Two Hours Later

When Lance awoke, he awoke slowly; gently drifting into awareness of himself his body. He could faintly recall an instruction to rest and wisps of leathery skin brushing against his body and nothing more.

He almost didn't recognize that he was awake at first, because nothing hurt. He was warm and he was dry and he was comfortable. His head was cushioned, and there was a heavy weight beside him, leaning against him. He was lying in a bed with Keith.

The babies!

Lance's body jolted, and Keith yawned and stretched beside him, mumbling and running his hand up Lance's chest.

"You're awake now?"

"Where are they?" asked Lance in a quiet panic.

"Hey," Keith whispered, gently pressing Lance back down onto the bed even as he weakly tried to push himself up, "You're on a lot of drugs right now."

That explained a few things. His mind was fuzzy and he couldn't feel his toes.

"And if you're talking about those things that came out of you," Keith added with barely hidden disgust, "They're sitting in a tank in Allura's bathroom. After you passed out, we took you up to your room and put you in bed to rest."

Lance let his head fall back onto the pillow, staring up at the alcove of his bedroom. He didn't like the idea of being away from the newborns while they were so young and weak and vulnerable. But, he thought, they were born and they had water. They would be safe and wouldn't suffocate. Keith kissed his cheek.

"And you're making sure I'm ok?" Lance smiled as Keith buried his face into Lance's collar.

"I didn't have any other job to do, and I didn't want to leave you alone, so, yes. I'm making sure you don't have any more nightmares or die in your sleep," said Keith, nuzzling his head down into Lance's body.

Lance allowed himself to relish in the feeling of Keith, warm and secure and heavy against his body. He felt a wave of relief. He'd survived. He'd lived through everything. There was no great enemy to be defeated or imminent death awaiting him. Only life, and hope.

He was so glad to be alive and still have Keith and his Paladin family that Lance suddenly found himself bubbling with a giddy excitement. They had so much time together! He and Keith could train together every day and sleep together every night! They could visit new worlds, and defeat the Galra and find their way back to Earth! Lance found his head swimming with new ideas and new possibilities until his eyelids grew heavy once again.

It was strange, the stillness in his body. Nothing was moving inside of him. Nothing was making him nauseous or cramped. It was like stepping off of a rocking boat and onto dry land. He felt whole again, settled in the sheets next to Keith. Lance slid his hand up, over the area of his abdomen where the knife had once been. It was smooth and whole, with perhaps a hint of a scar. He'd look later. It didn't matter much to him. He was alive.

"So what are you going to do with those parasites that came out of you?" asked Keith, and Lance felt a twinge of anger at the term. Though, technically, he was right. Maybe it was the drugs. Maybe it was the promise he'd made to the monster, but Lance felt protective of those two little beings he'd given birth to.

"They're not parasites, Keith, they're babies," said Lance, trying to sound like he had more confidence than he did, "And I'm going to raise them."

Keith lifted himself off of Lance and looked deeply into his eyes, obviously checking for any lingering delirium.

"You've gotta be kidding me! You nearly died!"

"Nope," said Lance with heavy finality, "I made a promise to that monster. We killed it, y'know. We owe it to them."

Keith narrowed his eyes at Lance.

"This... isn't a Catholic thing, is it?"

"No," Lance shrugged, "I just… I dunno. It just feels right."

Keith settled himself back down beside Lance, and Lance wrapped Keith's arm back over his chest.

"So… what exactly was that monster?" Keith mumbled into the blankets, "And why the sudden change? I thought you hated it"

"I'm still not entirely sure," said Lance, thinking back to his feverish nightmare on the main bridge. It felt so long ago and so far away, but he couldn't have been asleep for more than a few hours by now.

Everything he'd gathered from it using Allura's body to speak was still a jumbled, confusing mess in his mind.

"All I know is that it, well, they , are very old. And very angry. And when we killed it back on the swamp planet, it stuck its babies and its memories inside of me. To pass on."

He felt Keith tense up beside him.

"So, wait, the monster inside your head is real?"

"In a way, kinda," Lance said as he pulled Keith a bit closer, and Keith shifted his weight accordingly, "When I was dreaming, Allura used her psychic alien magic whatever to connect with my mind and enter my dream with me. She saw the monster there. She said that the monster we killed left behind some kind of biological memories inside my brain."

"Like Sendak or King Alfor in the computer?" Keith offered.

"Yeah. But it was kinda fucked up and incompatible with my human brain, so that's why I kept having nightmares and hallucinations. Turns out the monster wasn't really trying to kill me. It was kinda trying to tell me how to take care of the babies, but… I had so much going on in my life, it just got all mixed up..."

Keith nodded quietly, and Lance ran his fingers through his dark hair.

"But you said it kept strangling you to death in your dreams."

"Yeah, that thing is just… really petty."

He stayed quiet for a while, thinking of the months of agony he and the monster had gone through; fighting, struggling, and finally able to communicate. Lance was sure there was a lesson in there somewhere about relationships and communication, but he was on a lot of drugs in that moment, and Keith's hair looked really shiny and nice.

"God, I'm glad we have so much time," he sighed, kissing the crown of Keith's head, "We have so much time together, dude."

"I know," said Keith, squeezing Lance gently.

"And I just wanted to say," added Lance.

"Hmm?" Keith looked up at him.

"That I literally did have an alien zombie infection that was taking over my brain, and I was totally justified in biting your hand that one time!"

"Oh, fuck you!"

Lance burst into fits of giggles as Keith gently pretended to punch him.

"I still love you, though," whispered Lance.

Keith blushed, and kissed him, and Lance suspected it was more to prevent him from saying something incredibly dumb.

"Hey, Keith?" he said, breaking away at last.

"Yeah?"

"Want to be a dad with me?"

"Oh."

Lance watched as Keith's eyes widened in surprise, and his breath hitched in his throat waiting for Keith's response.

"What?"

"Actually, I didn't think you'd ask," said Keith, "I just kinda assumed I would be. We're together, y'know, and as much as I'm utterly horrified by the fact that you just spit out two giant alien worms out of your guts… I still want to be with you, and do whatever it is that you do."

Keith was blushing madly, and Lance pulled him close, feeling their hearts beating in time, and basking in his thoughts for the future. This would be incredibly hard work. And… Maybe it'd be nice to have some backup when he needed it. Like a bad cop. Or maybe he had no idea how to raise aliens. Lance shook his head and closed his eyes. He'd deal with it all later.

"I should warn you though," said Keith into Lance's ear, "I have zero experience with parenting alien eyeball-lizard-snakes."

Lance grinned and Squeezed Keith, planting kisses all over his face.

"Me neither. But I have millions of years of memories to access if I need help. This should be fun."

"You're really high right now, Lance."

One Day Later

"This is so weird, " moaned Keith, "I'm not sure I can watch."

Lance was sitting in Allura's bathtub in his boxer shorts, as the tiny alien creatures slithered and swam around his legs in the shallow water. He'd learned within a few minutes of getting into the tub that his babies were hungry. And they drank blood.

The larger one immediately flared the tiny flower of tentacles around its head and latched into Lance's ankle. He felt a piercing jab, and then nothing at all, as the creature numbed the area around his foot and calmly fed upon his blood. Its twin was a little slower, and Lance helped it along, guiding its slender, slippery body with his hands, and finding it an easy vein to feed upon.

Keith looked down upon the scene with mild horror.

"Get used to it, buddy. You're gonna have to feed them when I can't," said Lance, tenderly stroking the length of their pulsing bodies as they fed.

"No. Absolutely not," said Keith, crossing his arms and shaking his head, "Not in the deal."

Lance stared Keith dead in the eyes.

"I named one of them after you."

Keith raised an eyebrow at him, betraying his amusement.

"You have names now?"

"Yeah," grinned Lance, "I'm calling them Lance Jr and Keithette."

Keith stared down at the little black worms parasitically attached to Lance's ankles. They had no identifying marks beyond the fact that one was slightly longer than the other, and a little more energetic

"Keithette is a girl? How do you know?" asked Keith, with hesitant curiosity.

"Mother's instinct," Lance replied, patting the larger, stronger child as it happily drained his blood.

"This is so weird," said Keith, shaking his head.

Two Days Later

"I don't know what to tell you, Lance," said Coran, shrugging helplessly, "I read your short form summary every time. It always came back as more or less completely healthy."

"Yeah," said Pidge, peering at the data spread across the medical bay screens, "I don't get it. Why didn't it tell us that Lance had two giant parasitic worms feeding off of his liver for five months?"

Coran dragged the floating window to become much larger. Lance's longform medical scan results went on for miles. Coran kept flicking and flicking, hundreds of thousands of paragraphs and statistics and charts whirling past at lightning speed until he got most of the way to the bottom.

He zoomed in a tiny bit further. "Oop, whoa. Naw, look. Here it is. See? Pod wasn't wrong. Here it is right here. You weren't sick. You were pregnant," said Coran, twisting his moustache with assured finality.

"BUT I WAS MISERABLE THE WHOLE TIME!" Lance screamed, ready to break the med scanner with his foot.

Hunk grabbed Lance and held him tightly as Lance thrashed about helplessly, flinging his arms and legs in any direction that his rage dictated.

"Carrying a baby isn't a walk in the park, Lance." Coran ruffled Lance's hair as Lance stared daggers at him from underneath Hunk's crushing arms, "But by all accounts of the pod, you actually had a very healthy, uncomplicated pregnancy."

"Well," he added, stroking his chin in consideration, "Except for that part where the little ones started eating your liver and drilling a hole in your body cavity to get out. Mostly healthy. Congratulations!"

Lance had stopped fighting, but his eye had developed an unhealthy twitch. Hunk kept on holding him in a crushing grip against his chest.

"Ok, but why wasn't it coming up on our scans?" asked Hunk.

"I think that may have been me," said Pidge, sighing, "Slight, uh, programming error."

"What do you mean?" asked Lance, popping his head out of Hunk's bear-hug.

"Well, Lance is a cis dude," said Pidge, blushing and adjusting her glasses, "It, uh, well, when I made his profile, I didn't include that possibility in the scan check program's search. And the med pod's results didn't come up as parasite. It came up as pregnancy. So it kept saying you weren't sick."

"But the information was RIGHT THERE!"

"Lance, that is miles of medical data!" she spat back, "I wasn't going to read it all! I thought I had it all figured out! I had a program that read it for me!"

Lance settled deeply down into Hunks arms until his eyes were barely visible slits.

"I'm going to murder you, Pidge."

"I'M FOURTEEN LANCE, I'M NOT A FUCKING DOCTOR. GO PLAY WITH YOUR GROSS WORM BABIES."

"FINE, MAYBE I WILL. "

Three Days Later

"I just noticed something," said Keith.

Lance looked up from the tank where he was swirling his hand around, teasing and playing chase with the worms as they happily slithered between his fingers and swam through the hole he made with his thumb.

Keith was watching him carefully, his hand hovering hesitantly over the tank, obviously afraid to get bitten even though Lance promised that they'd already been fed.

"Yeah?"

Keith wasn't moving. His gaze shifted between the baby worms in the tank and Lance. Lance decided that slightly more drastic measures needed to be taken. He brought his hand up, out of the tank and flicked the water away. The worms splashed happily at the surface, inviting him back down to play. Lance gently grabbed Keith's hand and lowered it into the cool water, and for the first time, Keith felt the smooth skin and beating hearts of the tiny creatures Lance had carried inside of him. He was stunned with amazement.

Keithette gently explored his wrist with her tiny legs, grabbing onto him and crawling up the length of his arm. Lance Jr swam under the tips of his fingers, wanting to be tickled.

Keith was smiling now, as he got used to the feeling of slithering bodies and cool water. He laughed as one swam to the surface and spat a stream of water in his face. Slowly, over time, Lance knew that living with them would become less and less strange.

"What did you say?" he asked, remembering that Keith had spoke earlier.

"Oh," said Keith, looking through the glass at the two babies staring back at him with deep blue irises, "They, um, they have your eyes."

"It's 'cause I'm their daddy, Keith!"

One Week Later

"Hey, Lance?"

Pidge poked her head around the corner, and Lance looked up at her from the common room couch.

"We- what's with the book?"

Lance carefully placed a bookmark in the page and closed the small blue book in his hands.

"It's a journal," he replied, "Shiro gave me the idea when I was having nightmares. It actually helped me organize my thoughts. Now I just use is to keep track of my kids. Like, what they do and how they're growing."

"It's super weird the way you call them your kids."

"Yep. Heard it all before, Pidge," said Lance, going back to his book, "Whatta ya want?"

"Well, actually…"

"-We have a bit of a present for you!" Hunk cut her off as he poked his head through, grinning in the doorway. Together they motioned for him to follow them out of the common room.

Down the hall and into the hanger they led him, Pidge dragging from the front and Hunk pushing from behind, suppressing giggles all the while. Lance was curious, and also mildly suspicious. It certainly wasn't his birthday...

"There it is, buddy! Your present!"

It was, effectively, a pile of junk. But it was a pile of junk that had been built to look distinctly like one of the healing pods in the medical bay, standing upright and alone, with a plastic sheet spread underneath it.

"We cobbled together a sort-of replica of the med-pod out of old worn out parts," Said Hunk.

"And a few 3D-printed ones!" added Pidge.

They certainly did. It looked like a haphazard do-it-yourself medical pod, sitting in the middle of the lion hangar.

"How is this a present?" Lance asked, trying to suppress his sneer as his face reflexively winced at the triggering pod in front of him. The machine had brought him nothing but false hope and pain for months.

Hunk dug behind a rolling cart of tools and parts.

"And here, Lance, is your tool of destruction," He said, handing Lance an object that looked like the Altean version of a baseball bat.

Oh.

Oh, yes.

Lance erupted in pure joy, grabbing the heavy metal bat and running it through his hands. He took a few, slow test swings as his heart began pumping in his chest. He was practically salivating with excitement.

"Goggles!" said Pidge, "Safety first!"

Lance happily slipped the green-tinted goggles over his head.

"Smile for the camera!" said Hunk, holding up Pidge's tablet to take a commemorative photo.

"And lastly," said Pidge.

"Have fun!" they both cheered in unison.

The first swing shattered the sliding glass door. It felt euphoric.

Lance hacked and thrust and whacked away, denting and smashing the pod as hard as he could.

"You stupid piece of shit!" he screamed.

"I WAS!"

He smashed the back power couplings.

"PREGNANT!"

One swing and the input pad on the front was completely broken and dangling by a few wires.

"THE WHOLE TIME!"

Lance kept battering the pod for the better part of an hour, his rage sustaining an incredible stamina for destruction as Hunk stood by and cheered and Pidge recorded a few videos.

"And you couldn't tell! The entire time!" Lance wheezed, finally out of breath.

The fake pod was little more than a pile of mechanical rubble after Lance was done with it. Broken glass and metallic parts lay strewn across the plastic tarp below him and Lance was leaning heavily on his bat, a look of grand satisfaction upon his face.

"I was miserable for months!" he sighed, peeling off the green tinted goggles and wiping the sweat from his brow.

But it was over now. He didn't need the pod. He'd made it out alive on his own. Lance lay the bat down on the floor and went over to sweep his friends into a tight hug.

Two Weeks Later

Lance pushed his bowl away from him and stood up from the table.

"Sorry guys, I gotta go breastfeed my kids."

"Ugh," Pidge groaned, "Lance, please stop calling it "breastfeeding" when you let those gross alien things suck blood out of your ankles while you read a book."

Lance turned on her, pointing his spoon in her face.

"Well where else are they supposed to suck it? And don't talk shit about my little anklebiters, Pidge!"

"Ha-ha!" Hunk snorted, "Lance said 'suck It' !"

One Month Later

"Look, they're climbing out of the tank!" gasped Keith, watching with intense wonder as the two worms worked their tiny clawed feet on the edge of the glass tank, pulling themselves up and out of the water, blinking their blue eyes into the light and air of Allura's bathroom.

"I know, I've been watching them!" squealed Lance, "My little tadpoles are ready to walk around in the air!"

"Weird," Keith breathed, leaning his chin onto the back of Lance's shoulder, and sneaking a kiss to his cheek.

They watched the little worms balance themselves on the edge of the tank, suckered feet holding them firm, and both of them eyeing Lance as water dripped off of their bodies. With a final squirt from each creature, they expelled the last of the water out of their lungs and shook themselves off.

They both stared at Lance, and Lance was overcome with joy, bouncing on his heels and shaking off Keith from behind him.

Then the worms started... squeaking.

"Oh, my god, they're talking! they're talking to us, Keith!"

The babies chirped and trilled as they crawled along the edge of the tank, reaching their long necks out towards Lance, hesitant to actually jump the distance from the tank to their father's arms.

"Oh, they wanna be with me!" Lance was nearly crying with excitement, "I'm gonna take them all over the castle and let them look around!"

Lance gently scooped up the twin worms as their bright blue eyes flickered about, taking in the new sights around them. He placed them on his shoulders and they easily wrapped themselves casually around his neck, resting behind the hood of his jacket.

"Ok, babies! First up, I'm taking you to meet Blue!"

Two Months Later

"I can't do it. I can't do it! I just can't-"

"Hold on, Lance. Slow down."

"I'm so tired- It... It was a stupid idea when I thought I was dying. I just wanted everything to work out, but... But they're not human! I have no idea what I'm doing! I'm in fucking space! Everything is cold and wrong and I miss my mom and I'm so tired all the time! And they're always hungry or fighting and I can't get any sleep. I'm supposed to be saving the galaxy, but I have to take care of them and I- I can't sleep! I just… I can't do it. I can't keep doing it."

"Yes, you can."

"I can't do it."

"I can help."

"It's too much for anyone! And there's two of them! And when I finally have one under control the other is... missing or getting into shit! I can't feel calm. I'm panicking all the time!"

"It's not too much for both of us. The rest of us can help. Come on. Let's get you some food. You've lost a lot of blood lately. If you show me how, I'll help you feed them."

"Oh, god. Please. Yes. Please."

"We'll figure this out, Lance. We always have up until now."

"I'm just so worried about everything, all the time. And it's only gonna get worse as they get bigger, Keith. I can barely handle them now!"

"It's not forever, remember? And when they're ready, we'll bring them back to the swamp. Let's focus on the present: They're hungry, and you're spent. I'll help you feed them."

"It- it doesn't hurt, like I told you. They numb the area..."

"It's ok. Just keep breathing. And I'm glad it doesn't hurt."

"God, thank you Keith. I love you. I love you and I owe you, like, ten more foot rubs."

"I know. I'm keeping track."

Three Months Later

"Hey, I know I just talked to you last night, but, um, I have another question already..."

Lance waded a little deeper into the water on the edge of the clearing of trees where he knew the monster was resting under the muddy brown silt. The smooth, dark surface started to ripple until a great, round eye emerged from it, rising up to stare Lance in the face.

Lance took a deep breath, feeling no fear, and continued.

"So last night, I told you they were still going at each other and rolling around on the floor and I thought they were fighting instead of playing rough, so I pulled them apart and put them in seperate rooms."

He sighed, massaging his temples as the monster listened quietly, waiting.

"And that's when the weird crying noise started."

Lance felt a sudden wave of apprehension. Was the monster judging him? Did it think he was a bad parent? He was doing the best he could, under the circumstances. He wished he could still hear its thoughts coming from Allura's body. The monster only blinked silently.

"Now, today I saw one of Keithette's head tentacles is damaged. It keeps re-opening up and bleeding when she tries to spread to make her brother go away, and it's not healing. She's just bleeding and bleeding everywhere..."

The monster continued to stare balefully at Lance.

"So... What should I do?"

Lance watched as a thin black rope rose out of the muddy water and curled gracefully towards him. He closed his eyes and opened his mind as he felt the delicate touch of the monster on his forehead. Strange visions flooded through his mind, of generations of swamp monsters living and growing and fighting and dying playing out before him. The visions continued to flicker by, one after the other, until Lance finally saw the scene he needed to see.

"Thanks," he nodded as the monster's tentacle slipped silently back underwater.

And Lance waved goodbye to the monster, turned around, and left.

Four Months Later

"You love me."

"I do."

"You know you love me."

"I do."

"I... Come on- what's wrong?"

"I can't."

"What is it?"

"Look. I can't… when they're watching. I need us to be alone, Lance."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"I'm not sure they want to sleep alone since they moved out of the tank. They'll get lonely, Keith."

"Ugh. I just- We'll figure something out. But not while they're right there, on the bed, staring at me."

"At us."

"Yeah…"

Five Months Later

"Hey."

His voice echoed across the misty swamp as the warm water gently lapped at his thighs. Some nights he still felt a few wisps of fear and apprehension as he slipped back into the dark, viny woods and murky water. And though he had made ammends with the monster, the memories of thick black ropes and strangling and drowning still occasionally haunted him in the back of his mind.

A shining black arc rose out of the water and blinked its eye open. Another tentacle arose and offered itself to him. He grasped it, gently.

"Just wanted to let you know that they're doing ok so far. Getting pretty big, actually. It's hard to carry both of them at once and they still… Y'know, they still wanna climb all over my shoulders and sit there."

He let out a small chuckle that echoed far across the dreamy landscape.

"It's funny, actually. It's like they don't want to grow up…"

The monster blinked at him and the wet tentacle gently stroked his cheek.

"I think they get that from their dad."

He pulled the tentacle away and held it in his hands again.

"Yeah. So. I just wanted to say. It's going pretty good. They stopped drinking blood, thank god. I was getting pretty anemic. And… Yeah. Hopefully you're not too lonely just sitting out here in my brain."

Lance looked around at the swamp in his dream. It was the same as always, misty and wooded and dark, but somehow it was no longer foreboding. It was familiar, and he came here sometimes, in his dreams, when he needed answers, or he just needed to think. The swamp was once his worst nightmare, and now... It brought him peace.

Five and a Half Months Later

They were all sitting in the common room playing cards and resting after a long training session.

"Hey, Lance-"

"Don't say it."

"I'm not."

"You are."

"I'm not, I promise."

"Ok, fine, what?"

"Remember when you got space-pregnant with alien tapeworms?"

"FUCK OFF, PIDGE!"

Six Months Later

"Lando Calrissian Junior, get out of the first aid cabinet!"

A giant blue eye turned towards Lance, rimmed with that mischievous disobedience he'd come to know after one too many incidents of leaving his child unattended. The little alien lowered its front paws from the ledge of the first aid cabinet in Lance's ship and slowly backed away, but Lance wasn't going to turn back around so soon.

He'd learned, by now, that immediate compliance was not to be trusted. He waited, watching, as his son slowly slunk away to the back of the cabin in his Lion and forcefully lay himself down on the mat, staring at Lance with unblinking derision.

"And stay there until we get back to the castle. I don't want any more trouble from you."

Seven Months Later

"Lance, they need to stop sleeping on the bed. They're getting too big," Keith grunted as he tried to flex his leg straight, resulting in a harsh growl from one of the heavy bodies piled at the end of the bed.

"Nah! There's room for everyone!" said Lance, stretching his arms over his head and pulling Keith closer to him. Even with a queen-sized mattress, the two aliens were still growing larger and heavier each day. Keith kept asking what their adult size was going to be. Lance didn't think it was an issue.

The kids were curled up in their donut spirals at Lance and Keith's feet, stubby legs tucked under them, but at the sound of Keith's voice, they uncoiled and raised their heads expectantly at their fathers.

"Shh, go back to sleep," Lance cooed, and Keithette closed her eye, rubbing her head affectionately against his leg.

Eight Months Later

"Keith! Get in here! The hangar! Please! I need you!"

Lance was screaming into the wall com near the hangar door, frantically looking over his shoulder towards the crumpled black shape on the ground by his Lion.

"He's sick, he's sick!"

"What? Lance, slow down," Keith's voice came back through the comm.

"I finally found him. He's lying underneath Blue. He- he got into the coolant canister! Please, Allura! Keith! I need help!"

"I'm on my way, Lance," was Allura's quick reply and he could hear her footsteps running before her earring communicators shut off.

Lance grabbed the portable comm unit and dashed back towards the Blue Lion, skidding to a halt in front of Lance Jr who was lying nearly motionless on the cold metallic floor. He sank to his knees, trying to shake the limp body awake.

"Buddy. Come on. Wake up, please! Oh, god, I never should have- ALLURA! Quick! He's barely breathing!"

"Stay calm, Lance!" said Allura through the comm, her words short with exertion. She was running as fast as she could.

"-I don't know how to make him better!"

Lance was hurriedly looking around for a way to help, but all he could see was the empty metal cannister, bitten through, and the pool of greenish liquid machine coolant smeared everywhere.

"Oh, god, he's shivering. Lance, please. You're gonna be ok. I'm- I'm gonna..."

Lance was sobbing, holding the lethargic beast's heavy head under his arms. A trickle of blood was leaking from its unfocused eye.

"He's poisoned! Oh god, I don't know what to do! I don't have a memory for this!"

Lance Junior shuddered in his grasp and his body started convulsing. His tail spasmed and his toes twitched as the monster roiled in pain. A white foam stained with blood was forming around his eyelid.

"Please! Somebody help!"

Lance was crying hysterically and holding his child tightly as Lance Junior kicked his legs forcefully, suddenly.

And then, he was still.

Eight Months and Two Days Later

"Hey lil' guy."

A large, blue eye slowly blinked open, and Lance carefully wiped the dry, crusty weeping away from its lid.

"You gave me a huge scare there."

The eye closed once again as the head sought out his warm hand, ushering him to stroke it. Lance's affection was always generous and unconditional, but this time, he poured all of his worry and his love into every caress of the soft, leathery black skin. His son gave a small croon of approval and Lance settled himself down beside the soft bed they'd built for him in medical bay.

"And you know what the solution was?" Lance softly whispered.

The little monster trilled in response.

"We had to get you rip-roaring drunk, buddy. We found all the alcohol in the castle and gotcha full of nunvill and old Altean brandy."

He kept stroking Lance Jr, his hand moving from the top of his head, down the length of his body, where Lance gently traced his fingers down his front legs and rubbed the bottoms of his feet. Lance Jr flexed his toes and yelped in pain, not yet ready for any excessive movement.

"Shh, stay still. It's ok. You're gonna feel rough for a few more days. We had to pump your stomachs and make sure all that coolant fluid was gone. I'm sorry, buddy. I know. It hurts. Just stay here and rest, and you'll be better in no time. I promise."

The eye slowly blinked itself shut, as Lance Junior fell asleep the the gentle and reassuring sound of Lance's voice.

"I won't let anything like that happen ever again," he said, kissing his child, "I promise."

Ten Months Later

The castle had been infiltrated. The galra ops unit was small but effective. Allura, Shiro and Hunk were trapped on the main bridge while Pidge was climbing through the air ducts trying to reach the hangar to get to her lion.

Keith and Coran were doing their best to hold their own in the main hall outside the bridge, but they were quickly losing ground in the firefight, and Lance found himself suddenly surrounded.

He was halfway down the hall towards the main bridge on his way to help Keith and Coran, but Lance was flanked on both sides by Galra soldiers. And they were closing in.

"Look at this one. He's all alone," taunted the sneering soldier off to Lance's left side.

They were pressing him into a corner, guns raised in a circle around him. Lance's eyes flickered down the hallways, to the black shadows at each end.

"Why's he smiling?" asked the big one, "He's about to die. You got a deathwish, human?"

Lance couldn't help but laugh a little, his wicked grin spread across his face.

"You're wrong, you know," he said, back against the wall as the tips of guns closed in around him, "You said I was alone. I'm not."

"I don't see anybody else around."

"And that's your problem," shrugged Lance, casually, "Because as long as I have a family, I'm never alone."

The galra soldiers were not prepared for two dark, monstrous shapes the size of horses barreling down the hallway on lizard-like feet, screeching and spitting at them, tentacles flared and mouths open wide in deadly fury.

Keithette tackled two soldiers at once, crushing the first under her momentum and slamming the other with her tail. Lance Jr flared his head flower and spat acid at the panicking soldiers, whipping and grabbing their guns out of their arms.

In the confusion, Lance activated his bayard and shot the two remaining soldiers point-blank, killing them.

In mere seconds, the whole squadron lay dead or unconscious at their feet, and Keithette was enjoying slowly ripping off a dead Galra's arm and eating it.

"Snack later, baby. We need to go find daddy and the rest of them."

One Year later

"Hold on, Allura. I'm not- just give me a moment."

Allura nodded and stepped back as Lance held the two grown beings in his arms, eyes shut tight and they twined their dark tentacles around his body and each other. Even when they were the size of horses they were still gentle and affectionate.

Lance didn't know what it would feel like to remove the seed of memory from his mind. Allura had promised him that it would be quick and painless. Like waking up from a vivid daydream, but not being able to remember what happened in it.

He stood before his two children, already a year into their lives, on the edge of the swamplands of their home planet. This was their home. This was where they truly belonged. They would be happy here, and they would inherit the legacy of their ancestors.

Lance refused to admit to himself how much he would miss them. They'd be a part of him, always. They'd changed his life forever.

He leaned back, and was released from their grasp, and he turned slowly towards Allura standing next to him.

"I'm ready."

She took her hands and placed them delicately on his temples as the black tentacles wove around his head and body from behind. She closed her eyes in concentration and Lance could feel himself losing touch with immediate reality. He was swimming through endless ages of memories, lost in the river of life as generations of the swamp monsters came and went, flowing out of his mind and into his children.

And then it was over.

He tried to think back to the swamp, but lance could barely recall a few wisps mist and the smell of wet grass and nothing more. The memories were gone.

His children bowed their heads, now wise and fully adult versions of their species, thanking Allura.

Lance turned back to his babies once more. He had no more words to say. They stood before him, proud and healthy, ready to continue their lives without him. Lance felt many things in that moment. But all of it could be summed up, simply, as love.

His children turned away from him and he gently gripped their long tentacles as they slipped through his hand and they walked quietly, one after the other, into the misty swamp.

Two years later

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing. It just feels weird without them. You know?"

"Yeah, kinda… "

"...Empty."

"Empty."

Three Years Later

"With commander Holt's intelligence, we should be able to form an effective plan of attack against the last few Galra strongholds. Paladins, we have a real chance at finishing this war for good. I cannot say how proud I am of all of you."

Allura stood around the command table, holograms of battle plans floating around them. This was it. This was the final push. Zarkon was at his most desperate and dangerous, now, but Lance and the paladins were no longer alone.

"With the help from the rebels, we can split our forces and launch our assault against the supply outposts, cutting off the resources for the central station and Zarkon's last few loyalist holdouts."

This was it. They could finally end the war.

Five Years Later

"Hey Lance, wanna try this pasta I made with the sauce those interplanetary merchants gave us? Yo, what's with the book? Oh, wait- is that your old book from back when your kids were little baby worms?"

"Yep."

"Brings back memories, huh?"

"Yeah."

Ten years later

"You're sure this is where they live?"

"It's been a few years, Keith. The landscape has changed, and I don't know, maybe they moved to some better real estate by now."

"So you have no idea where they are on an entire planet."

"No. I have… a feeling. "Mother's instinct," y'know?"

Lance began their descent towards the swamp planet.

"I wonder how much they've grown," Lance muttered as he sought out a clearing large enough to land in.

They put down in the Blue Lion on a small raised mound in the soggy marshlands. Nothing had really changed, save for a decade of new growth of swamp trees and creeping vines.

But Lance could feel it. The aching tug. In fact, he could feel it even as he entered the atmosphere of the planet, but he didn't think it would be so powerful until they landed. Now, however, he knew. They were calling.

Just like ten years ago, Keith sighed and hacked away blindly at the endless vines with his bayard as Lance gave him vague directions, doubling back a couple times much to Keith's frustration.

Lance had learned over the years that there were no diminishing returns on kisses, and he dearly rewarded Keith for his enduring patience. Plus, he was cute when he was sweaty.

A few hours in, and Lance's mind was practically singing with the call. They waded through the water that reached their thighs and brushed aside the occasional falling crab and then, around a grove of dense trees, they were there.

the brown muddy water of the circular grove began churning and stirring, and a black ropey tentacle rose out of the water, it extended forward and Lance took it, allowing it to wrap itself several times around his arm and squeeze him tightly.

Then another. And four more black ropes burst out of the water, grasping lance, wrapping their length around his body, squeezing him until he couldn't move. They picked him up off, his feet, and then crashed him down into the water.

Keith shrieked and his bayard flashed and activated, but Lance shouted through the watery commotion.

"No! Keith, don't!"

The churning and sloshing subsided and Lance was gently released by the loosening tentacles. He picked himself up, wet and muddy but grinning all the while.

"I'm back, babies! Did you miss me? How you been doing?"

With that, the water bubbled and parted, and an enormous black body arose out of the brown silt, its ocean-blue eye staring at the two of them, its flower flaring, open and pink. The creature was enormous, now, larger than the two of his children combined, and as it picked itself up, out of the water, lance saw its black tentacles reach far and wide and deep into the swampland. They'd grown up.

"They fused into one!" he shouted, bursting with joy and sloshing through the water to hug the giant neck of the combined body of his twins. The monster curled its neck to wrap around him in a tender hug, while Keith watched from a distance, unsure of how to react.

"We should give them a new name," said Lance, stroking the areas he knew his children aways liked.

"Oh yeah?"

"Klance!" Lance gasped, full of unbridled joy.

"That's the stupidest name I've ever heard," said Keith, "I love it."

Fifteen Years Later

"Hey Lance!"

"Yeah?"

"Remember that time back when we first became paladins and you got space-pregnant with alien tapeworms?"

"...Yeah..."

Twenty Years Later

"Daddy, what are you thinking about?"

Lance turned his head, surprised at the sound of the young girl's voice.

"Dad said you were out here on the beach thinking. And we both know what trouble comes from that! " The girl giggled as her fluffy purple ears lay flat against her head. Lance smiled and ruffled the tiny child's hair, stroking his fingers behind her ears and cupping her chin.

"Did he say that?"

"Yes!" She laughed, sitting down beside him in the bright pink crystalline sand that covered the beaches of this watery planet. Together they sat for a moment, staring out at the hazy sunset over the greenish ocean in the distance. Her yellow dress fluttered in the light breeze as he wrapped his arm around her shoulder, giving her a little squeeze.

"Well," said Lance, "I'm just thinking back to a time before you came along. I was very young and very adventurous and full of silly ideas."

"So not at all like now?" She grinned, holding his large hand in both of her tiny ones.

"Nope, not at all. And I landed on this one planet that was a big, big swamp. And afterwards, I became very sick."

"Oh, no!" she gasped, "Did you die?"

Lance laughed, grabbing her and pulling her into his lap to tickle.

"I really almost did. But from that time I was sick, I had two kids that came before you, Korra-Marie."

The child's glowing amber eyes were wide and her mouth dropped open.

"Really? How come I never got to meet them?"

Lance sighed, and he thought for a long while before he spoke, gazing out towards the last rays of sunlight glittering on the ocean.

"Well, they weren't human, or galra, and they didn't want to live in the castle like we do. They wanted to live back on their home planet, in their swamp."

"Oh. So you put them back so they could be happy?"

"Yep," he nodded, rocking his child in his lap, "I put them back."

"Do you miss them?"

"Yes. All the time. Do you think they miss us?" he asked, kissing her cheek.

"Well, not me, since they never met me!"

"What are you two doing out here?" the low voice came from over Lance's shoulder, smooth and fine and beloved enough to tug at Lance's heart with every word.

"Dad!" Korra spring up from Lance's lap, waving Keith over towards them, "Come join us! Daddy was telling me that you had kids before me!"

Keith chuckled and sat beside Lance in the pink sand as Korra spread her little body over both of their laps, soaking up the attention.

"Did you love your other kids more than me?" she asked, looking up at them as pink sand got all over her dress and fur. Lance looked at Keith out of the corner of his eye and then smiled down at their beautiful daughter.

"Korra-Marie Amidala Kogane," he said, "No one could ever love anyone as much as your dads love you."

Keith sighed, leaning back on his elbows and staring up at the star-speckled twilight.

"Oh, that time. We were so young, Lance. How did we stay alive?"

"Don't look at me," Lance grinned.

"I think it made us better parents in the end," said Keith, as Korra crawled over and curled up in his lap.

"It really did."

Keith leaned over towards Lance and motioned to whisper conspiratorially in his ear. Lance bent over and perked up.

"I need to stop letting you pick the names."

"You really do."

THE END