The magic hit him dead in the chest. Lance cried out in pain, gasping and clutching his chest. He heard the paladins ask what was wrong but he couldn't respond. It hurt so badly. He heard Haggar laugh loudly. "Get ready for an interesting week, paladin," she said before she disappeared. The pain vanished.
"Lance? Lance what happened? Are you okay?" Hunk cried desperately. "Lance answer me!"
"I'm...fine," Lance panted. And he was. There was no more pain and he was fine.
"What happened?" Shiro asked.
"Haggar shot me with some magic," Lance said. He heard the team suck in a breath. "I'm okay! I don't think I'm hurt, it just hurt really badly when she hit me."
"Lance come back to the castle," Shiro commanded. "We need to check you out now."
"Roger that." Lance said before running to his lion. Blue let him and immediately Lance felt waves of distress rolling off her. "Blue? Blue what's wrong?"
You are hurt she purred.
"I'm fine, Blue," Lance said dismissing her concern. "It was just a bit of magic. I'll be alright." Blue didn't respond but Lance could tell she didn't believe him.
==Time skip==
"Well my boy," Coran said after Lance had exited the pod. "It seems like you go hit with a nasty curse. Whatever pains you emotionally with show up physically."
"English please?" Lance asked jokingly.
"If somebody hurts your feeling your going to get like a cut or bruise or something," Pidge said. Lance's smile dropped instantly. Shit. So many things hurt Lance's feelings, including the things the paladins say. How was he going to get out of this one?
"Yeah so no more flirting with girls," Keith scoffed. "Or you'll get hurt after being rejected." Ouch that hurt, coming from Keith, Lance's crush.
"Lance!" Hunk cried. Lance snapped his head back at Hunk.
"What's wrong?"
"Dude you've got a huge gash on your head!" Hunk cried. Lance frowned and felt the gash, small flows of blood coming out. "Why didn't you tell us that was there when you got hit?"
"Actually, Lance didn't come in with that," Coran cut in. "I'm assuming it's part of the curse." Everyone eyed Lance wearily. "What happened?"
"Nothing," Lance cried. He didn't want them to know how much he agreed with all of the statements that thy made about him. How he was only a jokester. He was useless. A worthless paladin. He shouldn't be here. He didn't deserve to be here.
"LANCE!" Shiro yelled. Lance looked up only for his vision to be blocked by something crimson. He was bleeding. "Lance what's happening. Did something hurt you? What's wrong? You're covered in cuts!"
"I'm fine," Lance said immediately. He brought his hand up and wiped away the blood. "It's nothing, don't worry about it. Just...I was....homesick?" Lance added. He needed some sort of excuse and that was the most believable one he could come up with.
Shiro nodded but still looked at Lance with concern.
"Just try not to be too sensitive," Keith added. Lance fought off a grimace as he felt a cut form on his knee. "After all, we can't form Voltron without you." That's the only reason he's worried about me Lance thought. They don't care about me, they only care about Voltron. Well, what did you expect, you're a nobody. Lance let out a whimper as he felt the cut open and crawl up his leg. He could tell it started at his hip and ended just below his knee. Keith gave him a weird look but Lance smiled and brushed it off.
"Right, I'll do my best," Lance said, trying to cover the pain with a laugh. "I'm going to go some food. I'm hungry." and with that Lance walked off, a slight limp barely visible.
Keith's POV
I narrowed my eyes as Lance walked away. Something was definitely wrong. Why was he limping? And what made his face cut up like that? He claimed it was homesickness but I knew it was something much more than that. What happened?
I decided to follow Lance and find out.
I heard him mumble t himself but I was too far away to hear him. But then I heard a pained grunt and a thud. I ran to him to see his shirt was drenched in blood. Panicking, I ripped his shirt off to reveal a huge slash down his chest. I then noticed another cut starting at the top of his waist that went down below his pants. That's why he was limping.
But what had happened for him to get cut this bad? No one said anything hurtful to him...right? Then Coran's voice entered my head again,
Whatever pains you emotionally will affect you physically
That didn't just mean someone saying something to him. Lance was thinking about something painful that caused this. Then I noticed the other cuts. With a painful roll of my stomach I realized that those cuts were not from the curse. They were old,scabbed over and some in the process of scarring. After closer inspection I found scars that were underneath the cuts.
Self harm.
Lance cuts himself.
I felt like I was going to throw up. How could nobody see this? They looked recent but some of them looked days old. And some of those scars looked like they were made in the past month or so. Lance has been hurting for so long and we never noticed.
I hefted Lance up and Ran back to the med bay. The rest of the team was still there, they hadn't left, and were talking to Coran about the curse. They stopped and gasped when they saw Lance. Coran ran forward and placed Lance in the pod.
The pod kept him in only long enough to stop the bleeding, then it ejected him out. "What's wrong?" Hunk cried. "Why won't it take him?"
"It's part of the curse," Coran said with a sad shake of his head. "He must heal on his own. The cuts will completely seal as soon as he gets over the pain that caused them."
"But he's homesick," Pidge jumped in. "How do we fix that? We can't take him home!"
"He's not homesick," I said. They stared at me. I stepped forward to where Lance was laying. He looked so peaceful. "It's something else. He's in a lot of pain. I found....I found...." I couldn't even say it. The team looked at me expentaly but I just shook my head. I looked to Shiro and signed self-harm. Shiro gasped and brought his hand to his mouth in horror.
The rest of the team looked at us confused but Shiro marched forward and lifted Lance's arm gently. He gasped when he saw them. "Oh Lance..." he said softly.
Hunk crept forward and when he saw what Shiro was looking at he let out a sob and turned around, doing his best to stifle his heart broken cries. Pidge saw the cuts but didn't understand. She must not know what that is.
I sighed sadly and looked back at Lance. His face was framed by his hair and he breathed shallowly through his mouth.
"Well, Shiro," I said turning to the man. "What do we do?"
Do you guys want a second part to this? If so please comment below.
