Keith was born "atypical." At least, that's what he assumed his mother thought of him when she left her deaf child in poverty with a father who was never there for him. And after so many years of bullying, he assumed that was the right word anyway. Born atypical. Born deaf.

However, Lance was a different story. He wasn't born deaf, he was in an... incident.

It all started when Lance had made yet another enemy at school. Lance couldn't keep his mouth shut, ever. Sometimes it served him well, but in this case, it obviously didn't.

Kids get in gangs. That's a well-known fact. You'd think, right? Lance didn't care who he talked to, who they were, what they were... he just yabbered.

One day, when he was thirteen... he yabbered at the wrong fellow.

"Hey! That's my homework!" Lance complained, irritated as he tried to dab the juice that spilled on the packet of papers.

"Yeah? And that's my drink that just got wasted on your homework. Punk!"

Lance fumed, "This is your fault! Now you owe me your homework." He sat in a matter-of-factly expression, and the other boy's skin steamed red.

"Excuse me?"

Lance repeated what he had said, to which the other boy replied, "Okay. See you after school."

As you may guess... it didn't go all that well.

But, I'll leave the story there. Hopefully, you've gotten enough sense to know how strong Lance has become. How resilient. Hopefully, you're proud of him too.

Keith and Shiro still will be ;)