I originally posted this no Ao3 and thought, hey, why not post in on fanfic as well? Haha! Enjoy!

Dear reader, before you proceed, I must confess that I've only watched like.. 5 episodes of Voltron so far, (please don't kill me), but I've read hundreds of fanfictions, so I think it'll be okay? Anyways, let me know what you guys think!

Hope you guys like it!

Lance used the back of his arm to quickly wipe off the sweat on his forehead before furrowing his eyebrows in concentration.

He aimed his bayard at the gladiator charging towards him and fired a clean shot right through its head. The machine spasmed momentarily before it slammed into the ground where it remained motionless.

Lance let out a breath as he stored his bayard and strolled out the room; which was now in complete disarray. The training room was now, quite literally, a robot graveyard. Broken gladiators lay all over the room; letting out sparks from their exposed wires and joints.

Some of the machines had dents or were missing limb and panels- exhibiting Lance's improvement in hand to hand combat, while the majority of the robots were littered with holes; no doubt the result of being blasted by Lance's bayard with precise accuracy.

There had to be hundreds of them lying around the training room- but Lance paid them no mind.

He was used to that amount by now.

He activated the room's auto-cleaning mechanism before heading out and towards the showers. The blue paladin was little sore, a few cuts and bruises here and there, but it was nothing a good night's sleep couldn't fix.

'Keith and Shiro could handle much worse.' He thought to himself as he reached the bathrooms.

After a quick shower, he changed into his pajamas and got into bed; falling asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.

This was Lance's nightly routine nowadays, and it's been this way for the past 5 months. After eating dinner with his team and their 2 Altean allies, he would hang with them for a bit; crack a few jokes, make fun of Keith, the usual, before excusing himself, claiming he needed his 'beauty sleep'.

"One does not get this good looking without proper maintenance you know!" He would joke and the rest would groan or laugh as he walked out of the room.

Lance would sleep in his clothes- since it saved him time later from changing, and would nap for about 2 vargas before waking up at about 1 AM Earth time.

Lance would then go to the training room and peek his head around the corner to make sure a certain red paladin wasn't in there. That mullet head probably spent almost half of his day in that room; though Lance probably now spent close to that amount of time as well.

Not including the training sessions in the day, the blue paladin would stay there and train for at least 3-4 vargas, before calling it a night; taking a shower and finally getting proper rest, before waking up and greeting his team with a smile in the morning.

In the afternoon, after his training sessions with the team, Lance would find the time to visit the castle library. It was hardly ever used so he didn't need to worry about anyone else finding him in there.

Lance spent a good portion of his afternoon learning to read and speak Altean, which he was quite confident in now.

The mice turned out to be pleasant company. They would shake or nod their heads whenever he pronounced something wrong, and tried to correct him by miming with their hands or tails. It was hard to understand what they meant half the time, but Lance was grateful for it nonetheless.

Of course, he knew he could always ask Coran of Allura for help, but they were always so busy and he didn't want to bother them any more than he already did.

He even found some books of Galran language and was learning to read that as well. I mean who knows? What if he or his team were captured and they needed to get out and the exit signs were in Galran? What if there was some sort of bomb they needed to diffuse but the instructions were in Galran? Highly unlikely but you never know. Learning the language of the enemy seemed beneficial so he made sure to learn it.

He wanted to do as much as he could for his team.

…

With the passing months, no one really noticed how much quieter the blue paladin was nowadays, or how his skin didn't glow as brightly as it did before, or any other changes for that matter. Whether it was because they were too busy with their own work, or if they just simply didn't care, Lance didn't know.

Though he hoped it wasn't the latter.

Lance would visit Blue every day. She was the only one who seemed to get him nowadays. She would listen intently to him whenever he talked to her; be it about his day or his life back on earth- something he deeply missed. From the conversations they had, Blue slowly grew more and more concerned for her paladin and his mental health.

"Blue, do you think I'm doing okay? Like, am I actually helping the team? I don't want to be a burden or anything..." the Cuban boy would often ask. He squeezed his knees against his chest, leaning against his lion's paw.

"Do you think... I've been doing enough?"

Despite being made of metal, Blue's heart literally felt as if it was being crushed whenever she saw her precious paladin this way. No Galra blast could ever compare to the amount of pain and ache she felt when she saw the worry and self-loathing on her paladin's face.

She'd purr softly in his mind, and surrounded him with a comforting presence. Assuring him that, 'Yes, you are doing so great my paladin.'

And, 'I chose you as the blue paladin and there is no one else in the entire universe better suited or more deserving of the role.'

He'd look up and give her a small smile. Pet her nose and thanked her for cheering him up… but Blue knew nothing she said would ever be enough.

It was so frustrating. Why couldn't her paladin just see how absolutely amazing he was? He was brave, kind, caring, selfless, willing to sacrifice himself for the people he cared about.

'You don't need to train so much. You've gone above and beyond for the team. You deserve some rest.' She would often say.

To which Lance would shake his head and reply, 'No. What I am now, it's not enough."

"Everyone helps out in some way or another and I'm just… there. I can't hack or build awesome stuff like Pidge. And Hunk's the engineer, and boy can that man can cook! Shiro's the leader, and both him and Keith are awesome in combat. I don't I'd ever get anywhere close to their level."

"Then there's Allura, who helps formulate the battle plans and monitors our training. And of course, Coran helps take care of us when we're injured and looks over the castle's maintenance and stuff. They all do so much and are so amazing. While I.. don't really do anything significant."

"Seriously, what am I even good for? I crack jokes, which probably annoys everyone anyway, and I try to help out around the castle when I can, but otherwise… I'm just the sharpshooter. Don't think that's anything to brag about either. I mean, with time, anyone could be a good shot."

"I'm replaceable."

Blue's growl was ignored as Lance continued.

"I need to earn my place on this team."

"Everything I've done so far, it's still... not enough."

...

Blue would let out a sigh and simply shake her head.

No one could ever, ever replace her paladin. If only he knew just how wrong he was.

She could see it in the others. How much they cared for him and appreciated him. He was always there to lend an ear when someone was having a bad day. Or would purposely make a fool of himself to make them laugh and try to cheer them up. He would force them, or drag them, to bed when he noticed the bags under theirs eyes, and brought them food when they missed lunch or dinner- too engrossed in their projects to find the time to eat.

Though they didn't often show it, and Blue thought they really should show it more often, the team appreciated him and were happy to have him as part of the team.

The team valued him so much…

Why couldn't he see that?

…..

Today, Lance was in the training room again for another one of his nighttime/early morning training sessions. He dodged a punch to his left and another one aimed his head before rolling across the floor. He swerved around the fired 2 shots at the gladiator, both hitting their gladiator powered off and fell down with a loud 'thunk'.

While waiting for the next gladiator to enter the room, Lance's mind began to wander.

Still so weak... Keith would have been able to defeat that in half the time.

Sigh.. and the voice was back.

He remembers when he first started hearing it; about 2 months after he joined the team.

/

They had just finished one of their hardest training sessions yet, and the team was sitting down on the floor; tired and exhausted.

'This training things kinda hard. Garrison never had anything like this...' The blue paladin thought to himself. 'I hope I can keep up with the rest of the team.'

Pathetic... Is that the best you can do?

Lance eyes widened in slight panic. 'Woah what was that?'

A million different thoughts raced through Lance's mind immediately. 'Did some Galra druid get to me or something during one of those mission? Coz I swear I'm hearing voices."

"I mean I don't remember anything like that happening.. but what if... they're the ones who made me lose my memory about it or something?!

But why would a druid even bother in the first place?

You are the person with the least value on the team.

If there were going to do something like that, they'd pick someone more worth their time.

And thats when Lance realised..

That voice... it was his!

'Oh great.. another thing to add to the never-ending list of 'what's wrong with Lance'. Now I'm even taking to myself.'

Is there even anything that's not wrong with you though?

Lance shook his head hard, hoping to shake away the voice.

"Lance, you okay? You suddenly began shaking your head." Hunk asked him, his face one of concern.

Lance let out a nervous chuckle. "Yeah yeah! Nothing to worry about!

He brushed it off then, but the voices never stopped. And as the months passed, Lance kept hearing the voice more and more.

/

7th Wheel.

Talentless.

Waste of Space.

"...Shut up." Lance whispered softly, trying to keep his focus on the gladiators.

The team deserves someone else.

"Shut up."

Whatever you do will never be enough. Why even try?

"SHUT UP" Lance yelled in anguish. He threw his bayard to the side and charged at the gladiators; opting to kick and punch the shit out of them.

He realised some time ago that the more he fought, the more he immersed himself in training, the less he could hear the thoughts. And that's what he was doing now.

Just focus. Ignore the voices. Ignore the aches and pain. Ignore your throbbing knuckles and hands- he was punching metal after all.

By the time the last gladiator fell to the floor, Lance was panting hard. His knuckles were badly bruised, and he had numerous cuts and bruises all around his body. He looked up at the display screen inside the training room and cursed out loud. It was equivalent to 6 in the morning.

Ah crap. He remembered how Allura had told them the day before that they were going to have an important strategy meeting at 7. He rushed out of the room, a slight limp in his step but he ignored it. He showered, bandaged up his wounds, put on his day clothes, and made his way to the kitchen; where the rest of team was no doubt already eating breakfast.

"Hey Lance, Good Mor- what happened to you?" asked Hunk.

Lance panicked. He quickly checked his body- were any bandages peeking out? Any cuts he forgot to bandage up and were bleeding through?

"Yeah Lance, you look like crap." Pidge said bluntly. Shiro and Keith turned to look at him now too, agreeing with Pidge that Lance had definitely seen better mornings.

Lance sighed in relief. They were just talking about how tired he looked. No surprise there- considering he had just finished fighting against gladiators for 5 hours straight and hadn't slept a wink.

"Thanks Pidgey... Just had a bad night. Didn't sleep too well.."

Shiro stood up and gestured Lance to take a seat at the table. "Maybe some food would help? Do you think you'll be able to sit in for the meeting? If you're not feeling too well, I could always ask Allura to-"

"No!" Lance yelled a little too loudly. He cleared his throat and continued. "I mean. No, I'm fine! Just need to fuel up and I'm good to go! You're right, I'll feel a lot better once I've eaten." He finished, shovelling a spoonful of food is his mouth.

Shiro did't look too convinced, but he let it slide. After 15 dobashes, Princess Allura's voice echoed through the castle speakers; letting them know if was time for the meeting.

...

"Lance! Have you listened to anything we've been saying?"

A dozing Lance immediately sprung upright. Back straight, face blushing slightly in embarrassment. "S-sorry I didn't mean to doze off princess.. I just haven't been.. um.. sleeping well..."

"And you didn't think to notify any of us?" Allura questioned, annoyance clear in her voice. "Lance, that is very irresponsible. What if the Galra were to attack us right this moment? You wouldn't be top condition, which in turn would endanger the team."

"Figures.." Keith grumbled. Shaking his head in disappoint at the blue paladin. "You've probably been staying up, fooling around doing god knows what instead of sleeping."

"I wasn't fooling around!" Lance shouted. He could feel his anger starting to bubble up.

"The universe is at stake here-"

"You think I don't know that!?" Lance answered back, raising his voice.

"-and we don't have time to deal with problems you've cause by goofing off."

Lance felt something inside him snap.

He had been training! Working himself to exhaustion these past few months to help the team cause he didn't want to get left behind. Did the team not notice any changes to his fighting style? Or how much more skilled he was at hand to hand combat?

When he spared with Shiro and Keith, did they not notice how much longer it took now for them to defeat him? Sure he wasn't up to their level, but they had years of training compared to him!

Does this mean.. that despite all the training he'd done so far, he wasn't improving as much as he thought he was?

Nothing you do will ever be enough...

No.. please.. not again..

Compared to them, you are nothing...

They'd be much better off without you...

Should find someone more capable for the job..

You don't deserve to be a part of the team.

"Lance, Keith, stop it." Shiro got between the two, stopping the fight from escalating further. "You guys need to go cool down. Now. The meeting is postponed till later."

Lance physically sagged, immediately hating himself. Because of him, they now had to postpone the meeting.

Yet another problem he caused the team. The voices were right. He didn't deserve his place on the team among such amazing, talented people.

But..

They were like his second family now and.. he didn't want to get left behind.

He wanted to stay with them.

He wanted to be apart of the team.

He wanted to prove to them that he was good enough to stand beside them as comrades.

As fellow paladins of Voltron.

'Train. Need to.. train more.' Lance turned around, not looking at his teammates faces as he left the meeting hall and headed straight for the training room.

He walked to the centre of the room, clutching his Bayard beside him and yelled to the castle system to begin.

"Set at Level 30! Commence Gladiator training!" he shouted, tears welling up in his eyes.

More, more. He needed to do more. Be better. Help the team.

Trap doors opened up from the ceiling, dropping 10 gladiators at once. He knew there were many more to come, so Lance shook his head and readied his bayard. "I can do this." He whispered, blinking back the tears.

"Forget the thoughts. Focus on helping the team."

"Do more. Need to do more."

Nothing you do will ever be enough.