Marks or masks

More Than Meets the Eye

The castle was in a state of chaos. Nobody had any idea what the hell they were meant to do. Lance was basically screaming in agonizing pain, everyone was borderline panicking, save for Hunk, who was trying to get everyone to quiet down, because no matter how you look at it, yelling is just making everything worse.

Eventually Hunk settled for putting his hands around Keith and Pidge's mouths, muffling most of the sound. Those two really were loud while in panic mode. Allura, Coran, and Shiro quieted down, Keith forced Hunk's left hand off his mouth and Pidge licked the other one. They all stood, staring Hunk down and waiting for answers as Lance struggled for breath as he choked out small noises, tears staining his tan skin.

"Okay, I can't give you all the details right now," Hunk whisper-shouted. His voice was filled with urgency. "But this sometimes happens to Lance, because his mark is incorrect, it happens to other people, but he ran out of meds a couple months ago and now I have to fix it so please, for the love of all that is holy, please just stand back and stay quiet," he turned his back to them, facing his best friend in the galaxy.

Lance could barely take full breaths, much less form sentences. Didn't stop him from tryin, though.

"H-Hunk... Hurts.... I, I... Make it.... stop... P-P-Please.... Nghh..."

"I know buddy, I know it hurts, don't talk, you'll make it worse." Lance complied, without question. He didn't need that extra pain.

Hunk kneeled in front of Lance, taking his tan arm in his hand and looking back to the other teen.

"This is gonna hurt a lot, Lance. So, I'm really, really sorry in advance," Hunk looked him in the eye and gave him a small, solemn smile. Lance knew what he was about to do, but he could only nod in response.

With that small nod as enough evidence that Lance was okay with it, Hunk pulled a needle from his pants pocket. It wasn't like one of the sewing needles you'd find at your grandmother's house. It was a medical syringe needle. It wasn't too large, but it was very sharp and made the whole team queasy. None of them had ever been good with needles, some for different reasons than others, but Hunk and Lance seemed to be totally accustomed to doing this. Though Lance was still in pain, he didn't seem surprised in the slightest by the medical syringe pulled out of his friend's pocket, and Hunk held it like a professional.

Hunk held the needle over Lance's mark, which was glowing brighter by the second, and stuck it into a specific spot. The exact middle of the biggest flower. He pulled at the handle of the syringe, and the instrument was filled with some sort of gray, bubbling ooze. The liquid almost filled the entire vial before the mark no was longer illuminated in red. It seemed that Lance was no longer in much pain, as his back was no longer arched, he didn't yell and he could finally breathe.

Hunk looked at his friend and smiled softly. "You did great, buddy. Just lay here and rest, you earned it." Lance let out the rest of his anxiety, exhaling and relaxing, and letting himself settle and attempt to get his breath under control.

Hunk made his way to the door gesturing for the others to follow.