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zesstie · 10 months

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Space Ranger Partner's Adventures Chapter 1

A marriage proposal from a complete stranger in the middle of a top-secret alien spy base was, surprisingly, not the strangest thing to happen to Lance in the past 24 hours.

The strangest thing was probably that he was even here. He'd been proposed to a handful of times after his part in the war efforts largely ended; Adoring fans, of course. But in under a day he'd been flown from his family home in New Altea, introduced into the very secretive very select ranks of the Blades of Marmora, got his ass handed to him by some cat alien who was currently standing 10 feet away and therefore very likely his new teammate, and—possibly most surprising of all, realized he was going to have to ask his buddy keith out because apparently he'd gone off and gotten hot in the past three years.

"No, no. I told you no proposals." From beside him, the very same Keith Kogane—his ex-teammate turned leader—lurched forward and extracted Lance's hand from Torat, one of his new teammates. Though the alien stood well over a stocky 8 feet, he had dropped to one knee before asking Lance to spend the remainder of his apparently short life with him. His large hands had all but encompassed his own, but were shockingly gentle.

"Have I.. conducted myself improperly within the ritual..?" Torat questioned in a small voice, much to Keith's clear chagrin.

"You forgot a ring!" Kestin, another of Lance's new teammates—their pilot—helpfully supplied.

"Not supposed to do it in front of a crowd unless the other person says you can!" To the right of Kestin, Hedrox joined in. They'd met yesterday, and the blade seemed all too happy to join in on the fun.

"...Yh.." The lanky cat alien, En, stood stiffly next to Hedrox, slightly turned away from everyone. He'd been that way since he and Keith entered the room just moments before. "You cannot simply ask a h-hu-human being to join into such a pact! T-There are numerous prerequisites—to say nothing of the time needed to be spent with the other individual—before such a momentous proposal can be made!" They turned their head to look directly at Lance—Or so he assumed; All members save for himself and Keith wore masks covering their entire faces. Then they gave a human soldier salute. "Lieutenant, Sir!"

Lance had no idea how to respond to any of this. "Y-Yeah. Uh.. Uh. Yeah. Sorry." Man, he really hadn't been around anyone except for his family for a while. He felt rusty. He gave a weak salute in return, before a memory from the evening prior bubbled to the surface of his mind.

"I will do my utmost to familiarize myself with human naming and title customs-"

"It's fine, man."

Oh. Maybe that was related.

"Okay, guys, enough." Thankfully Keith cut in, and pinched the bridge of his nose. "We're not here to—propose to Lance, alright?!" He wiped a palm down his face as if to try and banish the redness creeping in. "We're here to see all the time and effort we've been putting into this project finally see some results."

The room quieted, and everyone stood tall, and tense. Hedrox, however, seemed excited.

"That we are, Commander!" There was a table with a digital surface separating Keith, himself, and Torat from the other three, and Hedrox slapped their palms down onto it. Immediately, several large rectangular screens coated in Galran projected into clear view. The room automatically darkened. "I'm very pleased to say I've been at the helm of this—which, er, Commander? Do we need an explanation for those who are new?" His voice held a pleasant watery lilt to it, and if it weren't for the horn protruding from their forehead Lance would have guessed they were a half-Galran half-merperson or something.

Keith crossed his arms and gave his throat a quiet clear. "I've only briefed him on the basics. Floor's yours."

"Excellent. Gather 'round, team. Here's what we're doing." With deft hands they tapped away at a console and began pulling up several images, as well as additional Galran text Lance struggled to quickly translate. He'd all but mastered Altean since he retired (thanks mostly to Allura teaching him, but sometimes he wondered if the marks she gave him when she thought she was going to die contributed to how effortlessly he learned), but he'd only just started learning Common Galran half a year ago. Frustratingly it was way more context based, and very, VERY heavy importance was placed on sound emphasis. There were also over three hundred individual characters to memorize, whose meaning could vastly differ depending on what other characters were next to it. He was actually pretty glad to have something else to fill his time now; A great excuse to avoid slamming his head against the language every day. He could make out.. Eta-17 pa-facilty..? Facility? Facility. He squinted. Why was that familiar?

"..For the last year, we've been surveying a Galran anti-coalition outpost at the edge of the Ornitier System, which we know is serving as a key point for filtering and channelling intel. I've been doing what I do best and systematically replacing tiny components of their communication terminals with the tech the green paladin and I co-designed.” There was something strangely human about the way he spoke, despite the mild alien accent.

“And now, we stand nearly ready for a seamless takeover.”

Hedrox held up two small devices. "These. Are my baby children. Months of hard work. Cleared—and might I add complimented—by the green paladin. When both are installed into the facility's internal security network and main processing core respectively, they're undetectable. We'll be able to spy on enemy intel with them none the wiser." The ground beneath them gave a weak lurch. Lance could feel the familiar pull of motion, even if he couldn’t confirm via a window; No one paid it any mind, so he assumed it was normal.

“So that's why we're here today. They're too complex for my little helpers to remotely install.” Tiny clicking erupted then spilled from Hedrox's hood; At least thirty floating mechanical looking creatures no bigger than sunflower seeds circled his head. “I've altered the security rounds the sentries take to facilitate an easy infiltration and installation, and as long as they haven't gone and scrambled their normal routes, this should be an easy in and out.” The blade then motioned towards Lance. “The commander had research and development outfit a sniper rifle with a scrambling code that will temporarily freeze any sentries it hits and reroute them in case there's any hiccups in the plan, or someone's about to get caught.” Among other things; the knife and pistol in their respective holsters reminded him of their weight.

“Their monitoring and sentry patrol systems ‘refresh’ once an hour—so, that’s our time limit—and we need to get in so I can upload a new set of instructions to a pre-existing program that will facilitate—That is, uh. It’s—It’s a virus? The green paladin called it a virus. Am I using the term correctly?”

Keith nodded, scratched the back of his head and turned to Lance. “Basically, we need to get in so Hedrox, En, and Torat can upload a virus that’ll make it so we can track down their headquarters eventually.”

From the other side of the table, En growled. “The malignant remnants of the accursed empire and their cowardly tactics..! Always on the run, attacking colonies before fleeing. They’re filth, and we will find them, and cut short their worthless excuses of lives..”

The room grew quiet, and stuffy. There was the whir of machinery and motion from all around. Keith cleared his throat.

“Right. So, the security network room and main processing core are in different locations, but the area where Hedrox and En need to work together will have more foot-traffic. You'll be giving them cover.”

Hedrox brought up additional panels, this time with a 3-D map of several alien-looking floors. He traced what Lance read as “entry-point” labelled in Galran all the way over to the right. “Here's where you'll be stationed with the Commander—route A. First, Kestin brings us in. The Commander and Lieutenant follow route A and get into position and provide cover fire as needed. Torat goes through route C, and En and I head to B. Easy!”

Lance smirked. “That's it? I take out sentries from afar while the hacker blades do their thing? Just like old times?” With a fond smile, Keith let out a puff of air from his nose.

“Just like old times. I’ll be there next to you since—uh, I was originally going to take your spot.”

Lance blinked at him. “Huh? I didn’t know you were good at—“

“I’m not. Just, making due with what we had. Things’ll go much more smoothly now that you’re here watching our backs, and I can focus on troubleshooting if anything comes up.” Keith’s complete faith in him left Lance light on his feet, and he hung his head and chuckled nervously.

“Cool, that doesn’t actually sound all that bad. ‘Think I can handle it.” Keith gave a surprisingly gentle nudge with his arm against Lance’s own.

“You got this, Lance.” He turned to the rest of their team. “ETA?” This time, Kestin spoke up.

“Approximately 20 minutes, sir.”

—

Pre-mission anxiety, long forgotten, made its unwelcomed return.

Lance sat pressed against the dark wall of an unsecured entry duct alongside Keith, Hedrox, and En; Though the tallest of them gave him a wide berth likely due to the events of the night prior.

Good. He might have acted the bigger person, but Lance very much did not like having his ass handed to him. He’d get a rematch from them at some point.

His stomach gave another uncomfortable lurch, and he pressed a palm to his abdomen to will the discomfort away. They had to wait for Torat’s initial sweep of the place before they could advance to their own spots; Surprisingly he seemed to be the stealthiest out of all of them despite his size.

“You alright?” Keith’s quiet voice filtered through the internal comms system in his suit. Though now masked, Keith tilted his head back to glance in his direction. He gave a weak thumbs up.

“Nerves. It’s been a while,” he quietly admitted. Three years of therapy had made it surprisingly easy to talk about his feelings, even if years ago he would have balked at the idea of showing weakness to Keith. But things were different now.

Keith reached a gloved hand over, and rested it on Lance’s forearm. Firm, but comforting, somehow. “Hey, you’ll be okay. I’m right here beside you the whole time, right?”

Things really were different now; Even his voice was doing things to him. “Y-Yeah. Yeah. Thanks—We got this.”

“In position.” Torat’s whisper of a voice interrupted the singing in his chest, and prickles of anxiety returned to gnawing deeper into his stomach. “Sentry patrol routes seem randomized.” Hedrox gave a light click of his tongue.

“..I knew they’d start doing it to all their bases eventually, but I was hoping we’d have more time before it got to the ones we compromised..” The blade brandished from his thigh pouch a strange, tiny black capsule that was barely the size of Lance’s thumb. “Guess there’s not enough leeway to sticky our fingers a bit, huh?” Lance furrowed his brows.

“Uh, what?” Keith made a dismissive gesture towards him.

“Pidge’s new tech. They’re tiny, but we use them to collect huge chunks of inorganic matter—usually servers or data storage. Not today, though. Come on, clock’s ticking.”

“Yes, Commander.” Featherlight and silent owed to their suits, the four advanced. En and Hedrox split off into the seemingly endless halls, while Lance trailed behind Keith. Weapons were a last resort, but if anything went wrong; Lance felt the pistol’s weight heavily on his right thigh, and his knife on the left. He’d dealt with sentries hundreds of times before now, and so despite how queasy he was starting to feel, the idea of potentially fighting some of them left his pulse surprisingly steady.

Keith took a sharp turn left to a dead-end, then motioned for Lance to use him to boost up to the small maintenance shaft in the corner. Right, the nest was up in there. Despite himself, Lance felt his cheeks flush and was grateful that they were hidden while he sat on Keith’s shoulders for the short time needed to remove the panel. He slid in with plenty of room to spare, and the other man soon followed.

After half a minute of near-silent upwards crawling, the shaft opened up into what would be Lance’s vantage point. There were seven large, curved window like panels punched out of the metallic dark purple walls, with a dimly shining object rested off to the side on a wall. He made his way over and picked up what was clearly a blade issued rifle, shockingly alike to the one he had practised with the day before. Adjusting to it wouldn’t be an issue, then, other than—

“This doesn’t shoot bullets, so—no kickback?” Lance turned to face Keith, who was now peering through the open panels into the massive facility below; From Lance’s precursory glance he saw walls upon walls of wires and oblong towers lit up in Galran code. The hood on Keith’s head bobbed in affirmation. From behind, he could see just how broad his shoulders had gotten..

“Got you in my sights, Hedrox.” Keith looked around. “Where’s En?” With that, Lance realized he should be doing what he was brought there to do and got into position. He raised the sights and took in the area below, scanning for the wayward blade.

“Eight o’clock, Commander.” He couldn’t hide the satisfaction in his voice, and Keith followed the point of his rifle until he spotted them emerge from a small maintenance shaft. Another pleased half-laugh.

“Good eye, Lieutenant.”

“‘S what I’m here for.”

“Uh, do you—“ Lance turned his sights toward Hedrox working to pull apart the base of one of the strange techno-towers while he spoke in a jovial watery tone. “We have a private line on our comms, Lieutenant, in case you and the Commander want to—Y’know what nevermind.“

“Focus.” Keith crossed his arms and looked away. “Torat, how’s that upload?”

”Forty percent, Commander.” His already quiet voice was a hush of a whisper. Then, “..Patrols have necessitated my heavy cloak function for five dobos—minutes and counting.”

Keith's masked view immediately shot to his wrist with a quiet hiss. Their regular cloaking built in to their exo-suits dampened sounds and turned the outer coating into something like a mirror, but the heavy cloaking function removed any and all methods of detection that the Galra were currently known to use, Keith had explained on the way there. But the power cost was enormous, and could only last fifteen minutes when drawing from the suit’s internal battery. Best used in short bursts, since completely depleting the suit’s power meant no oxygen, and no protection from the ravages of space if they had to be jettisoned out in an emergency.

“Hedrox, anything you can do to help speed it up from there?” Immediately tension shot through the air, and Lance listened with a growing sense of helplessness. “Lance, your left.”

A sentry getting too close to the others, quiznack! He held his breath, took aim, then fired. The rifle didn’t flinch, but the sentry’s head immediately bent at a strange angle, it twitched while standing upright, then turned around and began heading back in the direction it came. He got too caught up and Keith had to bail him out, he realized shamefully. He readied a quick apology on his tongue, but voices buzzed back into his mask.

“Working on it. Not great at multi-tasking though. En, gimmie a hand.” Hedrox’s normal ease had sharpened into something else. The cat-eared blade made their way to his side and took the panel passed to them before typing away nearly as quickly as their partner. “Couple yottabytes of code to implement Commander, this is gonna take some time on both ends.”

Quiznack. Another two sentries from either side. Inhale, hold. Position, fire. Position, fire. Another sentry turned the corner just as soon as the other two turned away. Exhale, inhale, position, fire.

“Torat, are the sentries letting up?”

”Forty-two percent. ..No, Commander.” Inhale, position, fire. Lance spared a quick glance at Keith, now clearly growing more tense. He returned his focus. Man, there were so many! Three more marched in a group to Hedrox and En’s flank, and there was only a narrow gap of space to get them as they approached. Exhale, inhale, position, fire, position, fire, position, fire. The sentries turned away, and so did Keith.

“We may have to call this.” Keith's tense body language betrayed the even way he spoke. Inhale, position, fire.

Lance could hear En’s breathing pick up as they typed furiously away beside Hedrox in between shots. There was a shocking number of sentries, and Lance couldn’t help but wonder if having less bases to work within meant the anti-coalition Galrans could stuff the ones they did still have full of them. “An entire Deca-Phoeb worth of operations, wiped away..?! Commander there must be another way.”

“No. Torat, abandon the upload when your suit gets down to two minutes. I’ll extract you.”

Inhale, position, fire. Silence.

“Torat.” An authority from Keith Lance hadn’t witnessed before emerged from his suit. “Is that understood?” Harsh. No room for further discussion.

“….Yes, Commander.”

In between breath after dizzying breath, the seconds and then minutes ticked by as everyone worked in frantic silence. He watched as Hedrox and En practically glued themselves to the small walls of the gutted tower, hands flying over keys faster than even Lance’s eyes could keep up with. Distantly in his ears, Torat updated the upload percent every sixty seconds as he, too, typed away. Sweat beaded then dripped down his neck as stiffness crept up it. His rifle smeared and shifted until it looked like his old bayard, and Lance ignored it and continue to fire.

Thirteen minutes in, it was clear to everyone there wouldn’t be enough time. Keith’s steadying presence had knelt next to Lance by that point, intently watching the battery of Torat’s suit drain and pause, then continue draining via a small screen on the underside of his wrist. He stood up, and shook his head.

“I’m calling it. Torat, abandon the upload, rendezvous at the extraction point.” A muted, miserable sound. En? Inhale, position, fire, position, fire, position, fire, exhale. No, Torat.

“We must succeed, you have worked too hard, Commander.”

“There’ll be other outposts. Now, soldier.” Again, silence. Inhale, position, fire, position, fire.

“..Failure here, for a life that may not even see il’E’s newest sun.. No, black paladin sir. For this I would gladly go without its warming rays.” Keith froze. Lance glanced at him, then back to his scope. Shit, shit, what was happening?! Inhale, position, fire, position, fire. “If ever you are able to retrieve my capsule from the vent below, have my family bury it under the spire by our sea.”

Before Lance could even register what was said, he was pulled. Keith vanished from his view and he felt a hand grip the back of his suit’s chest piece before being yanked very quickly from the room. It happened so quickly that he nearly fumbled and dropped the rifle, but managed to keep his hold. He was then hoisted up by—he realized now it was Keith—and manoeuvred until he was then sliding down the shaft he and Keith had crawled up before. “En, Hedrox, heavy cloaking, now. Keep your work out of sight. Abandon mission when I give the signal.” Steady, clipped.

“Yes, sir.” Keith was sliding behind him now even though he couldn’t hear or see him; The heavy press of his palm against his side to keep him steady nearly burned. He felt pressure lift his hand and press down on his palm—oh, right, the button to cloak himself. Then, in through his mask,

“Get your pistol ready, set it to stun, follow me.”

They shot out from the end of the maintenance crawl and Lance tore after the back of Keith’s head.

“The upload will proceed as planned. It’s been an honor, sir.”

Keith did not respond, only sprinted and twisted down the endless hallways as they dodged around sentry after sentry. Lance had strapped the rifle to his back and readied his small pistol as commanded, even though he didn’t understand. Were they going to extract Torat? He tapped the side and slid a piece into place to ensure it was set to stun. He trusted Keith, he knew what he was doing, and he could—he wanted to help in whatever way he needed him to.

The sound was different, somehow, but Keith’s voice once again came into his ears, panting with exertion. “He’ll have to uncloak for at least half a second for the capsule to recognize and capture him. When you see him, I want you to shoot him in the forehead where his eye is, Lance.”

The capsule? The one for.. inorganic matter? If organic matter like a person was compressed into it—wouldn’t that definitely kill them? Through the adrenaline, it distantly clicked what Torat was intending to do, but he couldn’t waste time thinking about it. “O-Okay.” Lance hooked his arm against a corner and pulled, narrowly missing a towering sentry as he caught up to Keith. Half a second to make a shot when he was practically wheezing though; Hesitation crawled up his spine. “How far—until we—get to him?”

“End of the hall, dead left.” Keith showed no signs of slowing, and Lance through the haze of it all wondered if he was cut out for any of this, and what would happen when he failed. If he failed. He was going to mess this up. He was going to get Keith killed somehow, wasn’t he?

Their feet silently pounding against the neon lit floor came to the end of the hallway. As they did so, Lance took in the most even breath he could muster, prayed his pulse wouldn’t throw off his aim, whipped his pistol up to the left, and aimed. Keith jammed his palm against their open com channel and flashed back into view.

“Torat, look at me—That’s an order!” The blade in question materialized suddenly in front of them, holding the same thumb-sized black capsule in front of his chest. Time slowed. In that millisecond of a moment, Lance realized he didn’t have a clear shot of Torat’s third eye. The capsule glowed a clear enough target, easy to shoot out of his hands, and his thumb was still hovering over the button on the top. Time moved another inch, and the hulking blade twitched, then could not help but turn his head towards his commanding officer.

“Forgiv—”

Lance took the shot.

—

Debrief was quiet.

No one spoke except for Keith. Lance, foolishly, felt like he was eight years old again and in trouble, for some reason. A memory of something his therapist said to him once drifted into his mind as Keith grumbled out a report. Lance couldn’t even remember the exact wording, but it was something to focus on while he ignored the ache in his entire body, and his pounding headache, at least. What was it, again..?

Hyper aware of mental states of those around him.. Discomfort around emotions regardless of where it was directed..? He couldn’t really remember. While he was reflecting, he decided to explore the room they always met in back in New Altea; Two o’clock sharp every Friday, warm room facing the sun, post-modern in decoration and very comfortable. Photos of her family on the desk, two dogs. Always enough tissues when he went there because he couldn’t cry around his family who would worry, but he could cry around a stranger who didn’t matter.

A stranger he would outlive, since she was fully human.

Torat swayed next to him, but soon righted himself.

“Understood. You have completed your mission, if nothing else.” Kolivan’s ever serious visage stared down at them from a bizarrely massive screen. Did it need to be that big? If he had nose hairs Lance would have been able to see them. “Dismissed.”

They were supposed to meet in the rec room after showering and, if needed, a trip to the med bay; A Keith mandate since his team was supposed to set an example that it was normal and good to relax after a mission, but.. was that still okay to do?

Lance probably had some of the best aim in the universe, if he was being honest, but with that aim he had just shot one of his teammates in the head not even an hour ago! The suits obviously had eye protection, but Torat dropped like a rock back in the facility, and they only managed an evac without being seen thanks to Keith’s ridiculous half-galra strength. While he dragged the unconscious Torat, Lance covered them with the rifle, and somehow En and Hedrox finished up on their end without being seen.

They did everything they set out to do, but it really felt like they failed.

The silence was broken with a soft clearing off Hedrox’s throat. “Wellll, I’m beets. Time for a shower, then uhm. Whoever feels like it meet up at the usual spot..?”

En pointedly kept his sharp gaze toward Torat, who did not look up from the ground. Sneering displeasure was evident on his now unmasked face, but he eventually turned to face his horned companion. “…The correct term is being ��beat’ as in ‘beaten, and exhausted.’” The taller blade pressed his palm to his other set of fingers and stretched his wrists as he began to walk away. “But yes, I shall await you in the showers.” Hedrox jumped comically before slapping En’s arm.

“Don’t say it like that, shh!”

Lance blinked as he watched the two aliens saunter away, with Kestin soon to follow after giving Torat a sympathetic look. How was it Hedrox seemed like the most human out of all of them? Lance felt awkward, and guilty, and didn’t know what to do with himself.

He looked over at Keith, who ripped his furious gaze from Torat and regarded Lance with an unreadable expression. His eyebrows furrowed, and he looked like he wanted to say something; He only shook his head, turned, and marched off, leaving only Lance and Torat remaining in the room. Lance peered up at the blade and saw he couldn’t entirely hide his trembling.

“..Hey man, is your eye.. Did I—hurt it?” He wanted to apologize, even though he knew he’d done the right thing. Keith must have realized the only way to keep Torat from.. killing himself was to knock him unconscious, and he needed Lance’s arm to make sure the job got done correctly. Lance wasn’t sure how he felt about that, but there was still guilt shining through. Above all else, he really didn’t like hurting people.

Torat gave a nearly imperceptible twitch, then brought his large palm over his masked eye. “Bruised, but unruptured. I will be fine, Lieutenant, thank you. Please excuse me.” Quietly, the larger blade nearly tiptoed away through the opposite door of Keith.

Lance wanted to go after him, even if he wasn’t sure what to do or say.

There’d been times back in the castle of lions where he used to catch his teammates sulking alone, or when Silvio was upset and would hide in his garden, and he always went after them to at least make sure they didn’t feel alone. He could only crack stupid jokes, and maybe he annoyed them more than he helped, but it still felt like something he needed to do.

A shower, first, Lance decided. Then, he’d track down Torat and—at least make sure he went to the med bay or something. After that, if there was time, rec room with the others.

He wanted to spend much more time scrubbing the sweat and grime off of his aching body in his shower, but tingling urgency didn’t allow a long stay. Lance popped into his most comfortable hoodie and grey sweatpants, slipped on his sneakers, then began his search.

First, he went to the obvious location, Torat’s room. No one was in, so he went to the med bay next (after signing a few autographs from some fans on the way) and once again did not find his teammate. It was at that point Lance realized that despite how the mission turned out, Torat might have just gone to the rec room. Maybe Keith was trying to foster a more tight-knit team unit thing, but before all that, and even now, Lance was pretty sure death in the Blades was a very common occurrence.

Approaching the hallway connecting to the rec room, a loud slam sent Lance a foot into the air. A sharp cough came from just around the corner before he heard a growl that undoubtedly belonged to Keith. Was he in trouble?!

“—That was the whole reason I even formed this unit in the first place!” Keith hissed, and there was another grunting cough. Lance sidled up against the wall and tried to figure out if he was needed.

“Your work is—ghh—more important than my life, Commander..!” That was Torat’s strained voice. There was some shuffling, and Lance could at least piece together that they were having an argument.

“You don’t get to call me that. My work, is showing the rest of the blades that we can do our job without throwing away our lives for the sake of—knowledge. Understand?! No matter the mission, you keep yourself alive.”

Quiet pulsing buzzing from the blue-tinted lights above hung in the air. “..I-I.. If—this is what you wish, Commander.. I shall.. try.”

A dull thud, then footsteps. “No, you’re off the team. I’m not risking keeping someone on who’s fine with killing themselves if it means the mission succeeds.”

Torat gasped. “Commander, please..! Allow me to stay—I shall make up for my transgressions, this I swear..!”

Should he leave?! Lance felt like he shouldn’t be hearing any of this.

Boots scuffing on the waxy floor. Keith turned back towards him? “Make up for it by staying alive on a different team.” His clipped footsteps faded in the opposite direction. Lance needed to leave, right now. His throat was feeling hot, and it was getting too hard to focus.

He couldn’t help Torat at this point, that was becoming obvious to him.

The muffled sounds of the rec room and even quieter alien cries faded from Lance’s fuzzy mind as he stumbled back into his room and hid under his desk.

Breathe. Deep breaths. In through the nose. Count to—how long? He couldn’t remember. Okay, okay. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t focus. Try to breathe.

Keith flashed into his vision, an impossible view of him in the cockpit of a tiny cruiser as Lance watched him try and fly into the barrier at Naxzela. His death in exchange for the mission succeeding. They never talked about it.

Allura in the Blue lion, about to be killed; A split second decision to trade his life so Voltron could go on with its heart intact.

Keith was a hypocrite.

No! People could change their minds. It had been years since he pulled that stunt. People could change. Lance mushed his soggy face into his palms and shuddered.

Stupidly, all he could think about was how terrifying it was for Keith to be so close when he shot Torat with the stun round. With Keith’s armor, even if he had somehow accidentally missed and hit him, he couldn’t have killed him. There was no way. But his dreams were always so vivid and he was always accidentally killing Keith. To be there next to him in that situation felt—surreal.

Lance managed to get his breathing under control. It took a few minutes, but eventually he calmed, and shuffled over to the bathroom to wash his face.

He thought for a second about going and meeting up with the rest of the team, but shut that thought down almost immediately. Instead, he slipped into his pyjamas and slid into bed.

The empty ceiling greeted him without his familiar stars.

And Lance thought back to Torat, holding the small capsule in front of his chest, ready to ensure the blades could eventually track down and eliminate the remainder of the empire with his tiny sacrifice in the grand scheme of things.

And Lance realized he didn't disagree with Torat's decision.

😳👉👈

DID U LIKE....

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zesstie · 10 months

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my toxic trait is wanting to print out every fanfic i’ve ever read of a specific ship and make it into a book.

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zesstie · 11 months

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post war where the gaang is telling zuko abt their escapade to the fire nation. sokka tells zuko abt how he pulled off mr wang fire incredibly well, kataras telling zuko abt how fire nation has a pretty decent style. and aang complains to zuko abt how shit the schooling is, complains abt how it’s historically inaccurate and “no fun AT ALL like how did the poor children get thru their day!?” and zuko is nodding along, yknow, being considerate bc aang is really passionate abt this topic. but as soon as they leave zuko runs to his office and starts reconstructing the entire school system. he has multiple lists, chalkboards for brainstorming, and constructed little models of classrooms. toph helps zuko with making sure it’s accessible for every single child. he doesn’t have a lot to go off of due to being raised the way he was and his social awkwardness, but he uses his time with the gaang and when he was at sea to create a bomb ass, fun as hell, new schooling system. aang cries

#avatar #atla #fire nation #avatar the last airbender #post war #zuko and aang #zuko headcanon #atla headcanons #atla aang #aang #atla zuko #zuko #prince zuko #fire lord zuko #atla katara #katara #atla sokka #sokka #u can’t tell me zuko wouldn’t do this

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zesstie · 1 year

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keith doesn't trust people having a sharp object close to him, so he has to cut his hair himself. he has a mullet bc he isn't able to reach the back of his head to cut his hair, so he only does the front and trims the bottom of the back where he's able to reach. once, shiro offered to cut his hair, and keith trusted him enough at that point. but he had grown fond of the hairstyle and continued doing it himself.

#imagine shiro walking in on a 14yo keith taking scissors to his head and just panicking #im not adult enough to deal with this where's adam #vld #voltron #keith kogane #keith #keith headcanon #broganes #vld keith #vld shitpost #vld headcanons

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zesstie · 1 year

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The knock on the door is so quiet that it can only be heard if you’re straining to hear it.

Luckily, Keith is.

He rolls out of bed immediately — he’s fully dressed, he hadn’t bothered sleeping last night — and walks stiffly to the door. He pauses for a moment, when his gloved hands touch the cool metal of the doorbell, taking a deep, long breath, steeling himself.

Shiro stands behind the door, hands clasped sombrely in front of him.

“You ready for this?” he asks quietly.

Keith nods once. “Yes.”

Shiro softens at the trepidation in Keith’s voice, reaching out a hand to rest on Keith’s shoulder. He tries for an encouraging smile. It falls flat, but Keith appreciates the encouragement nonetheless.

“We’ve got this, kiddo,” Shiro says. He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself as much as Keith. “We can do this. We know the risks. We’ve been training for weeks.”

“And where has that gotten us?” Keith murmurs. He feels bad for making Shiro’s face fall again, but it’s the truth. They’ve been training for weeks, yes, but it’s only yielded them failure. Now time is up, and they’ve got nothing to show for it but tattered hope.

“We have to try.”

Keith takes another deep breath, squeezing his eyes shut. When he opens them again, he’s determined, straightening his spine in a display of what he hopes is confidence.

“Okay. Lead the way.”

As silently as they can — they can’t wake up the rest of the team, because any one of them will try to stop them — they creep down the halls, freezing every time they so much as hear a creak. They stay crouched low to the ground, ducking in and out of shadows, breathing so silent and shallow Keith is half sure they’ve stopped entirely.

There’s no sense of relief, when they finally reach their destination — they may be free from their concerned teammates stopping them, but now they must face their bigger challenge. The biggest they’ve ever faced. An impossibility, if Keith’s being pessimistic.

They exchange a wary look, fists clenched at their sides, and step into the kitchen.

“Fire extinguisher ready?” Shiro asks.

Keith pats the contraption, strapped to his utility belt (the Altean version are much more effective and compact). “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Shiro snorts. “I’m not sure how much hope I have left. You grab the ingredients, I’ll grab the equipment.”

Keith pats Shiro’s back, then heads off to do as asked. He rifles through the cupboards for sugar and flour, grabs the milk and eggs from the fridge.

Baking. Their mortal enemy. The one thing, out of everything either of them has ever attempted, that has completely eluded them; has proven well beyond their skills and capabilities.

Well, not tonight. Tonight, they are going to bake cupcakes. Successfully. They’re going to show the team that they can be trusted in the kitchen without causing a fire, thank you very much, and not only that, but that they can make something delicious.

“D’you get the red food dye?” Shiro asks.

“Shit, I forgot.”

“How did you forget the red for red velvet cupcakes?”

“I’m stressed! These have to be perfect! Let me live!”

“Alright,” Shiro says, chuckling. “Go get it, goober.”

Grumbling, Keith does, slamming the little bottle on the counter next to the mixing bowl.

“Red velvet’s basically just chocolate, anyway. I dunno why we’re making it all stupid and fancy. We can’t even do the regular stuff right!”

“Hey, you’re the one who insisted on making cupcakes on Valentine’s Day,” Shiro says. He smirks. “Although I’m sure that has less to do with proving ourselves and more to do with a certain lanky rival of yours —”

“Moving on,” Keith says loudly. He’s sure his face is as red as the stupid dye. Shiro snickers, but he doesn’t make any more comments, carefully measuring out the dry ingredients and tipping them into the bowl. He goes painfully slowly, and as much as Keith wants to tell him to get a goddamn move on, he knows better. (That was the catastrophe of Attempt #4. Somehow neither of them had considered what would happen if they dumped several cups of carefully measured flour in the mixing bowl, and had been left with both a dust explosion that had taken them four hours to clean, and what was essentially cake soup since the measured flour did not make it into the batter and the ratios were all off. They will not be making that mistake again. Sometimes Keith still finds flour in weird places when he’s bothering a cooking Hunk, and has to wipe it off when the man is distracted.)

They manage to avoid repeating any of their previous catastrophes for the entire creation of the batter. No eggs end up exploded (attempt #7 — don’t microwave eggs because the recipe said room temperature and you forgot to take them out of the fridge in time), no skulls end up cracked (attempt #11 — if you spill butter on the floor, clean it, or else someone will trip and you’ll need an emergency healing pod), and no batter ends up coming to life (attempt #2 — avoid using weirdo space ingredients you don’t recognize). After thirty minutes of careful measuring and even more careful mixing, they’re left with a beautiful, bright red cake batter, not too thin, not too thick, and it tastes delicious.

“Leave some batter for the actual cupcakes, you brat,” Shiro admonishes, wrenching the spoon out of Keith’s hand. “Also, stop double dipping. That’s disgusting.”

“I actually have a theory about that,” Keith says around a mouthful of batter. “You know how Lance and Hunk and Allura use the same recipe when they make cookies, but each of them tastes just a little different?”

“Frankly, I’m afraid to say yes.”

“I think that might be their saliva —”

“Gross!”

“—because since everything else is the same, the only thing that changes is the mouth that licks the spoon —”

“Keith, I am going to vomit if you don’t shut the fuck up.”

“—and I don’t think they’re, like, spitting in the batter or anything —”

“Ew! Nasty! Stop talking!”

“—but I do think that trace amounts make a difference! It’s the only explanation.”

“I hate you,” Shiro says. “Not joking.”

Keith places his hands under his chin and grins innocently, batting his eyelashes.

Shiro rolls his eyes. “You spend too much time with Lance.”

“I do not,” Keith says, flushing. “I spend — a regular amount of time with Lance. Same as you.”

Keith considers smacking the smug look off Shiro’s stupid face. He considers it very hard. Maybe he’ll wait until Shiro’s done pouring the batter into the tins and then pinch him.

“Uh-huh. Sure. That’s why you want to make Lance’s favourite cake on Valentine’s Day, and why you spent four space mall trips looking for a heart shaped cupcake tin.”

“It’s — they’re cute! The pan is cute and the cupcakes will be cute! And — I love Lance! I love all the team! Platonically! We are good pals! Pals for whom I would like to bake successfully so I can be unbanned from the stove!”

“Right. Okay. Sure.”

“Good! Glad you agree!”

“Yes, totally.” Shiro slides the now-full pan into the oven, triple-checking the timer and temperature (Keith doesn’t think he needs to explain why they know to do that now), then turns to Keith with a smirk.

“Sure, Nick Carroway. Real close friends you two are.”

Keith grinds his teeth, cutting Shiro a sharp glare. “I hope you burn yourself when the cupcakes are done.”

“I’ll be sure to get on that. Now, make the frosting. Did you want to make chocolate frosting, so it matches Lance’s eyes?”

Keith says nothing, because that is what he wanted to do, actually, and there’s no coming back from that one. He’s grouchy the whole time he makes the stupid chocolate frosting because Shiro spends the whole time laughing.

(Shiro does actually burn himself a little when he takes the cupcakes out, which brings Keith joy. Ha. Karma.)

———

“I can’t believe we actually did it,” Keith says, awed, an hour and a half later. The cupcakes are cooked to perfection, and iced to — well. There is icing on the cupcakes and it is not melted. Keith feels like he still gets a point for that one, even though some of the frosting genuinely looks like a pile of doodoo.

He throws some sprinkles on them. They now look like doodoo with pink sprinkles.

Oh, well.

“They look…rustic,” Shiro decides.

Keith laughs. “Is that what we’re going with?”

“Yep. If we look enthusiastic enough, everyone will feel too bad to make any sort of comment.”

“That works for me.”

“Excellent.” Shiro checks his watch, then claps his hands together. “Well! It’s a quarter to four, so that only took us a few hours. We still have time to go back to sleep. You ready to get out of here?”

“You go ahead,” Keith says hesitantly. He looks pointedly away, fixing his gaze on the doodoo cupcakes. “I, uh, have to do something.”

He’s expected teasing, for Shiro to make another stupid literature reference to mock him, or something along those lines. Instead Shiro pauses, turns around, and nudges Keith gently.

“Hey. Look at me.”

Keith does.

“You planning something?”

“I was,” Keith admits. “I had flowers and shit. I dunno. All that gooey stuff. I wrote him a letter.” He looks down again, kicking the ground. “But I don’t think I’m going to give them to him.”

“So much for platonic cupcakes, huh?” Shiro teases, but it’s much softer. He wraps an arm around Keith’s shoulders and squeezes gently.

“It’s okay to be nervous, you know. You’re doing something vulnerable. That’s scary.”

“What if he hates it? I don’t — I just don’t think it’s worth the risk. I don’t have to tell him. I’m cool with wallowing for eternity.”

“That’s a good idea, actually.” Shiro drags him to the table, sitting him down and handing him a doodoo cupcake. “Not the wallowing. The question. What would happen if Lance didn’t return your feelings?”

“Some pep talk,” Keith grumbles, unwrapping the cupcake and shoving it in his mouth in one bite specifically to watch Shiro wince. “Hey, these are actually good.”

“Just humour me,” Shiro insists, trying to ignore Keith’s chewing. “Imagine you give Lance your letter, the flowers, the knife.”

“I didn’t say anything about a knife.”

Shiro levels him a look. “I know you, Keith. You made him a knife.” He pats Keith condescendingly on the hand. “That’s how you show affection, you feral desert child. With weaponry.”

“I’m taking back the knife I made you.”

“You can take it from my cold, dead corpse. Anyway. Talk me through it. Say you give Lance your gifts, and he doesn’t return your feelings. What would happen?”

As much as he loathes to admit it, Shiro’s thought exercises actually have helped him work through things before, so he takes a moment to actually think about his answer. What would happen if Lance read the note Keith wrote him, and he didn’t feel the same way?

“He’d be honest about it,” Keith admits. “Tell me the truth right away. And he would be gentle about it.”

Shiro hums. “And then what?”

“He’d…probably ask me what I need. Like, do I want space or whatever.”

“And once you’ve had your space?”

Keith lets the barest smile cross his lips. “He’d go on being as annoying as possible. Possibly even more frustrating.”

“Right,” Shiro says, smiling. “You two are friends, kiddo. You’re also disgustingly down bad for each other — seriously, it’s kind of hard for the rest of us to watch — but you guys have a solid relationship. You’re going to be fine. This is Lance we’re talking about, remember? The guy who cried when we passed a supernova because it was a star dying? He’s not going to hurt you.”

Keith smiles a little, remembering. Lance had made everyone have a moment of silence for the star, and for the system it had potentially sustained for thousands of years. That had been the first moment where Keith had looked at Lance and just thought: oh. I love this boy.

“Okay,” Keith says quietly. “I’m — I’ll tell him.”

“Good,” Shiro says. He smiles proudly. “I can’t wait to hear about it, kiddo. You’re going to do great.”

———

Knocking is the hardest part, right? It has to be. There’s no other reason why he’s been standing here for ten minutes, flowers clenched in his hand so tightly he’s probably ruined the stems, staring unblinkingly at the white door of Lance’s room.

Y’know, his room is two steps away. He could just give up. Giving up is always an option.

He screws up his eyes, forcing himself to untense a little. It’s fine. This is fine.

This is Lance.

Before he can talk himself out of it again, he knocks on the door. His signature knock — one single knock, because he’s his own target audience and that’s hilarious.

It takes him three milliseconds after he knocks to realise hey, dumbass, it’s four in the morning. Lance is not fucking awake. Obviously you’re not going to get an answer.

Only just as he’s about to step away, the door is inched open, revealing Lance sitting by the floor of his bed, leaning over so far he’s practically bent in half in an attempt to open the door without getting up.

“Hey, Keith,” he says, without looking away from his game. “I’m almost done this level, you wanna join? I could use your help because Pidge said the next level is hard as —”

Keith knows the exact second Lance finally looks over and takes Keith in completely, not because they make eye contact, but because Lance freezes, controller falling from his hand and cracking on the tile floor.

Lance doesn’t even glance down at it.

“…Keith?”

“Your face is shaped really well,” Keith blurts, and immediately wants to throw himself out the airlock. “Wait. No. That’s not what I —”

Lance laughs quietly, ducking his head. The tips of his ears are red.

“C’mere,” he says, patting the spot next to him. “Take a breather. Tell me what’s going on.”

Keith does, sitting down carefully so he doesn’t drop anything. He thinks back to Shiro’s pep talk.

This is Lance.

“These are for you,” Keith says, when he’s finally got ahold of himself. He hands Lance the flowers — and, yes, a dagger he made — then sets the cupcake on the floor between them. “For — Valentine’s Day.”

Nothing could prepare Keith for the grin that lights up Lance’s face. It’s the brightest thing he’s ever seen. It’s blinding.

“Really?”

“Yeah, Lance,” Keith says softly.

Lance covers his face with one hand, the other still holding his flowers. The knife rests in his lap. His cheeks are ruddy, and he’s very giggly.

“I love them,” he says. “Thank you.”

Keith clears his dry throat, but it doesn’t do much. “There’s a note. In the flowers. For you.”

Carefully, Lance nudges aside the buds to find the envelope, unfolding the note. Keith watches as his dark eyes flit over the page, and the smile on his face only grows.

For the first time tonight, Keith lets himself get excited. He lets himself believe that this is going to go well. He lets himself believe that Lance may very well like him just as much as he likes Lance.

People who don’t have crushes don’t react like that to romantic gifts, after all.

After a minute of reading — Keith’s note really isn’t all that long, because after four or five tries of trying to fit everything he was feeling into one letter, he gave up and just got to the point — Lance carefully sets down the note and the flowers, shifts so he’s facing Keith, and leans forward.

“Keith,” he says, very seriously. “I am going to kiss you know. Thoughts?”

Keith opens his mouth, then closes it again. Lance smiles wider.

“I’d be down with that, yeah.”

“Great,” Lance says, and there’s not even a second of pause before he’s leaning in and pressing their lips together.

At first it isn’t much of a kiss — both of them are smiling too hard to kiss properly — but after a bit both of them melt into each other, hands reaching out to touch, hesitant but determined.

“I’m so glad I spied on you and Shiro,” Lance mumbles. “Y’all should be suspicious more often. Especially if it means we get to kiss after.”

Keith huffs in amusement. Of course the various creaks he and Shiro heard when sneaking to the kitchen weren’t just the castle settling. Hunk may be the nosiest person on the team, but Lance is probably the sneakiest.

“Did you really watch the whole time?”

“No. I left when Shiro asked you about the fire extinguisher. I figured you were well-equipped at that point and I could leave without waking up to a fire.”

“Oh. So you didn’t hear me talking about you?”

Lance grins, resting one of his hands on the flowers. “No. This was — I didn’t see this coming.” His smile turns sly. “You should tell me all the mushy shit you said, though.”

Keith snorts, reaching over to grab Lance’s hand and press a kiss to the back of it.

“Not on your life.”

———

“I can’t believe you and Shiro actually managed to make decent cupcakes, by the way. Holy shit.”

“The frosting kind of looks like doodoo.”

“Well, yeah, but still! I’m gonna go to the kitchen and eat the rest of them.”

“Wait, Lance, no—”

#vld #voltron #keith #keith kogane #shiro #lance #takashi shirogane #lance mcclain #they so cute #i want this in my life

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zesstie · 1 year

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God, sunlight feels so good. Lance missed it. It’s really such a nice way to wake up. Warm sunbeams on your bare skin, a gentle brightening of the room; God, it even makes the room smell better… it sucks so bad that his room in the castle doesn’t have any windows. He’s so glad to finally be getting some now.

Lance shoots awake in a panic.

He should not be feeling sunlight on his skin right now.

He takes a half second to wake up fully, taking in the clean white sheets tangled around his hips, the sterile boringness of the room, the giant window with a sparkly view.

Oh, right. They stopped on what was essentially a Vegas planet yesterday to get a specific part for one of the castle’s reactors, and then he, Hunk, and Pidge convinced Shiro to let them hit the casinos for a bit.

The rest of the night is a blur.

“What the fuck did I do last night?” Lance mumbles, shifting around to stretch a bit. His hip bumps into a lump in the bed — a person-sized lump — and the movement makes him suddenly aware of a soreness in his rear.

His face heats up.

Oh.

That’s what he was doing last night.

Makes sense, he supposes. Drunk Lance is either extremely affectionate or extremely horny, so it was really only a matter of time. He rubs his eyes, then drags his hand down his face. Fuck. He’s gonna have a helluva time explaining this one to the team.

Fuck!

With a renewed panic, he throws himself out of the bed, tripping out of the sheets and looking around desperately for his clothes. Fuck fuck fuck! He is supposed to be on the castle right now!

He finally manages to locate his boxers, yanking them up his legs as he checks his watch. 5:13. Okay, not ideal, but no one’s usually awake before seven, so if he grabs some coffee or something on his way in he should be able to make it without making anyone suspicious —

“Lance, please shut the fuck up,” mumbles a grouchy voice, tinged with sleep, and Lance’s heart drops to his throat.

“Keith?!”

Keith drags himself upright, black hair a rat’s nest around his head, and glares heavily, shielding his eyes from the sun.

“What part of shut the fuck up do you not understand, God, it’s like your voice is actively bashing into my head —”

Lance registers the exact second Keith awakes fully, because his eyes widen and he yelps, yanking the sheets up his chest.

“Oh my God!”

“Oh, drop the fucking sheet,” Lance snaps, face flaming. “It’s obviously not something I haven’t seen before.”

Keith thankfully does let go of the sheet, using his hands to yank on his hair instead.

“Fuck,” he says, turning panicked eyes to Lance. “Oh, we fucked up, we fucked up good —”

“Why, thank you, Keith, that’s oh so lovely to hear from you in this situation —”

“Fuck, we gotta call Shiro —”

Lance abandons his search for pants and lunges towards Keith, yanking the comm out of his hands and throwing it randomly behind him.

“Are you cracked in the fucking head,” he hisses.

“My comm!” Keith cries. He throws off the sheets and stumbles in vague direction Lance threw it, ass fucking naked.

“Put some goddamn pants on!” Lance shouts, whipping a pillow at Keith’s chest and frantically looking away, pretending his did not just get and eyeful and that said eyeful was not an objectively kind of a nice one.

“Piss off,” Keith snaps, face red, but dutifully locates his pants and puts them on before continuing. “I’m calling Shiro now.”

Resisting the urge to tackle the thick-headed dumbass to the ground, Lance forces himself to stay where he is.

“Do you want to be lectured for three straight days?” he demands.

That makes Keith pause. “It won’t be that long.”

“Sure, but then what? He’s going to be mad, Keith. Or at least disappointed. And you know we’ll be assigned the most boring missions possible until he forgets about it, and who knows how long that will take?”

Keith hesitates a moment, then sighs, giving up on his search for his comm and flopping back on the bed.

“Fuck,” he mumbles, face muffled in a pillow. “This sucks. And my head hurts.”

Lance reaches out, pressing his hand to Keith’s forehead — it’s definitely a little hot. Keith groans, wrapping his hand around Lance’s wrist and holding tightly.

“God, your fingers are freezing. Do not move them.”

Despite the situation, Lance smiles, brushing his fingers carefully through Keith’s fringe.

“Let me go. I have painkillers and peppermint oil in my jacket pocket, it should help.”

“Mmf. Fine.”

As soon as Lance’s hand is relinquished, he pulls away, hunting around the mess on the floor for his clothes. He finds his jeans first, but can’t find his shirt — only Keith’s black one, and a white shirt with some text on it.

“Keith?” he calls, pulling it on and tilting his head down to read it. “Why has my shirt been replaced with one that reads ‘SEAT RESERVED FOR DILFS’ with an arrow pointing to my face?”

Keith props himself up his elbows, squints at the shirt, and then winces.

“I may have,” he says reluctantly, “the faintest memory of throwing up on your shirt. So. I imagine you replaced it.”

Lance pouts. “Aw, man. I liked that shirt.”

“Sorry.”

“Not your fault. You are getting me a new shirt that I can wear without getting mocked, though.”

“Noted. What’s the ETA on that advil, by the way?”

“Coming, Mr. Impatience,” Lance mumbles, finally locating his jacket. (Thankfully Keith didn’t throw up on that, or Lance would have to kill him.) He digs around in his pockets, finding the peppermint oil where it usually is, but not the advil. He flips his other pockets inside out, and thankfully the bottle comes tumbling out, along with two slips of paper. He hands to pills to Keith, along with a bottle of water and the oil, and then reads the papers curiously.

His eyes widen.

“Keith,” he says, voice strained, “I have some very good news, and then some very bad news.”

“Good news first,” Keith says immediately.

Predictable.

Lance hands Keith the smaller slip of paper. Keith squints again, harder this time, bringing the paper close to his face.

Lance rolls his eyes.

“Coran had reading glasses made for you, you know. Months ago. How many times have I told them to bring them with you places?”

“I don’t need them,” Keith insists, paper perhaps an inch from his face. “I’m just — hungover.”

“Okay, dumbass.”

It takes Keith a second to read it — really, Lance might start carting around his glasses for him — and then his eyes get just as wide as Lance were.

“That’s a lot of zeros,” he says quietly.

Lance snorts. “Sure is. Apparently we’re very good at card games when we’re drunk. Or very lucky at one game.”

“Apparently,” Keith agrees. He looks back down at the paper, whistling. “You’re gonna have a hard time finding bad news bad enough to beat this, I think.”

Lance grimaces. He glances down at the bigger, fancier paper, then hands it to Keith.

“I really don’t think so.”

This paper is a lot easier for him to read — it would be hard for him to miss the giant ‘CERTIFICATE OF MARRIAGE’ printed in bold at the top of it.

“Oh, shit,” he says weakly. He glances at Lance’s hands. “I guess that explains why you’re wearing my dad’s ring.”

Lance stares at his left hand in horror, where, on his fourth finger, shines a red stone inlaid in heavy gold — Keith’s father’s ring, that he’s never once taken off his pinky in all the time Lance has known him.

“Fuck!” Lance exclaims, immediately taking it off to give back to Keith. He knows how much that ring means to him.

Only — the ring isn’t coming off.

“I can’t get it off,” Lance says, looking at Keith in a panic. Keith looks back, just as freaked.

“It’s stuck?”

“No, it’s not — it’s not tight, I can move it and my fingers are narrow, but it’s not coming off!”

“How is that even possible?”

Lance pulls on the ring until it hurts, twisting it every which way and shaking his hand roughly. “I don’t know!”

“Here, just — stop freaking out,” Keith orders. Lance freezes, heart pounding. Keith slowly reaches over and wraps his left hand around Lance’s wrist, right hand on the ring. Lance has a sudden, vivid memory of their hands in the exact same position, stood in front of an alien with bright pink hair and dressed like fuckin’ Elvis, because of course they were, only in the memory Keith is sliding the ring on instead of trying to pull it off.

“Okay, that’s weird,” Keith says, finally giving up after pulling hard enough to make Lance wince. “It must be the marriage ritual in this place, or something. Alien magic, I dunno.”

“There has to be something we can do,” Lance says, snatching back their marriage certificate — their fucking marriage certificate, dear God — and reading it over carefully.

“Here!” Lance points out a tiny block of text near to corner, then reads aloud for Keith’s benefit. “Klent City State 347th Union Office.”

Keith sighs in relief. “Oh, thank God. We’ll just explain the situation to them, and boom. Annulment. Problem over, we rush back to the castle before anyone else wakes up, and then we never speak of this again. Perfect.”

Lance nods, swallowing around the sudden bile in his throat. “Yeah. Perfect. Get dressed, Mullet. We have a divorce to attend.”

Keith snorts, rolling back off the bed and digging around for his dumbass go-go boots and jacket.

Once he looks away, Lance allows himself a pained wince, pressing his fingers to his eyes and scrunching his shoulders up to his ears.

“Lance? You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Lance says, pulling his hands away and straightening himself out. “Just — I’m fine. Don’t worry about it.”

Keith, obviously, does not do that, because he is incapable of following instructions. He presses his hand to Lance’s forehead in a mirror of what Lance did earlier.

“You hungover, too?”

Lance shakes his head. “No, it’s not that. I don’t get hungover.”

Keith raises an eyebrow.

“Seriously,” Lance insists. “I drink lots of water when I drink, and besides that, I never really have enough alcohol to get hungover in the first place. I am essentially a toothbrush bristle, Keith. I get drunk off, like, two drinks.”

Keith snorts. “You had a lot more than two drinks last night, if I’m remembering correctly.”

Lance flushes. Keith is remembering correctly. Lance hadn’t even intended to drink last night — he wanted to have fun and be sober — but he’d gotten bored watching Hunk and Pidge demolish the slot machines, and he didn’t feel like helping Shiro and Allura supervise Coran, so he went to go find and bother Keith. Unfortunately, he found Keith leaning close to some guy, laughing brightly, his hand on Keith’s bicep, and he’d tipped back an entire line of shots before he could convince himself not to be a dumbass.

Not that Keith needs to know that. Not that it even means anything.

“I got bored,” Lance says instead, which isn’t even technically a lie. “But, no. I’m not hungover. I’m just — um, it was a big night last night. Lots of light and sound. I’m a little overwhelmed and oversensitive.”

“Oh.”

“Mhm.”

A minute later, something is being placed on his head. Lance looks up in surprise at Keith, who just smiles sheepishly.

“No idea why there is a sparkly pink ball cap with my clothes, but you need it more than me.”

Lance laughs brightly. “Oh, I remember this one! You remember when we were first running away from everyone else? Hunk was on our tail at some point, so I decided to steal your hair band and shoot him with it to distract him. Then you were moping about your hair in your eyes, though, and you grabbed the hat right off some dude’s head.”

Keith’s jaw drops. “I did not.”

“You really did, dude,” Lance says, grinning. “Clean off his damn head. Then you walked off like it was nothing.”

Keith shakes his head at himself, snorting. “Whoops. Sorry, Random Alien Dude.” He pauses for a minute, checking his watch. “Hey, we still have a little over an hour before everyone else gets up. Do you think we can grab some food on the way? I’m starving.”

“Shocking,” Lance says drily, but makes no argument. He could go for some shitty fast food too, honestly. They make their way out of the hotel, both of them wincing at the brightness when they finally make it outside, and head to the nearest brightly lit sign that offers grease and salt.

“Good thing we’re billionaires now,” Keith teases. “We wouldn’t be able to afford this otherwise, because your drunk ass was losing at every game we played.”

“I was not!” Lance says indignantly, but Keith pays him no heed.

“You were so. You only started winning when I was blowing on the dice.” He smiles smugly, poking Lance in the cheek. “You suck at poker, dude.”

Lance huffs, reaching over and stealing one of Keith’s fries as revenge.

“Hey! Paws off! You have your own!”

“You’re being a dick, and you upchucked on my favourite shirt last night,” Lance points out. “I deserve at least half of your fries.”

Keith inclines his head. “Yeah, alright, fair. But if it makes you feel any better, I couldn’t find my boxers and these pants are tight as hell, so I promise I am also suffering.”

Lance eyes, without his permission, glance down at the front of Keith’s pants. He flushes.

“That does make me feel better.”

Because Keith is suffering. That’s why.

…Whatever.

“Hey, by the way,” Keith says, swallowing his last bite of food. “How come you’re limping?”

Lance could smack him. Honestly.

“Why do you think, dumbass?” he snaps. “I’m not…used to this kind of thing. Or whatever.”

It takes a moment for Keith to clue in, but when he does, his eyes go wide and he freezes in his tracks.

“Please tell me I did not just take your fucking virginity.”

He looks so genuinely horrified that Lance can’t help himself, so he rears back and punches Keith in the arm as hard as he can.

“Ow!”

“I don’t buy into that shit, so don’t flatter yourself,” Lance says harshly. “It’s the most dumbass idea I’ve ever heard. So what last night was my first time? It doesn’t — don’t be an idiot about it.”

Keith glares at him for a moment, rubbing his arm — in hindsight Lance could have probably held back a little, he’s definitely going to bruise — but then sighs.

“Yeah, sorry,” he relents. His face turns slightly teasing. “I just — I guess I just didn’t expect that from you, Loverboy.”

Lance scowls. “It makes perfect sense! I bet your first time was some rushed and unsatisfying bullshit on a random couch in an unsupervised room.”

That makes Keith frown, looking at Lance strangely. “There’s no possible way you know that.”

“Of course I know that, because it was the fucking Garrison, man. That’s what everyone did. I have no interest in that garbage. I want it slow and on a nice bed or I don’t want it at all.” He flushes up to his ears, realising what he said. “Or — I did want that. Whatever.”

Keith is quiet for a long time as they walk, and the tension is so thick that Lance almost considers giving up and calling Shiro despite his whole tantrum earlier.

“I hope it was like that,” Keith says quietly.

Lance thinks back to all he can remember last night — it’s not much, but he does remember it, remembers them clumsy and drunk and laughing and affectionate. He remembers how Keith had kissed him softly, pressed him gently into the mattress, how the skin of his hands had been rough under his gloves, tangled with Lance’s beside his head. He remembers how Lance’s ring — Keith’s ring, Keith’s ring, they’re not really married — had glittered in the dim light of the room, how the same soft glow had been reflected in Keith’s indigo eyes. He remembers feeling so loved his chest hurt with it.

But Keith doesn’t remember — ‘I hope it was like that’, he’d said. He doesn’t know.

And it doesn’t matter, anyway.

“I don’t remember,” Lance lies. The words burn his mouth.

Both of them are quiet. Bitterly, Lance wonders if their relationship is ever going to be the same, or if everything they’ve ever built is ruined. If Lance ruined everything. Fuck, and he and Keith worked so hard, too. They both put so much fucking effort into their relationship. And Lance cherishes it — he really does. He likes having someone who’s just as competitive as him, grinning at him as they train, teasing and taunting as they spar. He likes having someone to look just as lost and confused with when Hunk and Pidge start talking tech. He likes having someone who will strike goofy superhero poses behind Shiro’s back whenever the man says something particularly Captain-America-ish. He likes having someone sit carefully next to him on the observation deck on bad nights, asking him to tell stories of his family to ease the hurt.

He likes being Keith’s friend. He hates that he ruined it with his stupid, stupid feelings. He should’ve just let Keith flirt with the alien dude. He should’ve stuck with Hunk and Pidge. Hell, he should’ve let Hunk bust out the Drunk Lance Backpack Leash —

He startles when a warm hand grabs his, tangling their fingers together.

“Keith?”

“Alien marriage magic,” Keith says, looking straight ahead.

“Huh?“

“I keep getting — urges,” Keith explains. His cheeks are red. “I keep wanting to — touch you, or whatever. It must be the bonding magic.”

Lance swallows roughly, looking away. He should really pull away. He’s only making things worse for himself. He should let go, maybe even sidestep away.

Instead he tightens his grip, and steps even closer.

“Must be.”

Lance can’t bring himself to look at Keith for the rest of their walk. There’s no point in making things even harder for himself, after all. Eventually Keith is going to let go, and their going to get their wrongful marriage rightfully annulled, and Lance is going to give back his ring — not his fucking ring, God, why has he become so possessive over it already? It’s only been one night, and barely! — and they’re both going to go home and pretend this never happened. Just like Keith said.

Except it did happen.

And Lance won’t forget it.

“We’re here,” Keith says quietly, jutting his chin at a flashing neon sign.

“Real tasteful of us,” Lance mutters as he looks at it. Keith snorts.

“Practically a destination wedding,” he agrees. Despite himself, Lance smiles.

Keith lets go of his hand to push open the doors. Lance does a very good job of not crying about it, which is excellent. Point to Lance for that one.

“Hello, there,” greets a woman, smiling kindly. “Come to get married?”

Lance winces. He wonders how he looks at Keith for her to assume that.

He’s taking back that mental point he just gave himself. He does not deserve it.

“Uh, opposite, actually,” Keith says. He clears his throat, embarrassed. “We got drunk and hitched last night? And now my dad’s ring is stuck on his finger. So. We were wondering if you could fix that.”

The woman looks a strange mix of pitying and amused. “Yes, that would be the bonding spell. Interesting that it worked on you both, if you were as inebriated as you say.”

Lance furrowed his eyebrows. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, nothing important,” she says, waving a dismissing hand. “If you wish to annul your union, I can do that for you.”

“That would be great,” Keith says.

Lance says nothing.

“Alright, then. Hold out your hands and close your eyes.”

Both of them do. Lance feels something ticklish and breezy wrap around his hands, and something glows brightly enough that he can feel it even with his eyes closed.

“Now, all magic bonds work on two things: consent, and desire. The breaking of those bonds is very similar. Both of you must envision your ties together, specifically those of marital union, and then use your desire to be unmarried to envision those ties broken.”

Lance squeezes his eyes shut tighter, trying to envision his bond with Keith. He’s not one hundred percent sure what that means, so instead he tries to picture Keith, just as he is. He thinks of sly smiles showing the barest peek of crooked incisors, of a strong hand on the small of his back when Lance gets overwhelmed, of a gravelly voice whispering ‘I bet they’re waiting for you, Lance, and when you come back to them it’s going to be great,’ of the scent of pine and sandalwood, somehow, even in space. And then he envisions Keith’s panicked face when he woke up, when he saw that it was Lance that he spent the night with. He envisions the steadiness in Keith’s voice as he asked the woman for their annulment.

The glow burns brightly, strong enough to hurt his eyes through his eyelids, and then there’s nothing.

“Did it work?”

“If you both followed the instructions, yes.”

Lance opens his eyes, glancing over at Keith’s expectant face. He swallows the lump in his throat, and forced himself to wrap his fingers around his ring — not his fucking ring — and pull.

It doesn’t move.

“It’s still stuck,” Lance says desperately. He pulls harder on the ring, more and more panicked by the second.

“Shit, Lance, don’t hurt yourself —”

“I’m — I’m pulling, and I followed to instructions, I envisioned the broken bonds —”

“Both of you followed instructions?” the woman interrupts.

“Just as you explained,” Keith says. “Our bond, and then envisioned it breaking.”

She raises her eyebrow. “Hm. That’s strange. I’ve never seen the ritual fail for two willing parties before.”

“Fuck,” Keith whispers, dragging his hand down his face. “This is bad. Did it maybe not work because we’re human? Well, I’m half-human, but still.”

“We’re a largely tourist-oriented planet,” the woman explains. “Most people who come to this office are not native here. There is no reason your species should have affected the spell.”

“Yeah, I get that, but humans have never been to space before, so maybe —”

“It’s my fault,” Lance blurts. He shrinks back at their questioning looks. He looks down at his hands, twisting his ring — fuck — around his finger.

“Lance?“ Keith asks quietly.

“I don’t want to get divorced,” Lance admits. He’s ashamed to feel tears welling up in his eyes. “I’m sorry, I know it’s not fair, I’ll try to ignore it, but —” He looks down at his feet, voice small. “I don’t want to get divorced.”

“Oh, thank God,” Keith says, and before Lance can even process, Keith strides towards him, cradling his face in his hands, and kisses him soundly.

“Wha —” Lance mumbles against chapped lips, confused and scared and unable to shake the hurt built in his chest quite yet. “You —?”

“So long,” Keith whispers, pulling away and then pressing back in again like he can’t help himself. “I — I’ve loved you for so long, Lance.”

Lance feels the tears leak finally from his eyes, dripping onto Keith’s cheeks. “Really?”

Keith pulls away for real this time, resting his forehead against Lance’s and laughing softly. “You have no fucking idea. You’re just — you are everything I’ve ever wanted. When I woke up this morning and saw my ring on your finger I thought I was still dreaming.”

Lance’s hands loosen their grip on Keith’s shirt, resting open-palmed on his chest. “But you wanted the annulment.”

“I wanted you to be happy,” Keith corrects. “I want you to be happy. Ideally with me, but — you were so panicked, this morning. I don’t want you to be tied down with someone you don’t want.”

“I want,” Lance says quickly. “I have — I love you, too. Always. Since the Garrison, probably.”

Keith grins. “Even when we were rivals?”

“We’re still rivals, Mullet. If you think I’m going to stop kicking your ass just because you’re my husband then you’re solely mistaken — oh my God. You’re my husband.”

“Yeah, hopefully.”

“No, Keith —” Lance pulls away slightly, so he can look up at Keith with the appropriate amount of panic. “What are we going to tell the team?”

But instead of freaking out like Lance expects, Keith is totally calm. Amused, even. He slides his hand down from Lance’s face to his hand, pulling it up to his mouth and pressed a soft kiss just below his knuckles, right above his — his! — ring.

“That I went to space Vegas and married the love of my life,” he says. He shifts slightly, turning Lance’s hand to press a kiss to his wrist.

“That I gave him the ring that I got from my father and he got from his grandfather and I’m happy I did.” He pulls up Lance’s sleeve, kissing the middle of his forearm.

“That I don’t regret it for anything, and would do it again in a second.” Three kisses, slowly, one after the other, up his bicep.

“That I look at him and every day is brighter. That even drunk me looked into those gorgeous brown eyes and couldn’t think of anything but being with him forever.” A lingering kiss to his shoulder, then a trail of them to his neck, where Lance can feel him smirk.

“That I got hitched and then spent an amazing night after doing more than just kissi—”

“Okay,” Lance interrupts, pressing his hand over Keith’s mouth and going red. Keith presses a kiss to his palm, eyes sparking in amusement. “I got it, Gomez. We’re telling them the truth. Maybe cool it a little.”

“For now,” Keith agrees, muffled.

Lance shakes, pulling his hand back and looking away. After a second or too he rolls his eyes at himself — why the hell is he holding back? — and presses a another long, lingering kiss to Keith’s lips.

“Ditto, by the way. With — all that mushy shit.”

Keith snorts. “Poet, you are.”

“Roses are red, violets are blue, shut the fuck up.”

That makes Keith laugh outright, pressing their lips together one last time before pulling away. He turns toward the officiant woman, who thankfully looks amused.

“Uh, sorry for wasting your time.”

“All is well,” she says, smiling slyly. “That was the most entertainment I’ve had in a long time. Enjoy your day, boys.”

Smiling like fools, they duck out of the office, giggling as they stumble back in the direction of the castle.

“Shiro is going to give us so many chores,” Lance says brightly.

“So many,” Keith agrees.

“And Hunk and Pidge are going to tease us for eternity.”

“Mhm.”

“Allura too, probably.”

“Most likely.”

“Coran’ll be on our side, though.”

Keith stops, wrapping his arms around Lance’s waist and dipping him before kissing him again.

“You’re a sappy loser,” Lance informs him.

“You love me so much you couldn’t even pretend to want a divorce,” Keith shoots back.

Lance sighs happily. “Not even a little.”

And God, is he ever grateful for that.

#idiots to lovers #vld #voltron #klance #lance #lance mcclain #keith #keith kogane #pining lance #oh my fucking god #why are they like this

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