A/N: my first multi-chapter fic! I'm excited. I have all the chapters written out already (seven chapters in total), I just have some editing to do, so I hope to post a new chapter every 3-4 days!

This fic is an AU taking place right after episode 5 of season 1. It's going to get more violent in the next chapters - there will be graphic descriptions of blood, although nothing gorier than that. A lot of emotional angst is also to be expected. Oh, the things I do to my favorite characters. :P

They found out about Lance's new ability barely two hours after he got out of the healing pod.

No matter how much he insisted that he was fine after putting some food in his system, Coran and Allura still ordered him to take it easy for the rest of the day. "Your body still needs to shake off the last remnants of the cryo, and it might take a few vargas," Coran explained. "Don't worry, there will still be plenty of work to be done tomorrow, so you might as well enjoy your day off while it lasts."

And there was plenty of work to be done indeed. The castle took quite some damage after Sendak's attack, especially the crystal room, which was half-destroyed after the explosion and the battle which took place in it. But Lance hated feeling useless while all of his friends were working, and he wasn't tired enough to go to bed; so he settled for hanging in the crystal room where Coran, Keith and Hunk worked, promising he won't do anything except for keeping them company.

So there he was when it happened, sitting on the floor next to Hunk who hammered a piece of metal to the wall, the two of them chattering about nothing in particular.

"Ow!" Hunk yelped all of a sudden, dropping the hammer he was holding to the floor. His hand shot to his mouth and he sucked hard on his thumb, his face scrunched in pain. "Owowowowo, oh my gosh..." he moaned, slapping his thigh frantically with his other hand.

"Oh no, did you hit your thumb?" Lance rushed to his friend's side. Hunk moaned again in response, and Lance sighed in empathy. "Man, this probably hurts like hell. Come on, let me see." Hunk looked reluctant, but eventually pulled his thumb out of his mouth and held it in front of Lance, whimpering weakly. The thumb was already an angry shade of red and swollen slightly.

"Hmm, let's see... It doesn't look broken from here..." Lance took Hunk's thumb in his palm, careful not to hurt his friend further.

Two things happened at once. Lance's palm glowed in a bright, blue light; and Hunk's thumb instantly shrank back to its original size and color, as if it has never been hit.

"WHAT THE QUIZKNAK?!" Lance screamed and let go of Hunk's thumb, tumbling backwards. Hunk shot to a standing position, looking just as shocked as Lance. "Dude," he panted, staring at Lance with wide eyes. "What... what did you just do?!"

"I - I - I don't know!" Lance stammered, his voice still squeaky with panic. He took another step backwards until his back met the wall. "I didn't - I - what!"

"Will you shut your mouth already?!" Keith snapped from the other side of the room. "Just because you're supposed to be resting doesn't mean you can scream like a madman and disturb those who are actually trying to get some work done!"

"Keith, you don't understand," Hunk said, his eyes still fixated on Lance. "Lance just magically cured my thumb."

Keith snorted. "Yeah, right. And I have two heads."

"Keith, I swear this on the castle's entire supply of food goo," Hunk said, and that finally got Keith's attention. He turned around sharply and walked towards them, wiping sweat off his face. "Okay, what the hell are you talking about?" he demanded.

Hunk pointed at Lance. "He touched my thumb to examine it and then his hand just - glowed - like a freakin' spell or something - and my thumb felt really cold for a second but then it stopped hurting and it was healed! Look! Look at how healed it is!" he waved his thumb at Keith's face, nearly sticking it in the other boy's eye. Keith jerked away and caught Hunk's arm, pushing it away from his face. He frowned and glanced at Lance, who was still glued to the wall, too shaken to speak. "Are you sure you didn't imagine it?" he asked suspiciously.

"Oh, so everything that's happened to us since we left the Garrison makes sense to you, but one of us having superpowers is suddenly too hard to believe?" Hunk deadpanned.

"What is all this talking I'm hearing about magically cured organs?" Coran popped up behind Keith so suddenly that the younger boy jumped in his place. He stifled a cry of surprise and ran a hand in his hair nervously. "Hunk claims that Lance did some kind of magic to heal his injured thumb."

"Hmm, so humans are gifted with healing powers? I don't recall reading anything about your species referring to this quality," Coran tinkered with the edge of his moustache as he watched Lance with interest.

"That's because humans are not supposed to be gifted with healing powers," Hunk said. "I mean, maybe in certain TV shows they are, but that's not real life - "

"Oh come on," Keith rolled his eyes. He reached down to his left pant leg and rolled it up, revealing a long, thin cut on his shin. "There. I got this about an hour ago when I stumbled on a few boxes in the storage room. If Lance truly has... powers, then it shouldn't be a problem for him to heal this." He looked at Lance impatiently. "Come on, work you magic, or whatever."

The last sentence finally snapped Lance back to reality. He released a shaky breath and staggered towards Keith, looking very reluctant. "Are you sure this is a good idea?" he mumbled. "I don't want to... I mean... what if I hurt you?"

"Why would you hurt him?" Hunk said. "You just made my thumb better, not worse!"

"Whatever you do, I'm sure I can handle it," Keith said flatly. "Now go on, I don't have all day."

Lance hesitated, but the red paladin's glare made it very clear that if he didn't act in the next few seconds Keith would force him to, so he knelt down next to him, staring at the superficial wound uncomfortably. Then he reached out and placed his palm against it. The blue glow appeared instantly between his hand and Keith's leg, and the cut started to close so quickly that barely five seconds have passed before it vanished completely, leaving nothing but pink, healthy skin.

Hunk and Coran gasped in awe while Lance snatched his hand back as if it was bitten, holding it close to his chest. His face turned about ten shades paler. Keith looked pretty dumbfounded himself - his jaw dropped and his eyes darted from his leg to Lance and back to his leg, unbelieving.

"What the Quiznak," he said eventually.

-X-

"Hmm, yes, very interesting..." Coran mumbled to himself as he swiped through the holograms which floated in front of him, filled with graphs and charts nobody except for him seemed to understand. "Yes, yes... it all makes sense now, though I must say I've never seen anything like that before..."

"Let me see," Allura leaned on Coran's shoulder and looked at the charts, wrinkling her forehead in concentration. After a few moments, her eyes widened in shock. "This is astounding! But - how come the pod did not inform us of this earlier? This type of anomaly should have been reported..."

"That's the point, princess, the pod had probably failed to recognize it as an anomaly, and considered it as part of the standard healing process..."

"Hey, move over, I want to see what you guys are talking about!" Pidge jumped up and down behind both of them, trying desperately to get a peek at the data even though it was all written in Altean.

"I'm sorry, I'm sure this whole scientific mumbo-jumbo is very interesting, but can you please continue it later and explain why the hell do I have magic powers?!" Lance screeched, his voice echoing across the entire med bay. Coran had summoned everyone there after the incident in the crystal room, and that was where they spent the last half varga, watching anxiously as he ran numerous tests and scans on Lance. Lance himself was sitting at the edge of one of the beds while Coran worked through the results, looking downright horrified. The hoodie of his jacket was pulled over his head and he was doing his best to hug himself.

"Patience, Lance," Allura scolded, but Coran hushed her as he turned to Lance. "My boy, you are in perfect physical condition - actually, more than perfect. The most appropriate term, in my opinion, would be improved physical condition - "

"Get to the point," Keith barked. He was trying to keep a straight face as he leaned against the wall and folded his arms, though it was clear he was nearly as nervous as Lance.

Coran's moustache twitched at the interruption, but he immediately returned his attention to Lance. "The results of the tests indicate that the cryopod you stayed in not only healed your injuries, but also charged your body with some of its healing abilities by directly manipulating your quintessence."

The silence in the room was so thick that only the low, steady buzzing of the medical devices was heard. It was finally interrupted by Hunk, who asked in a high voice, "What do you mean, 'manipulating quintessence'? I thought those things were only supposed to heal cuts and bruises and stuff like that, not to mess with our quintessence."

"Actually, we had no reason to think otherwise until today," Allura admitted. "We've never encountered a case like this in the history of the castle. However... we think we might know what caused it."

"The cryopods are programmed to deal with the biology of many species from all parts of the universe, but not Earthians," Coran said. "Since Lance has been the first Earthian ever to step in a pod, we believe that his foreign biology confused the machine and caused the overapplication of the healing procedure - not only curing the damaged parts, but also the undamaged parts, which meant super-charging his quintessence with healing qualities."

"It makes more sense when you think of Lance's unique quintessence," Allura added. "He is the paladin of the Blue Lion, the guardian of water; water are the element most associated with healing, purification and rehabilitation - it is the type of quintessence most prone to undergo such manipulation."

"Does this mean that if it was any of the other paladins, this wouldn't have happened?" Shiro asked.

"Since you're all humans, whose biology was unfamiliar to the cryopods until today, I'm afraid we don't know the answer to this question," Allura shook her head. "Either way, it doesn't matter anymore, because this won't happen again."

Everyone's heads whipped at her direction.

"What? Why?" Pidge asked sharply.

"I ran some tests on the cryopods as well," Coran said, "and it seems that the moment Lance was released from his pod, it updated the system with his data, so now all the pods are familiar with human biology and physiology as they are with any other species. Given that, from now on the pods will be able to handle every human they take in, without making changes to its quintessence or anything beyond the medical condition which requires repair."

"Did you hear that, buddy? You're special!" Hunk bumped Lance's shoulder excitedly, but Lance only shrank further into himself. He didn't seem too happy about the news - in fact, he looked more like he was going to throw up.

"Lance, are you alright?" Shiro asked gently.

Lance blinked and shook his head several times, clearing his throat. "Yeah, sorry," he said in a hoarse voice, staring at the floor. "It's just that I... well, it's a lot to take in."

"I thought you'd be more hyped about that," Pidge said in disappointment. "I mean, you have to admit, that's pretty cool. You're basically a superhero now! Honestly, I'd trade places with you any time."

"Well, too bad you didn't get to be the first one to almost die in an explosion so you can win magic powers," Lance hissed. Almost immediately, he blushed and ran a hand over his face. "Ugh, sorry. It's been a weird couple of days, that's all." He turned to Coran and Allura. "So... this is just the way I am from now on? It's not temporary? How can we even know for sure?"

"I don't see any reason for this to be temporary. It is your quintessence which underwent change - the very definition of who you are," Coran said. "It's not something that you can simply get rid of; it is your core, your lifeblood."

Lance released a short, somewhat hysterical laughter. "Jeez, Coran, way to calm down a guy." He sighed and tapped his chin in thought. "Well, I guess this could be useful to us..."

"It sure can," Keith said. "I mean, if one of us is hurt during battle, we don't have to retreat and get to a healing pod - we can just use your powers and keep fighting."

"Wait a minute, we don't know anything about the extent of Lance's abilities," Shiro said. "We only saw him heal very superficial wounds - we don't know if he's strong enough to heal more serious injuries, not to mention life-threatening ones."

"Well, it's not exactly something we can check now," Hunk muttered. "Unless somebody volunteer to crash their lion or something... not it!" he added quickly.

"I'm sure Keith would be happy to do it," Lance said mischievously, some of his usual confidence returning to his speech. Keith glared at him in exasperation.

"Nobody is going to crush their lion," Shiro said in a serious tone. "And I hope it's clear to everyone that we cannot allow ourselves to be get reckless in battle from now on. We're going to be just as careful as we were before - even more - but, if something does happen, well, it's a good thing we have Lance to cover us now." He sent Lance a warm smile and Lance beamed at him. The tension seemed to finally be lifted off his shoulders.