2. Their emotional/moral weak spots 

Lance has a heavy reliance on having others to back him up while he’s performing his Champion duties or making decisions. He grew up being isolated by his peers and manipulated by the one person who didn’t treat him like he was unwanted, so he tends to have a bit of a weird relationship with people as an adult. His major ‘weak spot’ so to speak is that he desperately craves validation, even if he’s very good at hiding this. He needs to know that people support him for his decisions and that he isn’t taking any actions that might drive others away from him. As such, he’s actually quite easy to manipulate if you get him alone. Without his backup (Elite Four, family members, etc) he’s especially vulnerable since he has trouble making decisions without knowing he has support. Someone could pretty easily get him to do what they want by setting up validation as a reward. 

Lance is fully aware of this weakness, and takes all the steps he can to ensure he’s never in such a situation. Another weakness of his is his temper. Lance can react strongly to certain situations, especially any that involve injustice or giving anyone a similar treatment that he suffered as a child. In these situations, his temper can get out of control and he can react extremely (Hyper Beaming a Rocket Grunt, anyone?). Making sure he doesn’t react too strongly to a situation is also something that Lance relies on his peers for. He knows he can become irrational, so he counts on them to keep him from doing anything too destructive. As it’s pretty obvious at this point, Lance heavily relies on others to cover his own weak spots, so really, that’s another weak spot itself. He tries to be aware of and cover his weaknesses, but there’s only so much he can do.

8. Bad memories/experiences

Lance has quite a lot of these, sadly. His childhood was just rough in general, so it can be hard for him to pick just one bad memory out of the whole bunch. One that does stand out, however, was from when he was around 6 or 7. This was before he had first met Kouka who, despite their manipulations, does care for Lance as their son and were a bright spot in his otherwise dismal childhood. However, for this memory, Draco had never met Kouka. For background, Lance was technically an illegitimate child who was left on the Fusube Clan compound’s doorstep after his father had had an affair with the dragon god Kouka. Being very traditional, the Fusube Clan is very wary of supernatural beings/youkai, not to mention the stigma of being an illegitimate child, so Lance was pretty much the epitome of ‘scary possibly demon child who might bring ruin to us.’ Kouka didn’t want the clan to know that Lance was their son, since for their plan to work Lance needed to be isolated and easy to manipulate. As such, for most of his childhood, Lance was treated like an outcast by his family – kept hidden away, not allowed to participate in events, or play with other children. His pokemon, and later Kouka, were his only friends (with Clair being an ‘almost friend’, though they didn’t grow closer until later). 

With the background established, this memory is just one of many similar circumstances, but it stands out in Lance’s memory for one reason or another. The Fusube clan was having a large feast and party to celebrate a seasonal festival, and the compound was full of merriment and cheer. Lance was confined to his room for this, since his family didn’t want the ‘demon child’ to ruin things and bring bad luck. Lance was still young enough he didn’t fully understand why he wasn’t allowed to do things with everyone else, so he decided to sneak out and try and catch a bit of the fun. However, he got caught, and rather than put him back in his room where he could just get out again, his uncle threw him into a shed and locked the door, saying that it was his punishment for disobeying his elders. Lance was terrified of being in the dark, unable to get out, and without even his pokemon for company. It wasn’t the last time he was locked away as punishment either, which is the root of his fears of isolation and claustrophobia.

While this is a bad childhood memory, the worst experience/memory for Lance is undoubtedly when Noelle died, however. I’ve discussed it a little bit previously, but the whole situation was a nightmare and still weighs heavily on Lance to this day, both in the physical scars (Noelle’s death, his and Adelinda’s injuries) and the mental ones.

12. Grudges and vendettas

Lance has a serious grudge against pretty much anyone older than him in the Fusube-Mikami clans. They treated him horribly when he was young, but as soon as his true heritage was revealed and he became Champion, they changed their tune and claimed he was their ‘prodigy son’ who couldn’t have made it without them. He hates the way they just changed their tune depending on what made them look good and doesn’t trust them as far as he can throw them. Lance tries to avoid interacting with the clan elders when at all possible and, when he does have to, he needs a mediator, usually Clair, to ensure that things don’t get violent. He also strongly encourages Draco not to interact with them either. 

This is pretty significant because, in other circumstances, Lance is very forgiving. He can see the good and bad sides in people and wants to help them even when others have given up. He even reconciles with Kouka, who is partially responsible for his childhood and wanted him to wipe out humanity for their own grudge. However, the one group that Lance will never forgive, or even attempt to reconcile with, is the elders who were directly responsible for his mistreatment. 

16. Dark secrets/’skeletons in the closet’

Lance tends to be pretty transparent with is flaws, issues, and backstory, since he knows that keeping stuff hidden can be disastrous. However, he does have a few ‘dark secrets’ so to speak. One that is a bit less ‘dark’ is his decision to keep Draco’s parentage from him. This was a decision he made with Ethan, however, so it’s not all on him, even if it is one of the factors that leads to Draco growing estranged later on. A larger one, and a more vague one, so-to-speak, is that he still hates humanity a little bit, even though he claims he no longer shares Kouka’s opinions. He has moments where he sees the worst in people, or feels like he has no one left who cares about him (his wife and daughter are dead and his son is estranged for a while) and that maybe, just maybe, he would be happier if he had gone along with Kouka’s plan and created a world where just pokemon and supernatural beings could leave, free from the prejudices of humans. Whenever these thoughts come up, Lance is always immediately ashamed he would even think that, and reassures himself that because he had a negative reaction to the thoughts, they must not be his true feelings. He never tells anyone about this, however, since he doesn’t want people to think he’s still a ‘possible threat’ to the League.

19. People they’ve hurt or indirectly killed, and how it affected them

While working with Kouka, Lance did seriously injure/possibly kill some Team Rocket grunts during the era of Red’s journey. He never got the point in Kouka’s plan where they were actually killing people, but he saw no qualms in killing ‘evil’ people like Team Rocket. He didn’t think about it much at the time, but after he realizes how terrible Kouka’s plan is and sort of has the veil lifted from his eyes, so-to-speak, he’s horrified at what he’s done. He never thought about the consequences of killing people before that and when it does hit him, it hits him hard. After this, he makes a vow to never kill again, even in self defense. As such, even when taking down TR for a second time, he roughs up a few grunts, but is careful to never seriously injure them. He’d rather try and scare them straight than never give them the chance to find a better life.

20. What-ifs/Alternate Timelines

In case it isn’t obvious, my Lance draws some fairly heavy inspiration from his Pokemon Adventures counterpart, so for a version of him who never changed his ways and continued with Kouka’s plan, look no further than that manga. Lance could very easily have gone full villain if it weren’t for Kohaku helping him see the good in people, which he is fully aware of.

Another alternate version of Lance is the one from Faller Noelle’s universe. This Lance is definitely a lot happier, considering that his wife and daughter are still alive and, as much as it’s mean to say, his problem child Draco doesn’t exist. All the same, this Lance might not be so quick to react in a situation as his more tragic counterpart, especially when Team Mystic starts acting up. I don’t think in this case there’s a ‘better’ version, even if one is happier.