#and i just went grocery shopping and he felt it prudent to open every God damn snack i purchased

[cryptid-crusader]

Bro I am just so grumpy tonight. :/

[dark-unimaginably-stupid-kids]

Not Dreaming of You  [Ch 1]

(Because You Won’t Let Me Sleep)

Series- Voltron

Pairing(s)- End Game is Klancelot, with a slight incline toward Keitor simply based on the set up.

Other pairs include minor Shallura, past Rolotor, one-sided Sheith. platonic Plance and even a hint of Heith if you squint real hard.

Characters in this fic in order of most screen time: Keith, Lotor, Lance, Pidge, Hunk, our Lovely Lady Generals, Kuron, Shiro, Allura, Rolo and Nyma

 Synopsis: Keith has been tensely living with Lotor for about a year. They aren’t exactly friends, but occasionally they can get along. Suddenly with no explanation their neighbor Rolo moves out and two very noisy whack jobs move in. Somewhere between the loss of Lotor’s old fuck buddy and Keith’s sleep deprivation things start to get a little…odd.

“I’m telling you, there is something wrong with them!”

Chapter 1-

In which Keith gets out of work late and is too tired to deal.

Lance is loud and Lotor is…Lotor.

Work had been exhausting. God knows why anyone in their right mind would travel all over the grocery store with raw meat in their basket just to leave it buried behind the cereals—because that’s absolutely where it’s supposed to go right?

Keith had been the unfortunate one to find the mess and the blood and the boxes and boxes of completed ruined cereal. That was just the cherry on top of his grueling day at the express lane feigning cheer and putting up with stupid customers.

One of these days he was going to quit. Just. Just take his little name tag and stab Iverson in the eye with it.

…That could end in incarceration rather than just a very clear “I Quit” though so…maybe not.

Whatever. He was exhausted. He was allowed to day dream.

Even if it was close to two in the morning and he was laying on the couch praying for his aching muscles to give him the strength to drag himself into the shower because!! He was not crawling into bed like this absolutely not, na-uh.

He was so tired though. Maybe he could just. Take a little nap right on the couch.

His roommate wasn’t due home for another couple hours, little club hopping piece of shit that he was. Heck, if Keith was really lucky Lo would find somewhere else to spend the night and Keith could have the apartment all to himself in the morning to wallow in his miserable life.

But he needed to shower.

Lo or not he needed to shower and crawl into bed and sleep for the next week.

He rolled off the couch and screamed at nothing—quietly, to mind his neighbors beyond thin walls—and when that didn’t help his situation at all he dragged himself to his feet to trudge along to his bedroom for his towel. Normally, he’d carry clothes with him as well as he was so unlike his roommate in that he didn’t thoroughly enjoy parading around the apartment naked but fuck it he wasn’t home and Keith really didn’t want to wear clothes or exist—

He was going to pull the extra fluffy blanket out of the closet tonight it would be glorious and absolutely necessary and prudent to his recovery.

God did he still smell like cow blood?

He still smelled like cow blood.

“What IS that?!”

Keith fumbled with his towel.

“I know it…! PIIIIIIDGE!”

“what-what-what-what!?!! Why are you screaming?!”

That was coming from those thin walls as previously noted. A boy and a girl. The girl sounded further away but grew progressively louder as she presumably got closer to the wall Keith shared with them.

It was two in the morning right? Why were they so active?

And didn’t Rolo live next door? Neither of these two sounded like Rolo.

“Do you smell that?! What is that!?!”

“Lance we just moved in there’s bound to be—Oh.”

“YOU SMELL IT TOO DON’T YOU!?!”

“Well—!”

“Dude! Is it coming from the walls!?!”

They were excitedly squeaking at each other, getting shriller as they went. Keith could feel his head rattling. He really didn’t have the energy to be concerned about what kind of mold Rolo had growing in his apartment. Of course, by default that meant it could very likely spread and become Keith’s concern in a short span of time but…

For right now, he just couldn’t be bothered.

As he held his towel in his hands he briefly considered how disgusting his hands were. He’d washed them eighty times at the store but they just. Didn’t feel clean enough. And now they were on his perfectly clean towel he was going to need to use to dry himself off later.

Maybe he should just dump this in the dirty clothes along with his uniform and just—air dry.

“No. No Lance, we can handle this okay. We just got here. This is gonna be good for us. We’re fine. We’re two… totally stable…totally normal individuals and we can handle this, no wigging out.” The girl sounded determined and her voice somehow retained human levels of shrill.

The boys did not, “But Pidge it’s right there!”

Keith glared at the spot on his wall where he was sure the boy on the other side must have leaned against it with a thump. He was confused, but too tired to ask so instead he walked over to that spot on the wall and slammed his open palm down against it. The smack made his entire body go weak but with the startled yelp from the other side it had been worth it.

“Keep it down!” Keith shouted at them.

“God Lance look what you—how could you already upset the neighbor!?”

“Why does it smell like this!?!”

Keith quirked a brow but the girl shushed him and there was the sound of several thumps and a door shutting hard.

Alright.

Okay.

You know What?

This is fine.

He took his disgusting towel in his disgusting hands anyway and went to shower.

There was something crazy soothing about being drenched in scalding hot water when your body felt like gelatin. He might have stayed in there until the skin on his fingers got pruney but frankly he didn’t care. He wrapped his towel around his waist, having mostly forgotten it was previously dubbed “disgusting” and let himself out of the extremely fogged up bathroom.

Standing out in his apartment in nothing but his towel felt a little strange, but he reminded himself Lo wasn’t home and hopefully, one day when he lived far far away in a lonely little shack in the middle of nowhere, every day would be like this and it wouldn’t be weird then.

The bathroom door looked out onto a hallway that ended in the apartment balcony and Keith offered the darkness of three AM a passing glance when he caught sight of something that looked vaguely terrifying.

If Keith had to admit it, it looked almost like the shadow of a person on the balcony. The shadow of a person, crouched on the floor, staring through the sliding glass door with glowing golden slits for eyes.

But, when Keith’s eyes adjusted from the light and fog of the bathroom to the blurred darkness of the outside there was absolutely no shadow and no glowing eyes.

Clearly, Keith was tired.

His stomach growled in agreement.

Wait, no.

No way. He was not hungry he couldn’t be hungry he didn’t have the energy left to be hungry—!!

---

Lotor came home while Keith was standing in their kitchen chewing on a pop tart over the sink, still clad in only his towel.

Keith didn’t need a mirror to realize he was probably pink in the face and doing a piss poor job of hiding his panic.

Lotor stared at him for a long moment, door ajar behind him, coat half shrugged off his shoulder and keys in hand.

“…Good Morning, Red.”

“It’s night time.” Keith mumbled over a mouth of pop tart he hadn’t managed to swallow.

Just like that, Lotor relaxed, “It’s 3 AM. As in morning. Don’t be difficult.”

“…Fair.”

Lotor shut the door and locked it before shrugging his coat the rest of the way off and hanging it from one of the hooks near the door. Keith had one too, but his cropped jacket wasn’t as aesthetically pleasing as Lotor’s long black fleece lined coat. And Lotor would definitely fight him if the hideous bright red thing clashed with his living room.

It had won him the nickname “Red” after all.

To be fair, since Lotor’s dad was footing most of the bill for the apartment the two of them had moved into after their sophomore year, Keith really couldn’t complain much.

“Anyway, is there a reason you’re up this late? And…naked?” Lotor’s eyes drifted up and down Keith’s pale form and Keith felt vaguely violated. When Lotor dared to raise his eyebrows and smirk Keith almost threw the remainder of his pop tart at him.

“Got out of work late, showered, snacked. That’s all.”

“Darn, and here I thought you’d finally cracked and fallen prey to my charms, that I could have gotten lucky tonight after all. Perhaps there’s still a chance to convince you?”

Keith flushed and stuffed his face with the rest of his pop tart, a large part of him wanted to dart into his room and ignore the comment but the part of him that rose to the challenge wanted to bait him. He knew it was a joke but he wanted to see how far Lotor would take it, “You want to convince me?”

Lotor leaned against the kitchen counter, a small but obvious smirk on his face as he looked Keith up and down again, seemingly considering the idea before he shrugged his shoulders, “Eh. You look beat. I’ll try again tomorrow. Stay naked though, makes it easier.”

Clearly Lotor was still working whatever alcohol he’d consumed out of his system if he was going to play flirt like that.

“The pop tart crumbs on your mouth really seal the deal too. Really works for me.” Lotor’s grin widened to show his perfect teeth and Keith rolled his eyes, before rinsing his still vaguely pruney hands in the kitchen sink and wiping his mouth.

“Maybe I should eat something myself actually. Narti had me try something called a Dirty Bong Water. We had…possibly eight of them.” Lotor drawled out before squeezing past Keith in their tiny kitchen toward the refrigerator.

Keith hummed absently, trying to pretend he didn't pay close attention to the warmth of the other man's presence or the way several unnaturally silver strands of hair were falling loose from the bun he'd tied it all into earlier that night.

“We have to go shopping,” Lotor mumbled as he peered around the contents of the fridge. They were almost out of soy milk, the grapes had shriveled and needed to be thrown out, they had two eggs left and a ridiculous amount of pudding but otherwise, yes, it was looking pretty scarce.

“Not it!” Keith shouted immediately.

Lotor turned to stare at him as if he’d grown a second head, “But you work there.”

“Exactly! That’s like my asking you to go to your dad’s firm on your day off.”

Lotor’s brows remained quizzically raised, “That isn’t the same thing at all. Why would I have to go there on my day off? I barely work there as it is.”

“To get groceries.”

“It’s a law firm, Keith. You're not making any sense.”

“I am very tired, Lo.”

The taller boy retreated from the fridge and shut the door behind him as he offered his roommate a sympathetic stare.

“Perhaps you should go to bed then?” He offered.

Keith nodded, “Hopefully the new neighbors will let me—oh! Did you know about that? That we got new neighbors today?”

At this Lotor’s eyes, a pretty deep dark blue, flashed in recognition, “Ah yes, I did see them come in today. Not sure what exactly got into Rolo but he said something about going back to his family for a while.”

Keith blinked, “…Rolo hates his family.”

“I’m aware.”

“He moved into his van when he was fifteen. He couldn’t wait to get away from them. Why the hell—”

Lotor raised a hand to silence Keith before placing both hands on Keith’s shoulders and turning him around, nudging him forward, “I don’t know Red, and there’s no point in asking me, these are mysteries for the daylight hours—”

“Eh it's not like it matters. I didn’t really like him anyway.” Keith continued, tilting his head back, watching Lotor’s long tan fingers as they released his shoulders with a questionable wave.

“Hm?” Lotor hummed. Of course, he didn’t know how little Keith and their neighbor got along given that in the last year he'd never actually seen the two interact. But if he had been paying attention one could even make the case that Rolo would have preferred his family to having to live next to Keith at this point.

Why were things so tense between Keith and his neighbor?

Well, because Lotor had an awful habit of getting bored, wandering over to the apartment next door, and not coming back for hours during which Rolo would play that horrendously awful “sexy times” playlist that Keith was more than tired of listening to.

Of course, to be clear, Keith’s annoyance was primarily with the playlist and not in Lotor’s involvement at all.

Naturally.

The man just had awful taste in music.

Though after Rolo met his girlfriend Nyma and Lotor stopped going over to the backdrop noise of deep repetitive beats Keith might have to admit he found his neighbors existence slightly less annoying.

Even despite the fact the music never stopped because Nyma wasn't even remotely prudish.

But again, Lotor wouldn’t know and it didn't matter because it had nothing to do with Lotor.

Nothing. Not a thing.

“He was just a dick sometimes, ya know?”

A vaguely knowing look passed over Lotor’s face as he eyed his roommate. At Keith’s unsure silence Lotor finally shrugs and reached up to run his fingers through his hair. Remembering at the last moment that his hair was tied up, he lifted both hands instead. One removed the hair tie, the other quickly went to work threading through his locks to make them appear sensible.

Of course, they always appear sensible.

Because Lotor always looks like a goddamn model no matter what he’s doing.

At least, Keith thinks dryly, he knows Lotor’s hair isn’t naturally silver. Hell, he’d even helped touch up the other mans roots once or twice when they’d been having a tolerable week.

Still. Rooming with Lotor had always given him a touch of a self esteem issue. He was just. Perfect. All the time. And on top of that he was a very prosperous flirt who could get pretty much anyone he wanted and flaunted this evil super power with this infuriating pride—

Keith wasn’t really interested in relationships if he was being honest, he was too busy trying to figure out his life and what he was going to do with a bachelor’s in liberal studies and a dead end cashiers job to really try going out and meeting anyone. But sometimes, he figured, it might have been nice.

And maybe it would be nice to get that kind of attention from Lotor in a more genuine way.

Rather—not Lotor, of course not Lotor—but when he’d walked in earlier and almost looked like he was genuinely checking him out it almost made Keith feel…good.

God damn Lotor had nice hair.

“But the new neighbors are noisy. So. I’m not sure if we leveled up or not,” Keith offered finally.

Lotor raised a brow as he decided he wasn’t going to wait for Keith to call it a night and let himself into the bathroom. Keith stayed idle at the entrance to the hallway. Honestly, it was rare they’d talked this long as it was and Keith probably should have taken the hint and just gone to bed.

Heck, he was still wearing just a towel. How exhausted was he that he could just forget that fact?

“Noisy?” Lotor called out to him, surprising him. He really had thought Lotor was going to ignore him and head to bed at this point.

Lotor turned on the sink and proceeded to brush his teeth while Keith explained what he’d overheard when he came back from work.

“Rolo doesn’t have mold. I was there yesterday,” Lotor responded dryly when he was finished rinsing.

“Well what else could it have been?”

“More questions I’m simply not equipped to answer for you tonight, Red. But I’ll tell you what, I’ll go over tomorrow and investigate. Make nice with the new neighbors. I’m sure they’re not as bad as you think.” Lotor dried his hands on the purple hand towel and shut off the bathroom light mumbling about it being way too late to take a shower and odds were Keith had used all the hot water.

This was one of their first arguments as roommates, they both enjoyed scalding hot showers and if Keith was tired he simply would not leave. They had decided at that point Keith would bathe in the mornings and Lotor would take the evenings baring unforeseen circumstances that they would then accommodate to accordingly. Much like he was going to do now.

But again, Lotor was perfect so he probably didn’t even sweat and he certainly didn’t come home smelling like cow blood so he’d be fine.

Regardless, Keith couldn’t help but consider how willing Lotor was to visit the new neighbors.

“…Which one.” He groaned, voice dripping with exasperation.

“Pardon?”

“Which one caught your attention?” Keith grumbled while the taller male paused in front of him, his eyes lingering on Keith’s collar bone for just a second. Keith assumed he’d imagined a mosquito or something. Lotor absolutely hated those and would quite comically rave about setting fire to the apartment if it took longer than ten minutes to kill one.

Not that there was any reason for Keith to be thinking about some of the funnier or cuter things Lotor was capable of when he was so close to him and naked.

Honestly, Keith didn’t want to hear the answer to his question but he couldn’t help that he’d still asked it.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about Keith.” Lotor even said it with a lilt and the beginnings of that shit eating grin Keith hated so much.

“I swear to god Lotor— they already sound annoying I don’t need you making it worse.”

Lotor laughed outright and Keith wanted to wretch at the awkward feeling in his stomach.

“Red, you think everyone is annoying.”

“And don’t you forget it. You’re not even an exception.”

Lotor nodded, raising a hand to Keith’s head and roughing up his hair. Would it be dramatic to say it felt like his heart stuttered with the motion? Lotor gave him palpitations. Clearly living together was shortening his lifespan.

“I’m aware. Nice chatting with you, we should avoid it in the future.”

Keith shivered at the fond way Lotor said that, but he blamed his current ensemble for it, “We should. Agreed.”

Lotor removed his hand from the others hair and waved, “Night Red.”

Yeah. Yeah really this was such a weird night.

“Night Lo.”

Lotor’s bedroom door shut quietly behind him and Keith shuffled into the hallway closet to dig out his fluffy blanket as he had planned at the beginning of the night.

When he made it to his room the neighbor was playing music. Not as loud as Rolo but still loud enough to keep him up if he were any less exhausted.

The quality of music was also nicer. Softer… Spanish?

When Keith’s head hit the pillow he went out like a light, whether it was from exhaustion paired with the music or the idea of this being the start of one of those “tolerable” spells between himself and his roommate, he didn’t know, he didn’t care.

Sleep was just. So good and so necessary right now.

And yet he woke up around sunrise to the sound of his neighbors shrieking.

“Cover it up! COVER IT UP!”

“I’m TRYING!”

Keith pulled his second pillow over his head and squeezed it tightly. Somehow he got the feeling sleep would be a rare thing from now on, with those two living next door.

What the fuck was wrong with them? ----

AN: So I would have posted this earlier but I was thoroughly distracted by Steven Yeun’s VOICE--

And yes, this is another multi-chaptered fic (Because what the fuck Gen) I’m still going to be working on IFE but it’s at a slightly lower priority right now because A) I’m totally winging it and it was mostly an experiment to play with some world building for my original series and B) There doesn’t seem to be much interest in it ANYWAY so like...no pressure yeah? <3;;; Also C) THIS STORY RIGHT HERE ACTUALLY HAS A PLOT?!!!

Like I have actual chapters planned and Lisa even got a ridiculous derpy outline when I was bored and ended up writing one instead of working on Dusk.

This was SUPPOSED to be a stupid little one shot with Klance and platonic Plance but then suddenly there was Lotor. Descended from space to give me a message! “You’re going to love me and give me the littlest blade now.” And suddenly my derpy Klance one shot became multi chapters predominantly Keitor/Klancelot.

So.

Fuck it.

Let’s see how this goes lol.