"Keith!"
Lance practically tackled Keith once he put Shiro down to rest against a wall. Keith, in turn, erupted in a fit of giggles.
"Ha- Lance! Get off!" Lance chuckled as he let go, but didn't move away. His smile was wide enough to see the second row of teeth he had, like a shark's. The blue mer moved Keith's hair out of his face with a scaled hand, and let the same hand rest against Keith's cheek.
"I was really worried about you. I'm glad you're okay." Keith smiled lovingly, his gaze moving from Lance's tired eyes to his lips.
"I think I can handle my own— LANCE!" Keith's luminescent marks flared as he barely caught Lance when he almost fainted. Krolia swam forward, alarmed.
"What happened?!"
"I don't know he just—" Keith sighed in relief when the mer opened his eyes, "What's wrong? You're exhausted!"
Lance shook his head with a forced smile. Only now did Keith notice the dark circles under his beautiful eyes.
"I'm fine, Keith, just tired. It took a lot of energy to save you..." He leaned into Keith's chest, having no more energy to keep himself up. Keith held him tightly. He squeezed Lance's hand to let him know, I'm never letting you go.
"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but we need to decide what to do with her," Krolia said, gesturing to the unconscious Haggar across the room.
"What is there to do?" Keith asked. "We could literally just leave, and never have to see her ever again." The mer in his arms shook his head slowly.
"No. That wouldn't be right."
Keith tilted his head at Lance, "Well, what do you think we could do? She's evil. We can't change that." The mer's eyes met Krolia's, both with the same idea in their minds. The Galran shook her head.
"You can't, Lance. You used enough energy with Keith, it'd be too much for you."
Lance swished his tail and swam up from Keith's grasp. "It isn't the same, though! For Keith I gave him quintessence, so obviously it took up a lot of my energy. This would be the opposite!"
"Lance, what are you talking about?" Keith asked. He had no idea what Lance and his mother were talking about. Damn, that's still weird to say.
"Okay, it's a long story but basically Alfor is a mer, and is like a lot older than any mers today, and he's like the old king or something, but he also told me about a human who gained too much quintessence and it corrupted him. Based on what he told me, I think Haggar might have gotten corrupted. She does work with a lot of quintessence, after all." Lance paused to gesture around the room at all the devices Haggar had.
"Anyways, he also explained to me that although they don't tell us anymore, mers have Altean powers that have to do with quintessence. It's this whole complicated power-y thing, but the gist is that we can transfer quintessence between beings, or something like that. How he explained it was a little confusing, heh. But that's how I saved you, by giving you quintessence which awoke your mer DNA I think, and I can do the same with Haggar but opposite, like taking away her corrupted quintessence." Lance took a deep breath. Even talking seemed to drain him.
Keith blinked a few times, processing the information. He didn't really understand anything about quintessence.
"But... wouldn't you get corrupted then? Or is that... is that not how it works?"
Krolia smiled, "To my knowledge, the quintessence doesn't go into Lance. He would just be the carrier between Haggar and this wonderful machine she has." She tapped a nail against one of the large machines that didn't get destroyed in their fight. Keith supposed they were a storage compartment of a sort for the magical substance.
He turned to Lance, a look of worry on his face. "Are you sure you want to do it? You'll be okay?" Lance nodded and grasped Keith's hands in his as a reassurance.
"If she's been corrupted, I want to give her a chance to live again."
Keith chuckled, a heat rising to his cheeks. "You have a heart of gold, you know that right?"
Lance only smiled, a bright flash of his sharp teeth. He knew.
With a swift movement of his tail he swam next to Haggar. Krolia and Keith swam to the opposite wall, with Keith putting a hand over Shiro instinctively.
Lance lifted his hands and held them over the Galran's head. He took a breath, then tried to focus his energy on the mer in front of him. He wasn't exactly sure what to do. It's not like he'd done this before.
In a second a yellow glow came from Lance's hands. It was like a snake of light, that slithered down to Haggar and coiled around her head. Sparkles filled the water around them, and Lance closed his eyes from the bright light. He felt something on his hands, a power that graced his fingertips.
He heard a gasp from across the room, interrupting him. Lance opened his eyes to see his fingertips aglow with the light from the quintessence. It was strange. It didn't look tainted, or corrupted, but when inside a body it manifested into something horrible. He quickly touched his hand to the machine next to him, and the quintessence flooded into it, little trails of light that slithered out from his fingers.
Before him, still unconscious, was a mer that did not appear to be Galra at all. Her skin was no longer purple, but around the same shade as Lance's, only a little darker. She looked younger— only by a little, though, as she still appeared to be around the age of Alfor, maybe. She had all of the defining features of an Altean— pointed ears, v-shaped marks beneath her eyes, that were more specifically red for her, and a scaled tail with a shimmering silky fin at the end that was the slightest bit transparent. The only tell of who she had been previously was her hair, long and white. She still wore the cloak that was torn in places from their fight.
Lance flinched when she moved. He stepped back to be next to Keith. They all watched as her eyes opened. The mer sat upright, raising a hand to her head.
"Ugh... where— Zarkon—" She gasped and jumped up quickly. Her eyebrows furrowed when she laid eyes on the three mers and unconscious human in the cave. "Oh, dear. Do I want to know, what happened to me?"
After a moment of silence Krolia swam forward. "You were corrupted by an over-exposure to quintessence. Do you remember anything?"
The mer hesitated. "I- I remember Zarkon. We went for a lovely date on the beach, and..." She gasped, hands raised to her mouth. Krolia swam forward, concerned. A bell went off in Lance's mind like a firework.
"Are you... Honerva?" He asked tentatively.
The Altean nodded, "Yes. How do you know my name? If I was corrupted, then... what year is it? How much time has passed?" When no one answered, Lance swam forward, and helped Honerva up from the ground. Krolia held a confused expression on her face.
"It's been a long time. The year is 2019. I don't understand though, how are you alive?"
Honerva seemed as uncertain about that as Lance did. Her head moved side to side in disbelief.
"I am not sure." She pressed a hand over her eyes. "There are small memories... I think... Zarkon kept me alive all that time. With the quintessence, he saved me."
It was Krolia's time to interrupt. "That's impossible. Zarkon has been dead for thousands of years."
Honerva chuckled, "Do you not even know the name of your own king?"
"What? He's not the king, Zadok is. Alfor told me Zarkon died when he tried to conquer Altea," Lance said, as Honerva swam towards him.
"You know Alfor?"
"Uh- yeah. It's because of him I was able to get all that quintessence out of you."
"Hmm. He was an old friend of mine."
The room was filled with awkward silence for a few moments until Keith swam forward.
"You- you said something before, didn't you," he began to ask, still wary around the mer who before tried to kill him. "You said that Zarkon is the king, and Lance thinks it's some Zadok guy. Now, I know absolutely nothing about mer royalty, but what if Zadok and Zarkon are the same person? The names do sound similar, after all."
"Is that possible? All historical accounts say that Zarkon was killed in the war," Krolia said, as Lance began pacing around the room.
"It could be... I suppose the only way would be to check for ourselves. The only mer who knows the king well enough would be Lotor."
Keith moved close to Lance, and held his fidgeting hands reassuringly. "The same mer who tried to kill me? And you?" The half-mer looked into Lance's eyes, then added, "Multiple times?"
Lance nodded. "You're right," he moved closer to Keith, "I would never put you in danger like that again." Oh my god. Keith's face must have been as red as his scales, but despite the panic in his mind he managed to keep his cool and give Lance a warm smile.
Their moment was yet again interrupted by yet another person waking up from being unconscious.
"Ugh..." Shiro sat up from where he lay on the floor. Keith turned abruptly, mouth open in a smile. His brother's eyes were no longer purple but were back to how they originally were— dark grey irises that were distinctly human. Shiro placed a tentative hand over his robotic arm, "Keith? Is that you?"
Keith swam over to sit in front of his brother, a wide smile on his face.
"Yeah. It's me, Shiro." Keith wiped a tear away from his eye. It floated up to the roof of the cave, his tears replaced by the mer equivalent.
Shiro smiled, an underlying look of confusion in his eyes. "What happened?"
"Do you remember anything?"
"There's just flashes... I was on a beach, you were a fish, and then..." Shiro looked down at Keith's mer tail. His face scrunched, the gears in his mind churning, then he smiled. "Looks like you are a fish."
A cry came from Keith as he enveloped his brother in a hug. He laughed as tears began to rise. This was the first time he truly laughed since his brother was taken.
It was like a dream come true. Keith had never thought he'd be able to see Shiro again, save for in his dreams. He felt Shiro return the hug, his muscular arms wrapping around the smaller man.
After a few moments Keith let go. He sill kept a hand clinging to the edge of Shiro's shirt, however, feeling as though he didn't want to let go.
Shiro looked up bewildered. "I see you have some friends who are also fish people."
"I'm a mer, thank you very much," Lance huffed, then smiled and raised a hand for Shiro to shake. "My name's Lance." Shiro shook Lance's hand. The latter was surprised as to how strong his grip felt.
"Takashi. Though, most people just call me Shiro." Lance didn't get where that nickname came from, although then again it was a mystery as to how they got "Lance" from Leandro.
Shiro's gaze moved to the Galran mer behind Lance. She wore an expression of worry, but behind that her eyes were kind. The human went silent as she swam forward.
"Hello. You may not remember me, but—"
"Mom," Shiro interrupted, stepping forward but keeping a hand on Keith to avoid floating away in the water.
Keith gasped. "How did you know that?!"
Krolia hugged her son, holding his hand for a second before the embrace. Shiro turned back to Keith.
"You were too young to remember when she left. I was going to tell you one day," Shiro chuckled, "Guess you already know." He paused, eyes trailing over Honerva and through the rest of the room. His mouth opened to speak, then closed again in hesitation.
"And Adam?" Shiro finally brought himself to ask.
Keith placed a reassuring hand on his brother's shoulder.
"He's waiting for you. He's waited all this time."
A/N:
I finally let these characters get a break and be happy for once! The next few chapters I have planned consist of a lot of fluff for multiple ships =^-^=
That's all for today, thank you so much for reading!
- Soni <3