Lance stared at his childhood home. From inside he heard laughter, light and cheerful. On the fence around it, he saw some posters with his face and a "MISSING" caption. Some seemed much older than others, with faded corners or ripped edges.

The blue paladin took a deep breath and walked past the broken gate. He remembered when he broke it - he wondered if it had ever been fixed. It would have been easy, and would have only taken a minute. Rehinging it was the only thing needed for it to be done.

Lance walked past the small garden his little brother had started so long ago. There were tiny tomato vines sprouting here and there, though none had any blossoms yet. Lance smiled and picked up a tiny pebble and put it at the small grey pocket on the side of his armor.

He took a deep breath and raised his hand. It took him a minute to knock on the door. He would have a lot to explain - his absence, his armor, his giant lion sitting only a few blocks away.

"Just a moment!" Someone called from inside. The doorknob jingled and a smiley woman with wrinkle lines and greying hair appeared. "Hello?"

"I..." Lance stared at her for a moment. He choked back a sob and took another deep breath. His mother's eyes widened.

"L-Lance?" She whispered. She looked as if she had just seen a ghost. Lance nodded and wrapped her in a hug.

"It's me, mamá. I came home..." He let tears run down his cheeks now, tears that he once cried alone in rememberance of his family. His mother hugged him back, tighter than she had ever hugged him before. Just as they pulled away, someone ran up from behind her.

"Mamá, mamá! Ramón broke my-" The young girl's words caught in her throat. Her eyes widened, and she glanced from something on the wall and then back to Lance.

"Hey, Lizzie." Lance smiled fondly. She had been just a toddler when he left for the Garrison. Now she was at least six.

"Are you Lans?" She whispered. Lance nodded. "Lans!!" She yelled loudly. She jumped up and down and ran back the way she came, now yelling, "Lans is home! Lans is home!"

It didn't take long for the rest of Lance's siblings to race to the front door.

"Where the hell were you?!" María asked, grabbing him forcefully by the shoulder. He winced, and she let go. "I thought you were dead, Lance." She muttered, pulling him into a hug.

"Lance, what are you wearing?" Mateo asked, holding up one of Lance's arms. "Is this cosplay?"

"No, it's not. I, uh, I've got something to show you guys." Lance smiled and turned around. He closed his eyes and reached out to the blue lion (A/N - fite meh) and asked her to come to him. She purred in response and deactivated her particle barrier before flying over to Lance's street. She landed in the front yard of Lance's house, her paws right next to Mateo's garden.

"Holy crow, what is that?!" Georgé stumbled backwards, earning the laughs of his four siblings.

"That's blue. She's my lion."

"You have a fucking robot lion?!" María gasped. "How?!"

"Well, she's from this planet called Altea. It was destroyed 10,000 years ago, and we found her near the Garrison. I woke her up, and, well... You better come inside. I have a lot to show you."

Lance led his family inside blue's open mouth and took his seat in the pilot's chair. "Now, make sure you all hang on to each other. It can get hairy when we're leaving Earth's atmosphere."

"But I have a casserole in the oven!" Lance's mom shouted. Lance sighed and let her go turn it off. After a moment of awkward silence, Rosa came back into the cockpit. "Sorry. I'm ready."

"Are we going to gloss over the fact that we're going to leave Earth's atmosphere?" María panicked, grabbing into the only chair in the cockpit. Lance smirked and pulled on his helmet.

"Allura, I'm ready for wormhole." He said.

"Perfect. Follow the castle."

"Try not to end up underwater this time." Pidge smirked.

"Shut up, gremlin." Lance grinned and pushed his controls forward. Blue roared and zoomed after the castle. A chorus of ooh's and ah's came from his family as he shot through the wormhole and surfaced on the other side of the universe.

"Lance, this is..." Mateo grinned. "It's amazing!"

"Thanks. I got some time off when we defeated Zarkon..."

"Zarkon?" Rosa asked.

"He's the emperor of the Galra. He lived for 10,000 years and was extremely oppressive of his 'people'. He conquered and drained entire planets of their quintessence. Voltron was the only thing that could stop him."

"This Voltron?" Lizzie asked with wide eyes.

"Yes and no." Lance pursed his lips. "I would show you, but we're, uh, down a paladin at the moment. Basically, this is one of the five Voltron lions. All five come together to make a giant robot man called Voltron."

"That sounds incredible." Georgé whispered.

"Let's go into the castle." Lance smiled and shot towards the entrance to the blue hangar.

"So this is where you've lived for the past three years?" Rosa asked as they climbed out of the lion.

"Well, sort of. I lived at the Garrison for a year and a half, and then here for almost two years." Lance recalled, smiling at his family.

"Wow." Mateo spun around to look at the room.

"Do you know how to fight now?" Lizzie asked with a gap-toothed grin.

"Yep." Lance grinned, pulling out his Bayard. He held it up and it turned into his signature blaster. He threw the pebble he picked up across the room and shot it out of the air.

"Damn, Lance." María grinned in approval.

"Wake the hell up." Keith said, running into the room.

"What?" Lance furrowed his brow.

"I said, you know that you're going to have to get them back to earth, right? They aren't safe out here." Keith crossed his arms.

"I... Uh, you know that the plan was to let them see me. I didn't want them to think I was dead."

"Yeah, well, you're going to die if you don't wake up." Pidge rolled her eyes as she walked in.

"I... Is this...?" Lance looked around. The more he looked, the less real everything seemed. He gasped and fell backwards. He squeezed his eyes shut as wave after wave of nausea rolled over him. When it finally stopped, his eyes fluttered open to see Keith staring at him. Sweat and blood dripped down the red paladin's forehead.

"Thank God." He whispered. Lance groaned.

"Where am I?" His throat was dry, but his eyes were not. Tears began to slide down his face, wiping away a few layers of dirt and grime.

"I don't know. We're on some sort of planetoid, but I can't get communications up." Lance tried to sit up, but Keith pushed him down. "You need to rest; you were shot in the shoulder."

"I... Okay." Lance sat back down and closed his eyes. He knew it was too late to go back to his dream, so he just laid there, thinking about it.

If only it had been more than a dream...