So, I'm stalling. This really isn't a continuation of the St. Patrick's Day RR, because nothing really happens. It's really more of a rehashing of just about everything that's gone before, just from Lance's point of view. Why? Because angsty addict Keith was feeling lonely in his addiction and needed a buddy. Unfortunately, Lance wasn't really feeling angsty or addicty. He's just sort of, well, cynical now.

As to why I'm stalling...well, how would you like to follow both Taryn and forest! It's hard, I tell you. I mean, you all get these wonderful, beautiful, breathtaking fics from forest and Taryn and then you all get...me. It's something of a let down, isn't it?

Anyhoo, like I said, this is a stalling piece. I'm leaving it up to forest (whom I swear would make a much better diety than me because she actually writes good stories) and her more than capable hands to pull Keith and Lance out of their mess.

high

They all had their personal addictions, little private vacuums separate from the big common addiction, the addiction to tempting death. Big addictions, little addictions, deadly addictions, innocent addictions--it all amounted to the same thing. Sven, for example, was so thoroughly addicted to gambling that he once managed to piss away every last cent his family owned, and then win it back. Pidge was addicted to the feel of the wind in his hair as he sped along mountainous goat tracks on a bike that was easily three times his size. Hunk was addicted to glue, an offshoot of his love of building. Allura was addicted to money, whether it was making money or (and this was the option she preferred) spending it on designer shoes. And Lance was a smoker.

He had picked up the habit when he was 15 and Joseph Martin, who was 18 and legal and Lance's first boyfriend ever, had bedded him and then lit up afterwards, just like the did in the movies. Lance had watched the grey-blue smoke drift up to the ceiling and thought about the incredible sexiness of the sight of smoke streaming in a steady column out of soft, pink lips. Those feelings were multiplied further when, moments later, Joseph had taken a mouthful of smoke and blown it on Lance's half-hard dick (which actually hurt a little, but in an oddly pleasing fashion) and then proceeded to give Lance the best blow job he had ever had in his life. So sex--pleasure, in essence--was forever linked with cigarettes, at least in his mind. And in his body, too, because he always hardened a little when he took his first
drag of a new cigarette.

Besides, he liked the slightly fragrant smell of certain cigarette brands.

So, even though he knew that it was his duty to talk Keith out of this latest addiction, and he knew that this was what everyone expected of him, he just couldn't do it. He had a different reason for why he was up on the battlements, sweat chilling his skin as the day died and the smoke from his cigarette flew off to mingle with the smoke from the sacked village, two portents of death meeting in the crisp Arus air and becoming one. It was because of a personal matter--and Lance never aired his personal matters--that he had climbed the many steps to the battlements, firm in his resolve; and still firm when he had plucked the cigarette from Keith's fingers, examined it, then lit his own and sat with his feet free in the dusk air. Unfortunately the longer he sat, still and silent, with hooded eyes and a closed face, the faster his resolve slipped away.

So instead of resolving anything, he just sat and took deep, hot, dry drags and thought about the last time he had seen Sven and how, after the typically incredible sex, Sven had turned to him with a frown and said, "it's not healthy, Lance."

"Neither is your gambling, but do I try to stop you?" Lance had shot back, thinking that Sven was complaining about his post-coital cigarette.

Sven waved Lance's words aside. "I meant Keith. He's too dependent on you."

"I know."

"Then why don't you do something about it?"

Lance took a drag of his cigarette and blew smoke rings into the sex soaked darkness. "Don't you think I would if I could?"

"But you can." Sven sat up and the sheet that covered his nakedness slipped down to pool about his waist, leaving his sweat slicked body to glow in the red light of Lance's cigarette. "He needs you, Lance. He adores you, and trusts you, and you're the only person who can even begin to control him. You hold a power over him like that of no other person."

"Sven..." Lance shifted, uncomfortable with this subject because it touched too close to himself and he never let anyone past the mask. He reached for Sven, pulling himself up using the Swede's broad shoulders, licking the small pool of sweat that had collected in the crevice between Sven's neck and collar bone. "I don't want to talk about Keith right now. I don't want to talk at all."

"Lance. Lance stop. This is serious." Sven grabbed at Lance's hands, easily capturing Lance's delicate wrists with one rough hand. "Lance, listen to me. You get Keith. You understand him, you know him. He's let you in completely. And maybe you're too close to him, because I don't think you understand just how much he needs you. You need to be careful with him. You need to understand that you're the only thing between Keith and death."

"Shut up. I told you, I don't want to talk." Lance twisted and rubbed up against Sven, using the restraint as a means to get even closer, so close that instead of hearing him speak, Sven felt Lance's lips form the words against his skin. Sven sighed and the last of his resistance melted away as Lance rubbed his erection against Sven's. How could he resist Lance?

Still, even as everything except Sven's dick shut down and hung on, only able to enjoy the ride and pick up the pieces afterwards, a small part of him managed to rally enough strength to gasp out "he loves you" just before Lance attached himself to Sven's mouth and Sven saw stars.

But afterwards, when Sven lay exhausted and comatose, a heavy weight draped across Lance's lithe form, Lance thought about what Sven said. Particularly that last, desperate gasp. And he worried a little, because he knew that it was true--had always know that all of what Sven had said was true. Because he did know Keith. Oh, sure, he didn't understand a lot of what made Keith, didn't understand why Keith believed Lance to be so pure and innocent, thought him to be unsullied by addiction, and he didn't understood what drove Keith to such extremes, but Lance did understand that he was the only thing that pulled his captain back. It didn't take a wunderkind to know that.

Lance had mulled those thoughts over and over, unsure of what he should do, what he should say, hoping that he would never be confronted with Keith's feelings, but prepared none the less. He was prepared, goddamn it! He knew exactly what he was doing when he said no to Keith's trembling, deep, nervous, sultry //"It's not just when I'm drunk that I want you."// He knew that it was the right thing to do, that Keith was a masochist and the pain/pleasure of this rejection would outweigh every other pain and keep him alive, if only for one year, or one month, or even one second longer. Because as much as Keith needed Lance, Lance needed Keith and he was incredibly afraid of losing Keith. Better they both hurt in this fashion, this pain of Lance's choosing than the pain that would come from feeding Keith's addiction and letting him move on to something that Lance couldn't control.

He knew what he was doing.

Except...

Except he had never expected to see such naked pain in Keith's eyes, a pain greater than any pleasure. And he hadn't expected to smell the velvet wisp of smoke that clung to Keith's clothes. And he certainly hadn't expected to feel something deep within his stomach that had nothing to do with sex, or lust, or hormones, but with something alien to Lance's being.

He wondered if it might have been...well, he didn't know what it might have been because the closest thing that he could think of was love, and Lance never fell in love. Lust, yes. Desire, yes. But never, ever, ever love.

Which was why he went up on the battlements, just to prove to himself that the stomach cramp wasn't love, just some bad juice.

Except now that he was up there, that strange feeling was back in his stomach, and Keith radiated a welcome warmth, and Lance was feeling restive because he was at half-mast and next to a beautiful man who smelled of smoke, just like Joseph Martin had.

And then Keith grabbed his hand, and smiled, just a little, and Lance was suddenly light headed because all the blood in his body had rushed to his groin, for that little contact was more erotic in its shyness than anything Lance had ever experienced. And, of course, he had to tighten back, keep the contact and pleasure for as long as possible.

He looked at Keith out of the corner of his eye, marveled at the way his dark hair seemed to net the golden rays of the setting sun. And Lance realized that he did, possibly, kind of, love this boy. Maybe.

But that didn't stop him from being afraid.

=====================
Okay, forest, have at it.

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