I missed his birthday by a few hours, its fine, nobody knows, shh. Happy birthday, blue space boy. Sorry I didn't write a fic for the other Paladin's birthdays that have passed, I forgot and by the time I realised it, it was too late. But, I luckily remembered Lance's! I'm really tired and am trusting autocorrect, so apologies in advance for any spelling or grammar errors. Enjoy!
Lance's headphones were pulled off his head along with his eye mask as he was pulled from sleep and was greeted by Pidge's devious grin. She was dressed in her sleeping clothes and Lance immediately knew by the look on her face that she had something planned.
"Morning, Lance!" She said in a cheerful voice before holding out his eye mask again," Put this back on, we've got a surprise waiting on you."
He laughed before slipping the mask over his eyes again," You should at least ask me out to dinner first."
Before Lance could say anything else, he felt two small hands pull him out of his bed and onto his feet," Um, Pidge, I can't see."
"It's fine, don't worry. I'm just going to push you in the right direction and I'll tell you if you're about to run into a wall or something." Pidge's voice came from behind him as he felt her hands pushing him forward. The tone she was speaking in made Lance worry about what she was planning, but he walked forward anyways. After a few steps, he knew that he was out of his room and headed toward the main room of the castle.
Pidge pushed him through a large doorway and spoke in an excited tone," You can take the mask off now!"
When Lance opened his eyes he momentarily saw darkness before the lights came on and he was speechless from what he saw. His friends all stood in front of him underneath a banner that hung from the ceiling with the words 'Happy Birthday Lance!' written in blue letters. Hunk and Keith held a light blue cake in between them and beamed at Lance as Shiro stood with a grin on his face. Allura and Coran looked on with an approving expression as they watched their Paladin's reactions.
Lance smiled so wide it looked as though his face was going to split," Guys, this is just- just amazing! I had completely forgotten it was my birthday." He felt a tear prick at the corner of his eye and quickly brushed it away with his hand before anyone could see. He loved his new family, but this birthday surprise reminded him of what could have been if he had stayed on Earth. A birthday party surrounded by his cousins and mom and dad. Lance felt another tear well up at the thought of his family but shook his head and continued smiling at his friends.
"How did you guys remember it was my birthday? We don't even know what day it is!"
Pidge beamed proudly and looked up at Lance," You may not, but I've been keeping a calendar and syncing it up to the correct days. We all got it accurate by the time your birthday rolled around!"
"Apparently, Earthlings hold a yearly celebration to honour the birth of friends and family. Coran and I were not aware of this, but it turns out that it's great fun!" Allura waved around a string of blue streamers that were wrapped around her hand.
Shiro looked at the Alteans with a bemused expression," It took a bit of explaining to get the idea of what a birthday party was, but eventually they understood."
Laughing at Allura's statement, Lance moved to look at the cake but paused to glance up at the banner which, upon further investigation, had been written wrong the first time. The words were written over the words 'Happy Day of Birth, Blue Paladin'. He immediately knew that Coran had written the first draft, but, judging by the familiar handwriting, Hunk had written over it with the correct phrasing.
"Hunk made you a cake and I tried to help." Lance looked back down and saw Keith blushing slightly as he gestured to the plain blue cake. It was nothing fancy like his mom used to make, but it still meant a lot.
Lance punched Keith playfully on the shoulder and gestured to the cake," You tried to bake? Wow. Anyways, let's put Hunk's cake making skills to the test!"
There were the sounds of agreement rippled through the room as Hunk took the cake in both hands and carried it to the table. They all took the seats in their normal spots while Hunk handed out slices of the completely blue cake.
"How'd you even make this, Hunk? I thought there were no ingredients from Earth out here?" Lance spoke around bits of cake in his mouth and was practically bouncing in his seat, the cake tasted almost exactly like Earth cake.
Hunk smiled proudly and started listing off how he found items like foods from Earth and modified a cake recipe he remembered. It was interesting, but eventually Lance got distracted by the memory of when he and his family would sit around their large table and eat homemade cake whenever someone's birthday arrived.
"Isn't it customary to give gifts to the person whose birthday it is?" Coran piped up when Hunk stopped talking.
He was brought from his nostalgic memory by the excited tone in Coran's voice and nodded," But you guys didn't have to get me anything."
Before he could continue, Lance was pulled from his chair and pushed toward the large couch where six individually wrapped presents sat. He smiled and sat down in between Hunk and Pidge while the others sat on the rest of the couch.
Hunk put his hands together in excitement," Oh, open mine!"
Lance smiled and looked at the square-ish present that had a tag on it that read: From Hunk, To Lance.
After tearing the wrapping paper off, a book bound by some sort of material was revealed. The title was hand written in Hunk's familiar handwriting and it said Lance's Recipe Book.
"It has recipes that I made for you for food I knew you liked back on back on Earth!" Hunk grinned from ear to ear as Lance flipped through the book and smiled fondly at the names of the foods he used to frequently enjoy.
He turned to Hunk and gave him a quick, thankful hug before returning to the other presents," Okay, whose is next?"
"Um, here." Keith shyly scooted forward a unique shaped present and avoided Lance's eyes when he opened it.
The wrapping paper revealed a short knife in a well-kept sheath," Woah, dude, this is awesome!" The knife soundlessly slid out of it's case and into Lance's grip as he tested the wait," I don't normally use knives, but this is definitely cool. Thanks, Keith!"
Keith just nodded and leaned back against the couch as Coran slid his gift forward.
"This is a gift from the Princess and me!" As Lance unwrapped it, Coran kept talking about the gift," It's an old Altean device, but I think it's like an Earth camera!"
A thin screen slipped out of the paper and he quickly caught it from falling to the floor," Does this take pictures?! Oh, this is so awesome!"
Pidge leaned over to look at it with a curious expression, any mention of technology and she was intrigued," It looks almost like a smart phone, try hitting that square button right there."
Lance did so and was surprised at the clicking sound that happened afterword. A small picture promptly slid out of the bottom and showed Lance and Pidge looking down. He laughed and waved it in the air to show the others. They all laughed at the look on the pair's faces in the photo and Lance put the camera down to play with another time.
"Here, Lance. This one's from me." Shiro leaned forward and handed him a circular shaped gift as he placed the previous gift down.
A metal cylinder with a red dot and a lens on one end fell into Lance's hands when he finished taking the paper off it," It's a new scope for my gun! Thanks, Shiro!"
He held it up to his eye and his eye widened as he saw the magnification power that the lens held, it would fit perfectly on his gun.
Pidge slid a small round present toward Lance and he carefully picked it up and unwrapped it. A disk with blue casing on it had the words Blue Paladin engraved into it; and he cautiously pressed a small button on the side. He gasped as a hologram of Earth appeared from the disk and floated calmly above the metal below it. With a slow hand, he touched the hologram and moved his finger to the left causing the image to spin slowly right in front of his eyes.
"Pidge, this is… amazing. I-I can see where we're from," He sniffed and felt really emotional all of the sudden," Do you think they miss me?"
His voice was soft as he spoke and he felt Hunk place a hand on his shoulder and say," Of course they do, they're probably celebrating your birthday right now. All your little cousins are running around the house and screaming like usual."
"Yeah," Lance said," I miss them…"
No one said anything, but Lance felt Pidge lean her weight on him and look at Earth longingly, he knew he wasn't the only one who missed their home.
"Let's all take a picture together. We may have our families back home, but we've made a new one here. Come on in guys!" Lance leaned forward and picked up the camera as Keith, Allura, Coran and Shiro walked over to Lance and hovered around him. Pidge and Hunk smiled sadly but happily at the camera as Lance hit the capture button. Seconds later the photo slid out and they all leaned in to look.
Lance held it up for the others to see and smiled," I call that a family."
It's like 3 in the morning and I just now finished it so I'm trusting autocorrect to check my spelling for me. Sorry if it was short, I'm tired but I still needed to do something for Lance's birthday. Hope you enjoyed, I'm going to go and sleep now! Rip, my non-existent sleep schedule.