"Are you telling me we're out of fucking space peanut butter?"

Lance slammed the cupboard closed, whirling around to face the table, yelping as he smashed his foot into the bench that was definitely not there earlier.

Shiro and Vi winced in sympathy, Muxis doing his best to keep his face neutral as Lance hopped his way over to the table, only to bump into it and fall, smashing his face against the cold metal on his way down.

"You okay?" Nea stared down at Lance standing above his head so her face was upside down to him.

Lance sighed, playfully swatting her head bobble out of the way so he could sit up.

"Absoutely peachy," he sighed, rubbing at his forehead with one hand and his stubbed toes with the other, glaring at a random space he estimated to be halfway between the two offending pieces of furniture.

"Why are we catching fish?"

"I don't know, maybe—" Lance broke off, slowly lowering his hand as he turned to face Vi, eyebrows rising into his hairline. "What?"

"What?"

"What do you mean, 'why are we catching fish'?"

Vi raised their eyebrows back at Lance. "You said... absolutely... catching fish."

"Absolutely.... peachy."

"Catching fish."

".... peachy."

"Fish."

"Peachy?"

"That's what I said! Fish!"

"I think your translator is broken." Muxis chimed in, scooping Nea into his arms, the child letting out a squeak of glee.

Lance sighed. "I'll look into it. Might just be a mistranslated word, not the babelfish itself."

"Okay, that time you definitely said fish." Muxis said, letting Nea swing from his bicep. There was a noise from under the table, and Lance only caught sight of a pair of round yellow eyes before Mik launched herself at Muxis' other arm, tail lashing as her feet dangled in the air.

"Babelfish?" Shiro asked.

"Y'know... Hitchhiker's Guide," Lance said, and when Shiro didn't respond, he continued. "Look, I didn't want to say translator and mistranslation in the one sentence. Sometimes you've gotta switch it up a bit."

Outside of a nigh imperceptible headshake, Shiro didn't react any further.

"Sometimes..." Lance muttered to himself.

The kitchen lulled into a heavy silence, outside of the giggling of the two girls swinging from Muxis' arms.

"Sooo..." Shiro started out slowly, tapping out an uneven rhythm on the table and floor with his prosthetics. "What were you saying about space... peanut butter, was it?"

Lance huffed. "Yeah, Matt makes it. I'm assuming he took the last of it with him, along with his recipe, the greedy little quizna—"

"Announcement from the Captain!" Olly called cheerfully, leaning through the doorway, one arm braced either side. "She said the rest of use shouldn't expect any missions."

"We know how this works," Muxis said, as Mik pulled herself up to somehow sit on his shoulders. Nea cheered. "Home team, last line of defence if we get attacked."

"More or less the ship can't even function with a smaller crew than what we have now." Rolo said, slightly out of breath from trying to keep up with Olly, a position usually held by Roy. But she was gone now, Rolo filling her space. Lance held back a frown. It wasn't Rolo's fault Roy had been assigned a different post.

Lotty, who had been holding Rolo's hand, caught sight of the other two girls playing around and climbing on Muxis and looked up to Rolo in silent permission. "Yeah, yeah, go ahead." She nodded, dropping his hand and sprinting over to Muxis to wrap around his leg.

"I guess that's true," Vi said, and Lance's brain lagged for a second before he remembered what they were replying to, "everyone left specialises in different fields."

"Essential workers..." Lance mumbled under his breath.

"Got it in one!" Olly said cheerfully, and Lance idly wondered if her chipper attitude was in some part influenced by the children playing.

"I'm still kind of new to this," Shiro said, still tapping his uneven rhythms, "who does what?"

"I'm glad you asked!" Olly grinned. Rolo rolled his eyes, but she ignored him, hopping up to sit on the bench before continuing, "You're going to be part of our Core, which means you're our best line of defence if we get attacked."

"Core also includes me, Liliterthith, and Lance." Muxis added, as Mik wrapped her tail around his eyes like a blindfold. He gently pulled it down, and she giggled a little, wriggling it back out of his grip.

"Lance actually does double duty," Olly cut back in. "He's also on Medical with Kelaan, and Lotty's being trained in it as well."

Lotty looked up at her name, smiling shyly and nodding before attempting to scale Muxis' leg. Lance was momentarily distracted trying to work out when Muxis had discovered what patience was.

"I'm on comms," Vi said, "Matt was my second, but now that he's out in the field, it's just me and anyone who happens to be in the vicinity at the time." They smiled, leaning back a little in their chair.

"Terla, Terla!" Nea called, hooking her legs over Muxis' arm and swinging upside-down, "I can help!"

"Yeah!" Mik added, "Me too! I wanna help!"

"Looks like you've got some trainees," Muxis chuckled, once again moving to pull Mik's tail away from his eyes.

"Provided someone teaches them some self defence as well so they can keep out of danger," Vi nodded, "I'll be happy to."

"I can train them in my spare time!" Olly said, "I've got experience knowing how to fight when you're smaller than all your opponents."

"Anything else we haven't covered?" Vi asked, tilting their head to the side, disco-bobble catching the light.

"Pilots," Rolo said, leaning against the bench top. "In an emergency, the people that can handle that is myself, Lance and you, Shiro, if my recollection of the... ah... incident. Is anything to go by."

"I dunno..." Nyma's voice sounded from behind Lance, making him squawk in surprise. He hadn't seen her come into the room.

Nyma stared at him in bemusement. "Feels like we're missing out without that hotshot red pilot of yours."

Lance tried to laugh good-naturedly at the mention of Keith, especially because it seemed like Nyma was at least attempting to be civil with him right now. That was an improvement, right?

The laugh came out as a weak huff, however, and he ducked his head, trying to mask his falling expression.

"Honestly, having all of Voltron would give us an advantage," Shiro said, "but having one Lion will have to be enough for now."

Lance pulled his legs up under his chin, fiddling with the ever-present blue brace on his ankle. He hadn't flown Blue in a little while, still under strict orders and a lot of stress. He had too many duties here to go for a ride, but that didn't stop the guilt from gnawing away.

Would Blue reject him if he took too long? Would their bond weaken? Would Lance stop being a Paladin?

Who was he kidding, Lance hadn't been a Paladin for a long time. Not since the wormhole spit him out and Hunk and Pidge couldn't find him.

Not since the Resistance found him and Lance had cast aside his Paladin armour for the darker Resistance colours. Not since he tucked away his beyard for a regular rifle. Not since—

He cut his own thought off.

This wasn't constructive thinking. Spiralling wouldn't get him anywhere.

But even so...

"—nce? Lance!"

He jolted back to the conversation at hand, staring up at the rest of the group in the kitchen.

"Huh? What?"

"You alright, s- Lance?" Muxis asked, crouching down so Mik, Lotty and Nea could get back on the ground. "You spaced for a moment there."

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine," Lance replied hastily. "Did you need me for something?"

Olly chuckled guiltily from in the kitchen, various jars and containers now scattered over the bench tops. "Kind of? Do you know where Matt keeps the butter-thing? Beena?"

"Peanut," Lance said, "and no, sorry. Think he took the last of it with him."

Olly pouted. "Guess I'll make a new batch."

She turned to the fridge, tapping the front so a holoscreen popped up, and she started to search for the recipe. "How do you spell it?" she asked, and Lance was hit by a sudden memory, groaning.

"He handwrote it."

"Oh paper?"

Lance nodded.

The smile on Olly's face was somehow both sweet and threatening. "He better not have taken that with him."

A chill passed through the room.

"Right," Shiro said, smacking his thighs as he got to his feet in a move that was so dad-like Lance was thrown for a second. "Thank you for the explanation. We all have our tasks to do, so let's get to it."

And with that, the group split off to head to their various jobs around the ship.

Lance should've headed to the medbay. He was always needed there.

But instead, he turned down a different corridor, towards the hangar.

He had to pay someone a visit.