Toy Soldiers (The All Fall Down Remix)

Warnings: Very stream of consciousness in parts.

Disclaimer: WEP owns Voltron. Dang it.

Lance used to whistle when he left the showers, but he didn’t anymore.

He hadn’t felt like whistling in a long time.

Instead, he took his time getting dressed, dragging his comb through his hair, dragging his feet as much as possible.

He knew there was a briefing in just a few short minutes, but he couldn’t really bring himself to care. Not showing up would let him avoid Keith… for a little while.

He paused before shrugging into his jacket. Think about it, he told himself sternly. Is it really worth it to avoid him now just so he’ll search you out later to tear you a new one?

The only problem with this scenario was that there was a part of him—a big part of him—that didn’t see the problem with it.

Part of him thought that it would definitely be worth it if Keith sought him out, that it would be worth it to have Keith lay into him verbally with his tongue, even though he could come up with at least three other things that tongue would be better off doing.

When he left the locker room—the last one to do so, as usual recently—his feet turned in the direction of the control room, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t stop off at a couple dozen places on the way, and just say that he lost track of time…

This petty little revenge thing has got to stop, he told himself, even as he veered toward the repair bay. Just because you’ve always been the one to leave…

“We can’t do this anymore.”

“It never should have been this way.”

The desperate, despairing, resolute look on Keith’s face as he nodded, as if unable to say anything, because it would be a lie…

Lance stopped, halfway to nowhere, and closed his eyes. Do you know that it would have been a lie? Or are you just hoping it would have been?

His subconscious just loved springing these little flights of fantasy on him, he decided shakily.

When he set off again, Lance moved slowly, deliberately, fearing that his next step would pull the world out from under him.

Because… he was glad that it was over, no matter who was doing the breaking off.

Or he should have been, anyway.

He knew all too well how it went—the first flush of attraction, the admission, the can’t-keep-your-hands-off-each-other, then the fading of desire, the boredom. He’d always managed to walk away before, usually timing it so that he left right when things were starting to cool down. He was a master at it, had worked on it all through the Academy and even afterwards.

But… he hadn’t wanted to leave, not this time.

“I’m in love with you.” And, as if he didn’t know what he was saying, or maybe who he was saying it to, Keith grinned at him. “Just thought you should know.”

It was a situation that should have sent him screaming for the hills, because this was what he always had wanted to avoid before—fun, that’s all he wanted, with no emotional entanglements.

But it didn’t. Somehow, it just… didn’t. And that surprised him even more than Keith’s words.

He’d wanted to stay, to see what might happen if he let it…

Strange, strange thing—he’d stayed through Keith’s meltdowns, all of his “I’m your commanding officer” crises and convinced him not to end it time and again…

Once in a while, late at night, when Keith slept next to him, separated from him by no more than the width of a hand… he’d wondered what was wrong with him, or what had changed… and if this time…

In spite of all that, he had still been the one to leave. Keith hadn’t left him.

No, he just made it clear he wanted me to leave.

And that hurt, hurt like nothing else ever had. Hard words, cruel arguments with other bed partners who hadn’t got the whole “no emotional entanglement” thing… Yeah, he’d had all that and then some, but this, this blinding, searing pain that seemed to center in his chest, that kept him apart from the rest of the team because he couldn’t bear to be around them, that kept him from all but the most basic functions of life… This was all new.

Could have done without this a little while longer, too…

No matter how slowly one walked, one got somewhere if one wasn’t standing still, and before he was ready for the decision, Lance reached the repair hangar.

He stopped short, just inside the entryway. He felt his heart speed up, heard it hammering in his ears, but vaguely, almost as if it was happening to someone else.

Keith.

He was standing next to Black. The Lion’s head was bent, nearly touching the floor as it crouched in the hangar; Black was too tall and the ceiling too close for him to sit upright.

Even as Lance watched, breath caught in his throat, Keith reached out and laid one shaking hand along the armor of the Lion’s cheek. After a moment, his hand started to move, stroking the metal as if Black were a great beast that would purr at the attention.

If ever he had felt contentment, this was it.

It wasn’t just the post-orgasmic haze, either, though there was a fair amount of that, as well.

They were twined about each other, he and Keith, gangly kittens in a too-small basket. He could hear the lub-dub of Keith’s heart slowing beneath his ear, lulling him toward sleep. One arm was flung over Keith’s chest, not holding him, just touching him, and he had his nose buried in Keith’s throat, breathing in the salty-spicy-musky scent of him.

Keith’s cheek pressed against the top of his head. He luxuriated in the feel of Keith’s hand stroking his thigh, too completely spent to even think about responding to the caress, too utterly sated to care.

Lance returned to himself with a start as Keith slumped forward, resting the top of his body against Black’s muzzle… all without looking away from the cold dead eyes of the machine, or stopping his shaking hands from brushing the chill metal again and again.

He wasn’t sure he wanted to go over there, but he found himself by Keith’s side nevertheless, drawn there by the helpless, hopeless look Keith wore, by the tremors in his hands he couldn’t control.

Why had none of the others seen the changes? Eyes glazed, almost glassy, the dark shadows ringing them, normally golden skin turned pale and thin… He had noticed, and wondered, and wanted to laugh at Keith and call him an idiot, because he was making himself sick and Lance had already moved on.

But he couldn’t, because none of it was true, and he didn’t have the right to ask anymore to find out if it was. All he could do…

“Hey Keith, what’s up?” He kept his voice quiet, not wanting to startle Keith, and mindful of the way sound echoed through the repair hangar.

Mesmerized by whatever he saw in Black’s eyes, Keith’s reply was soft, unthinking. “I was just thinking how much he and I have in common.”

Lance sucked in a breath, staring at him, his too-lean form pliant against Black’s snout, then up at the Lion.

Keith—Black—had taken some pretty rough hits from Lotor’s fighter today, in an effort to save Blue and the Princess. The external damage wasn’t as bad as Allura had suffered, but he’d radioed to Coran that the Lion’s diagnostics showed damage to circuits and sensors, things that wouldn’t survive another day like today.

And now, here they are…

Keith had jolted upright at his gasp, watching him warily.

This was it, he realized suddenly, without questioning why or how he knew. He just knew that if he said it right and he said it now, he could hurt him. He could hurt Keith the way he’d been hurting.

“Keith…” Then he stopped himself, for the next words that had wanted to come had been words of comfort, meant to reassure and soothe… and he wanted to say them, too.

And he spent what seemed to be an eternity between them, revenge and understanding, not knowing which way to go.

Finally, aware that Keith was watching, had seen every thought flit across his face, he said, “No, you’re right.”

Keith’s face seemed to harden at that, and Lance had the sense that he was about to turn away. “Only,” he went on doggedly, “the thing is, you’re not a machine.”

You’re real, Keith, you’re alive, you can reach out, I’m here, you can heal…

But before he could find the words to speak, Keith looked at him again, and gave him a smile filled with bitterness. “No. I’m a soldier.”

Lance jerked as if he’d been slapped, and just stared, but Keith’s gaze didn’t waver. Slowly, because he’d somehow lost all connection with the rest of his body, he turned away. He didn’t know how he made it back across the hangar, because everything was a blur around him. The castle could have fallen down around him and he wouldn’t have cared.

Maybe they’re the same thing after all…

***

July 20, 2006