worry

Hunk frowns.

Something is up, something is wrong. He can tell, because it's his job to know the big picture. He has to know what's going on so Keith can bog himself down in the details and save their lives.

He looks at Lance and Pidge on the couch, pressed shoulder to shoulder. He looks at Keith, curled up in the big easy chair, just a mop of messy hair over the lip of a book. He looks at the worried, exasperated, frustrated glances that Lance shoots Pidge and Keith. He looks at Pidge's back--a little too rigid to be normal--and the way Keith doesn't turn the page as quickly as he normally does.

He thinks he understands and that makes him frown even more.

There's a large mess waiting for him, a mess that's compounded by Lance's meddling and Pidge's pride and Keith's uncompromising devotion to duty. There is a mess that will take weeks, possibly months to sort out, a mess that must be approached obliquely. He can already feel the strain of this new element on the team. The tight rods that bound them all together were whining under the stress of Keith and Pidge, the careful calibrations all out of whack.

Endless nights stretch before him, nights where he'll work his subtle magic, use his position as the friend-to-all to his advantage, maneuver the others into the positions that he wants. They are pawns before him, elements to be played with to achieve the perfection needed for their most desperate war.

Sven makes a noise beside him, and Hunk pulls his attention back into the now.

And here is his other work. Like the corroded pistons in some of the older ships stored in the vehicle bay, he needs to coax Sven back to life. He needs Sven, needs him to be healthy and part of the grand machine once more, so the purr of their combined energy is the healthy, happy, melodious purr that it once was. But it's thankless, painful, slow work and it worries him that he has become so cynical about Sven's near-death.

He remembers when he loved Sven.

He lost something when Sven almost died, however, and now he doesn't think he can love. Maybe if he didn't have to take care of everyone; maybe if he didn't have to keep the pistons churning in sync, the cogs well oiled, the machine working in perfect harmony. Maybe if he could be selfish and take some time for himself he would learn how to love again.

But Hunk is a slave to the machine.

Hunk frowns, and wishes for a simpler life.

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