lance didn’t hesitate. Despite the pain, despite the fact that it made him feel about three inches tall, he didn’t hesitate. They’ve got work to do. Work that doesn’t leave time for the normal progression of dating and hooking up and pining and fighting and all the rest of it. Work that requires them to function as a team first, above everything. Even if he wishes he had more time to think about his relationships with each of the paladins, individually.
He didn’t hesitate to promise Keith that he wouldn’t be distracted.
And that fact made him feel about three miles tall.
Turns out he’s not such a shit soldier, after all.
“I’d never let that happen. Because she… Well, first of all, we all saw what happened to the last guy she almost got distracted by. Never again, I’d guess. She’s gonna let herself be distracted by fuck-all. But, ah- I think… I think I do love her because she’s so much better than that. Than either one of us, distracting the other.”
“Yeah, in that, I actually think you’re both the same. You’re good soldiers; you’ll do what needs to be done. You- You’re a good man, Lance McClain.”
***
05.01.2119 (Earth reckoning)
System X9Y; Earth; Galaxy Garrison
And Lance thinks he must be.
A good man, that is.
Because how else could he have earned this?
On this spring day, Allura—Princess Allura of the now-not-quite-so-extinct people of Altea—has agreed to give him a bit of her time, as more than a teammate. Has agreed to go to dinner with him. Well. Agreed to attend the dinner that his mom has prepared, with him, alongside the rest of his family. The only “going out” will involve a haphazardly thrown together walking route around the least visually offensive parts of the Garrison grounds. And she only agreed to go in the first place because Hunk (the real MVP) literally kicked Lance’s ass into gear and Romelle cheerled his efforts at asking Allura out as they were all standing together in the middle of a random hallway in the Garrison.
Still.
It counts.
It counts because Allura steps in the doorway of his family’s too-small suite of rooms, looking like she does—and there is no way he, Lance McClain, deserves her.
There’s no way.
Because he looks at her, in those first fifteen seconds of their first date, and he instantly decides he’s going to have to go back on his word to Keith. She’s already driven him to distraction. And for this moment—this distracting, wonderful moment—he’d exchange every other good thing in his life.
The fact that they’ve saved the universe, again?
That the Galra are losing their grip on this and every other galaxy?
That the Voltron Coalition is strong and thriving?
That his whole family is alive, and safe, and here in what’s become the capital of Earth’s resistance and a universal bastion of hope?
Psh.
Lance would happily trade it all in and tell the big picture to go screw itself, if only to revisit this single moment in person, repeatedly, and not just have it burned into his memory.
No, Lance decides, as he comes down the stairs. He is not a good man.
But somewhere leading up to tonight, he’s fooled enough of the Powers That Be into thinking he is; because how else could he have earned this?
Over dinner, these two conversations happen simultaneously:
Veronica says, “Speaking of dates, maybe you could put in a good word for me with that long-haired friend of yours, hm?”
Lance replies, “What? Keith? No no. No, nonononono. Noooo way. No. Never. Not in a million decaphoebs, okay? All that guy likes is knives and space wolves. Also that mullet is terrible. No.”
Meanwhile:
His mom is saying to Allura, “Lance never brings girls home. You must really mean something to him.”
Allura replies, “That’s strange. He always gave the impression of being rather popular with women.”
“Oh he gets that from his father. It’s all talk. But if you can get past that, you’ll find a good boy with a big heart.”
And yes, Lance hears that. He may be pretty busy at the same time, bolstering his rationale about not hooking up his sister and his… whatever Keith is. But Lance is the team sharpshooter; his situational awareness is actually something to write home about, and he’s spent the last month training and getting ready to return to exactly that role. He’s aware enough to hear exactly what his mom says to Allura.
Allura, who is a literal magical alien princess.
Hell, she’s one of the most beautiful people in this—or any—reality. Strong. Loyal. Gorgeous.
And she’s on a date. With Lance.
“Well. Your family certainly have their priorities straight,” Allura says as they start their post-dinner walk.
“Yep. ‘Family is forever,’” Lance quotes. Then blows out a breath. “Sorry Allura… Veronica is my sister, but she could have read the room a little with that comment.”
“Oh no, please,” Allura responds, ever-gracious. “I was honored to be part of it.”
“But your whole family…” Lance trails off.
“Chosen family, too, is forever, I believe,” Allura says. “For example, Coran and I share no blood ties, but he could be no more family to me than if he were an uncle.”
“Right,” Lance mumbles, thinking of the “Altean courtship vestments” and perhaps the most bizarre conversation he’s had—which is saying something, given the last few years of his life. “Your ‘primary guardian’.”
“Pardon?”
“Never mind.”
A couple breaths of laughter from them both. And then there’s a peaceful silence.
“Your mother is an exquisite chef.”
“Ah, she’ll be glad to hear you said that,” Lance says. “I’m pretty sure that’s why she and Hunk get along so well. They met and instantly started talking about spices. He’s already promised to bring her something exotic back… whenever we do get back…”
Allura does him the favor of not following that last, depressing train of thought, instead humoring him with another breath of laughter—one that’s as thready and bare as the trees on either side of the path.
They’re walking along that haphazard route through Garrison grounds. Pidge had drawn him a map—well, Lance had begged Pidge to draw him a map, which he still has crumpled in the back pocket of his jeans. He’s never had occasion to bring a girl onto Garrison grounds. It was more… sneaking down Garrison corridors, in the time before Voltron.
Any walks he took with girls back then were taken in town. He’d known the couple bars, each of the scant, chic little restaurants, in Platt City. Known the way their bistro lights had lit up the sidewalk and made everything soft and accessible. Time, and hearts, and minds.
But each of those places seem to have been blown to smithereens.
All of the bartenders and waitresses that had staffed them had been stuck in the workcamps that dotted the Southwest, outside the safety of the Garrison’s particle barrier. Liberated, now; but nobody knows what to do with this new freedom. Not quite yet.
It’s heartbreaking, and possibly more heartbreak than it’s worth, to think about going back to an Earth that’s “normal.” Not when they haven’t yet won the war. An Earth you can travel freely; an Earth where you can move from bar to club, from one boisterous space to another, enjoying a riot of color…
If they can return to that Earth, it’ll only be after the fighting is done, anyway.
They make it to the little memorial park in the middle of the Garrison grounds. The natural spaces here used to consist of manicured trees and over-watered grass, lined with chainlink to keep cadets from trampling the new greenery. But now, the trees are nothing more than skeletons, and they do nothing to hide the relentless uniformity of the military installation beyond.
Lance had wanted something of Earth—the real Earth—to show Allura. He knew that by the time the family was scheduled for dinner, it would already be dark, so there wasn’t even the possibility of the desert sunset he’d wanted so badly for her to see.
That little blip in the plan was part of why Lance had taken his own detour, at sunset…
(Anyway, Allura has seen the sun set on Earth, of course; they’ve been here for months. But not the sunset, per se. It’s been all missions and recovery and the inside of the med bay with the mystery Altean.
No time to appreciate the depth of the color in the striped rocks into which the pieces of the robeast were stapled, like shrapnel.)
So yeah.
Twilight would’ve been more romantic. The City could have been romantic. Hell, walking out into the desert would probably have been more romantic.
But this is what Lance is working with:
Post-dusk and a path of uneven flagstones under stars, blocked by the light-pollution of old-fashioned but industrial-strength lamps. A sort of harsh, sodium yellow, and, where the older bulbs have been replaced, too-stark white patches among the ugly orange glow. A path that isn’t exactly lined with roses. Gnarled branches and uneven landscaping that hasn’t been seen to since the Galra invaded Earth those years they were stuck in the quintessence field.
Lance had wanted to show Allura the beautiful things about his home. But he was never going to get to show her the really beautiful things, not tonight.
The oceans.
The rainforests.
His family’s land back in Cuba.
Not unless they’d taken their Lions for a joyride would they have had a shot at seeing any of these things.
And even if they had… None of it would have compared to her, anyway.
Allura makes the barely tolerable beautiful just by being there.
She kind of does that with everything. Being in space for years with only four other members of his species to keep him company was hard. It was livable, barely: and only because it was full of the team-bonding that she instigated in the first place. The joy in it wouldn’t have looked nearly so sweet, even in retrospect, were it not for her presence.
Thinking how bleak the little park seems in comparison to the vision that she is, Lance says, “This place used to be so beautiful.”
He absolutely does not want her taking on any more guilt than she already has, so when she says, “It’s all my fault the Galra did this to your home,” he can’t help but explain that meeting her is the best thing that ever happened to him.
The best thing—and one that just keeps delivering.
Even now: she turns away from him, does her magic, and everything is tangibly more gorgeous. She’s channeled quintessence or communed with the trees or whatever it is she does, to fix everything so thoroughly with seemingly little to no effort.
But it’s after she’s done showing her power, and she is vulnerable and trusting and soft in front of him, that Lance thinks she is at her most beautiful.
To say that she is stunning, a vision, is an understatement. And an overstatement.
In fact, here’s the best compliment Lance can think of:
For the first time in their many months of living and working and being together—Allura looks like a woman.
A young woman. Sophisticated, in her white sandals and the modest cut of her dress. Obviously, she’s always been beautiful. Graceful, and feminine, and elegant. All those other adjectives you’d use to describe a magical alien princess. But right now, it’s as if those last three words don’t even describe her. Don’t do her justice.
She’s not an archetype; she’s a girl.
An extremely gorgeous girl, with bright eyes and a private little smile that keeps making his heart do backflips while his stomach tries to do frontflips. Instead of her titles, her accomplishments, all he can see now is the way the bright, soft fabric of her dress accentuates her dark skin, the way her silvery hair trails over her shoulders and down her back.
“You are my strength,” she tells him.
He tells her he loves her.
Like an idiot. He gives that away less than twelve hours after summoning the nerve to ask her out.
But how could he not?
Of course it’s partly because they’re launching back into the black of outer space tomorrow morning. Of course it’s partly that he doesn’t know that they’re ever going to be able to go on a second date. Of course it’s partly due to the low-level panic that’s been simmering under his skin since he first heard Coran call them the “Defenders of the Universe.”
They share that title, now, he and Allura. And although he’d trusted the Blue Lion with his own life, now that he has to trust her with Allura’s, too, it’s a little harder to stay calm about all of it. Regardless of the fact that Allura is the most capable out of all of them.
He’ll be glad he told her he loves her until the day he dies. However soon that is.
And not just because she kisses him, and her breath is warm against the spring chill, and her strong hands curl around the back of his neck like she wants to keep him there.
Allura won’t tell Lance she loves him back. Not this night, nor for many nights to come.
But she doesn’t need to.
It may drive him to distraction that she doesn’t. But there are a few things that help along the way.