Lance could tell that his parents felt guilty for not believing his story because, a few days later, they told him they were going on a day trip to his favourite aquarium whilst his siblings were stuck at school. He liked the idea enough to get into the car without even the slightest bit of argument. There was just something about water- and everything in it- that made him feel so calm and at ease. For a brief period during his time at the Garrison, he had even worked in the aquarium. He was forced to wear a shark fin hat (forced is the wrong word when Lance really thought it looked awesome) and he gave tours to families so often that he was able to blurt out a list of random fun facts he had learnt to keep everyone entertained. Part of him missed his job but he knew defending the universe with Voltron was more important than being a tour guide that knew a strange amount about fish.

When they pulled into a car park that most certainly didn't look like the one behind the aquarium, Lance began to worry. It was so dingy and dirty, litter spread across the floor in the most randomest places. To make it even more suspicious, there wasn't even a billboard hanging off the building that had hand painted dolphins on. It was just a manky white building with the words Forestar Hospital written on the side. Most of the letters had been scratched off but, still, the sight was enough to send Lance's heart plummeting to the floor.

A million questions ran through his head: was someone sick? Was someone dying? Was he dying? What was going on? "Mamá?" He questioned but she didn't reply to him. Instead, she grabbed his arm and tugged him towards the main entrance without so much of an explanation.

They walked passed a large white sign that stood by the main reception. It had a list of different wards written on it in a rainbow of different colours. His mum pulled him down a hall that was painted a sickening bright blue with Bluebell Ward scrawled on the top of one of the doors. Once they reached another smaller reception, his father walked up to the lady sitting at the computer behind it. Lance could only watch as his mum guided him to a lone seat pressed right up against the wall.

Finally, Lance let the questions in his head come out of his mouth in the form of an endless ramble. "Is someone sick? Why are we in a hospital? What's going on? Is someone dying?"

His mum refused to meet his gaze and only shook her head so slowly that Lance almost missed it. Her voice was so soft that it might as well have been laced with marshmallow when she next spoke; Lance had always thought marshmallows were too sickly. "We made an appointment for you."

"For me?" Lance's face scrunched up in thought. "But I'm not..." Something seemed to register in his mind as his face fell again and he let out a heavy sigh. He leant forward in his chair, sparkling eyes eating into his mum's own tearful expression. "Is it about my scars? They're fine mamá. They happened a long time ago and there were these healing pod things that-"

"It's not about the scars, hijo," That time his mum had spoken so fast that Lance was sure she was trying to drown out his space talk. If she had taken a loaded gun to his heart and shot a bullet right through it, it would have hurt less. Lance loved space and he loved Voltron. Talking about it was one of the only things that had made him happy: it gave his life so much more meaning. He could ramble for hours and hours about the different aliens he had seen and the adventures he'd been on but, there his mum was, raining on his beautiful sunny day. "You're going to speak to a psychologist."

You can only imagine what it's like for your family to completely dismiss something you've said. Lance's entire world was Voltron at that point but, still, his mum didn't believe him. She was sending him to a psychologist because she would rather believe her own son was insane than to trust what he had said about space. That idea alone was enough to encourage tears to break free and stream down his face.

"You- You think... mamá... I promise I'm not lying to you," Lance was shaking like a leaf, full of desperation as he mentally begged his mum to listen to him. He reached out and latched onto the bottom of his mum's jacket like a small child who was afraid of losing his parents. In a way, he was that child. He was petrified of losing the ones he loved as a result of their distrust for him. What if they put him in an asylum? What if no one believed him about Voltron? What then? He couldn't exactly prove it to them. "I'm okay. I didn't experience any trauma or whatever you think happened. Please... just trust me."

"Lance..."

"They're going to take me away from you," Lance let out a hiccup that soon escalated into a full on sob. He buried his head into his hands to muffle the noise but a couple of the other people in the waiting room turned to look at them regardless, half in concern and half in annoyance. "I can't tell them the truth. They won't believe me. They'll think I'm insane and- and- and-"

Lance's mum opened her mouth to say something but shut it again, only opening it again moments later after she was able to rethink her words. "These sessions are confidential so nobody needs to know what you tell the psychologist about. They won't lock you up unless they think you're a danger to yourself or others which you aren't. If you hate this session so much, you don't have to come back. Just speak to them this once for me, alright?"

Despite letting out another cry, Lance forced himself to nod. His dad walked towards them at that exact moment, only seeing his crying son and concerned wife. Once he leant against the wall beside Lance's chair, he placed a gentle hand on Lance's shoulder and sent him the reassuring smile he needed.

"Lance McClain?" A doctor called, poking his head out of his room. Lance subconsciously began gripping his mum's jacket with much more force as he wished he could stay by her side forever. He couldn't though. He had to face the psychologist alone.

Once his parents both nodded at him in encouragement, Lance followed the doctor back into his room, trying his hardest to hold back more tears.

-

"Just so you know, everything you say in here is completely confidential. Your parents won't know and I won't even tell my colleagues unless we believe you are a danger to yourself or the people around you. Is that okay?" The doctor, who had already introduced himself as Dr Anderson, seemed nice enough. He appeared to be in his mid-fifties and had round glasses sat on top of his overly pointy nose. Lance assumed that thing would have been able to pop a balloon if the psychologist tried hard enough. A constant smile adorned his face and his cheeks were bright with life, contrasting the deep wrinkles covering his forehead. He was wearing a shirt with the top two buttons undone, a style that wasn't the most common of his age. Within minutes, Lance was able to decide that Dr Anderson wasn't like any other fifty year old man. There was youth hidden in his heart that was desperate to break out of its cage and come to life.

"That's fine." Lance murmured, staring at the wall behind Dr Anderson as opposed to the doctor himself. He already knew Dr Anderson wouldn't understand the way he was feeling; not with a smile as wide as his.

"So tell me a little bit about yourself, Lance." The way Dr Anderson leaned forward and raised his eyebrows, as if he really cared, made Lance feel a little nauseated. He could predict what the session was going to consist of and it wasn't a friendly exchange: it was going to be Lance telling Dr Anderson about space whilst Dr Anderson wrote the word insane down on his stupid notebook. Lance understood that Voltron seemed bizarre but he knew he hadn't made it up. He wouldn't.

"Uh... what do you want to know?"

"Anything. What's your favourite colour? Are you in college? Do you have a girlfriend? Just tell me whatever pops into your head so we can get to know a bit about each other."

Lance shifted in his seat, moving so he was able to balance his arm on the side of the chair and then his head on his hand. "My favourite colour is blue and I was in highschool until last year but then I... kind of... left, I guess? I don't have a girlfriend at the moment but I feel like I should tell you to stop being heteronormative because I'm bi."

"I suppose that was a bit insensitive of me, I apologise. Now, tell me, why did you leave high school?"

Chewing on the bottom of his lip, Lance debated the pros and cons of telling the truth. Eventually, he decided that, as long as the doctor kept his promise of things staying confidential, there wasn't much harm in telling the truth. He cleared his throat as he debated the right way to phrase his thoughts. "It's a long story really but I... I went to space."

"Did you? That sounds really fun." Lance had to suppress the urge for his mouth to drop open. Dr Anderson didn't move to make any notes and the smile remained etched onto his face. He didn't argue or tell Lance he was making it all up, he just sat there as if he was willing to listen. A grin tugging at his own lips, Lance prepared himself to start rambling about the place that he loved without fear of judgement.

"Yeah, it was. I went to the Galaxy Garrison so I was training to be a pilot anyway. Finally making it up there was amazing. It was all so pretty and I was so happy to be surrounded by so many cool people."

"That's nice," Dr Anderson glanced down at the pieces of paper in his hands and sifted through them for a moment, though he didn't make any effort to jot any notes down. "When your mum got in contact with me, she seemed worried about you. Do you know why this may be?"

Lance stared a hole into his lap and began picking at a loose thread in his jacket. A frown filled his face as he recalled the thousands of concerned looks his parents had given him since he had gotten home. The sound of his mum's sobs behind closed doors bounced off the walls of his mind, echoing and slowly fading out until Lance was left lightheaded. "She thinks I made it up."

"Why would she think that?"

"Because I didn't just go into space. I found a blue lion spaceship here on Earth and it chose me to be its paladin. It flew me and some other people into space because we were chosen to defeat an evil race of aliens."

Despite the bizarre nature of Lance's statement, Dr Anderson's face didn't change. It remained frozen in its small smile and eyes like honey. "I see. Can you tell me more about the other people you were with? Did you know them prior to the trip to space?"

"I knew Hunk. He was my best friend before we left. Then there was Pidge and Keith who I knew from the Garrison but never really befriended. Keith was a bit of a loner and Pidge talked about science so much that I couldn't keep up," Dr Anderson let out an exhale of breath that sounded suspiciously like a laugh but Lance couldn't have been sure. Either way, it pushed Lance forward. "There was also Shiro who taught at the Garrison but he went missing before we found him again... it's really complicated. Oh and we met two aliens, Allura and Coran."

"Where are they all now?"

"Different places really. Coran is trying to increase the size of the coalition and Hunk and Pidge are working on building another Castle of Lions. They were also going to make Shiro a new prosthetic arm. I think Keith is helping the Blade of Mamora."

"Castle of Lions? Blade of Mamora?"

"Yeah. It's complicated but the Castle of Lions was a massive castle that belonged to Allura. Did I mention she was a princess? But yeah, we had to destroy the castle one time when the lions didn't have any power. I miss it a lot. The Blade of Mamora is just this organisation thing that rebel against the Galra and also help defend the universe."

"So are they all still in space?" Lance simply nodded so Dr Anderson raised a second question. He let his smile falter for a second as he asked, "Do you miss them?"

Lance let out a soft sigh and closed his eyes so he could imagine each of their faces again. He could picture Pidge sitting at her laptop, hacking into things she chose against disclosing most of the time. She could imagine Hunk in the kitchen, Keith in the training room with that rigid look of concentration on his face, Shiro commanding the team, Coran performing on stage and Allura... Allura standing up for what she believed in. Once Lance realised he had gotten lost inside his own head, he forced his eyes open and mumbled out an answer. "A lot. Me and Keith were only just starting to get along before..."

"Before what?"

"I'm afraid this is where we part ways. This is our only chance to undo what has been done; to save all of existence. I have to take it. It is my purpose. Your paths go on... Mine ends here. I'll always be with you, Lance... and I'll always love you." The words rushed through Lance's head so quickly that he was surprised they didn't give him whiplash. He hunched over his chair, covering his ears with his hands to try and drown out the sound of Allura's voice.

"I- I don't think I can talk about it." Lance's voice was weak and each word seemed to crack into oblivion. Dr Anderson must have understood the pain inside his heart because he spoke up again.

"That's okay. How about we move on?" Lance just about mustered a nod. "Alright... Why do you think your family don't believe you went to space?"

Lance blinked away the tears forming in his eyes and shifted his position yet again. He was struggling to get comfortable on the hard chair and underneath the gaze of the psychologist. "They think I was kidnapped or something. I know the stuff with the aliens sounds crazy but I know it happened. I wouldn't make it up."

"No, I'm sure you wouldn't, Lance," Dr Anderson paused for a moment to jot something down in his notebook. Lance let his gaze rise higher in an attempt to read the handwriting but he couldn't quite make it out. He was 99% sure that it said the words insane or a danger to himself. "Will your friends be coming back to Earth?"

"I don't know. I can't contact them at the moment."

"And why's that?"

"They said it was too dangerous in case someone intercepted our messages."

"Okay... are you paranoid that people are watching you and listening to your conversations?"

Lance didn't need to be a genius to figure out that the doctor was trying to label him with paranoia or schizophrenia or something. He had every reason to be paranoid. "Well, not exactly but we have to be careful. If the wrong people figure out who I am or where the others are, it could be bad. It's top secret information."

"Right," Just the way Dr Anderson said that simple word made it sound like he didn't believe Lance. "Whilst I was talking to your mother earlier, she told me about some scarring she was worried about. Could you show me? If you don't feel comfortable, that's okay."

"I'm not ashamed of it," Lance murmured before turning around and pulling his shirt up to reveal his back. Dr Anderson nodded as his eyes traced the different types of scars. "I got the biggest one saving Coran's life. If I hadn't been there, I think he would have died."

"What about the others?"

"Being the paladin of the universe isn't easy so I most likely got them on our little missions. I don't remember every single one's backstory."

"Do you get nightmares? About the pain or anything like that?"

"Sometimes..." Lance seemed to lose the confidence in his posture again as he hid his face from the psychologist. "But I can't talk about it. It's too personal."

"That's okay. I think you have done very well for our first session. Do you plan on returning next week?"

Lance shrugged, not moving his hands from his face. His words were muffled by his hands. "I don't know. It's up to my parents really."

"No, Lance, it's up to you. If you think you'll benefit from seeing me again, you can come back. If not, the you don't need to."

"I guess I'll see you next week then... if that's okay?" Lance's decision was made entirely with his parents in his mind; he didn't want to keep worrying them. If it took a half an hour session once a week to put his parents' minds at ease, he'd do it.

"Is the same time alright?" Lance lifted his head up, nodded and forced a smile. "I'll see you then. It was nice meeting you."

"You too."

Lance pushed the door open and met eyes with his parents who were staring at him with cloudy eyes. His mum was up first, rushing towards him and blurting out a series of random questions. "How'd it go? Did it go alright? Is your psychologist nice? Did you feel comfortable talking to him?"

Dropping his gaze to his feet, Lance muttered the response, "It was fine." His mum didn't push him to speak any more. Even she was aware of how tough it must be for her son.