4:15 in the morning was the quietest time in the Garrison.
Pidge was usually asleep by 3:30, 4:00 when they lost track of time. The glow from underneath their door was gone and a single small fan could be heard, but only if someone pressed their ear to the crack between the door and the doorframe. They slept silently, and the fan covered up any of their breaths that could have been heard otherwise.
Keith and Shiro both woke up at 4:30 to train together, it was something they had started back before Kerberos. They continued doing it in the Castle, and now that they were back on Earth, they went straight back into their routine.
Hunk was asleep from 10:00 to 5:00, almost on the dot. Lance had been his roommate for years and it was freakish how punctual he was about it. Surprisingly though, he didn't snore. Lance had fully expected him to saw some serious logs, but he had been pleasantly surprised when his nights were quieter here than back home with his brothers and sisters and nieces and nephews.
4:30 was a changing of shift for every one positioned at their respective stations. The computer technicians were too tired to do anything except stare at their respective monitors. It was too late to get a new cup of coffee, but their last ones had already worn off. The guards posted systematically around the base stopped doing their rounds, content to wait for the next set to relieve them of their duties. The new set of guards and technicians would start arriving around 4:20 bringing energy and caffeinated happiness to the environment.
4:15 in the morning was the quietest time in the Garrison.
This was exactly why it was the time when Lance let his thoughts wander. He crept out of his room, past the stationary guards that were practically falling asleep at their posts. He walked right out to the cliff's edge where he let his legs dangle precariously off of the edge. The dry desert wind picked at his clothes and flung some dust through the air towards him.
He closed his eyes against the grains and when the sand settled around him, he opened them again. The rock felt cool through the thin material of his shirt as he laid down and looked at the stars. The vastness struck him once again. Just a few days ago, they had been up there, among the stars. After being up there so much, he had almost forgotten what it was like to look at the stars from Earth.
Lance smiled as he traced out the constellations. He imagined his younger family members huddled around his legs as they pointed at different stars. "What's that one, Uncle Lance?" They would ask. "Those right there look a little like a bunny, is that a constipation?" "Is there an archer star, I wanna be an archer when I grow up, like Robin Hood."
He would laugh and tell them that the star she was pointing to was called Polaris; it was how people could find their way in the night. They're called constellations, not constipations. He would trace Orion out and say that there were several stars because an archer could never be just one.
His legs felt cold where they would have gripped his calves like lifelines, trying to wean as much information of the infinite sky as they could from him. The wind tugged at the jeans he was wearing in a crude imitation of their insistent hands.
New memories floated to the forefront of his brain. He was looking at an entirely different set of stars; there was no North Star to guide his way. Pidge was sitting on the floor in front of him, their hands flying across the keyboard of their laptop as lines of code floated across the round glasses.
Hunk was to his right, offering everyone his newest culinary creation as they sat down. It looked like some type of popcorn covered in a neon green sauce, but it tasted like chocolate cake, so no one was really complaining.
The Alteans were in the corner, looking at the stars together, trying to piece the sky from Altea together. They pointed to different stars, rearranging them in their mind's eye.
Shiro stood behind him, his metal hand cold on Lance's shoulder as he looked out at the stars in front of them. He was getting far more from the black abyss with little white glowing specks than anyone else. Lance sometimes wondered what he saw when he looked at nothing.
And to his left was Keith. He was wearing a slight smile on his lips, as if he was remembering a joke that was told a few minutes ago. Lance's arm was thrown over his shoulder and pulled him into a half-embrace.
Two separate memories looking at two separate skies with two separate families.
Lance really was lucky, wasn't he? He had two families.
But where did he really belong? On Voltron, he was the second best blue paladin and the second best red paladin. Allura had surpassed his abilities in no time at all, and there was no way that he would ever measure up to Keith. Black would never accept him.
And here on Earth… He was the brother who went missing and came back a hero.
He had told Keith back when Shiro had first come back that maybe he should leave Voltron. Maybe this was his cue to finally make good on that. What was he really? Blue and Allura had gotten along just fine together. Griffin seemed to handle himself well out in the field; maybe he could take over Red. He definitely had the impulse control for it.
He wasn't wanted on the team anyway. Hunk and Pidge got their technology fix from each other. Allura was just using him to soften the heartbreak that Lotor put her through. He knew that's what she was doing, and he knew that getting attached was only going to hurt him more in the long run. Maybe if he left now, then it would hurt less.
And Keith… I don't have time for this the words 'I don't have time for you' clearly implied. I just don't want to be stuck here for eternity with Lance.
No, Keith didn't want him on the team.
A boot scuffed against the ground behind him and Lance launched himself straight up. He almost lost his balance on the precipice of the cliff's edge, but caught himself before he could accidentally die, again he thought bitterly.
He turned to look at who had almost scared him to death and blue eyes met purple ones. Think of the Devil he thought and turned away from Keith. He expected the black paladin to continue walking, go wherever it is he was going.
Instead, he sat down next to the red paladin. The awkward silence was palpable. Craning his head to look at the stars was beginning to hurt, and he didn't think that staring down the steep drop right below him would send the right message. There was nothing in front of him for miles, maybe a cactus or two, but that would be it.
That only left staring at Keith.
Keith who had closed his eyes, breathing calmly with the wind. He was leaning his weight back on his hands with his face turned toward the sky. His legs swung idly in the empty air below them. Pale skin looked so smooth beneath the full moon and even though Lance knew the scar that was burned into his other side, from here, he looked totally human. He looked totally vulnerable.
No matter what everyone says, Lance knew that he had definitely gotten bigger over the course of those two months that he was gone. His chest had widened and his biceps had grown far more muscular. He looked so mature, here in the moonlight with no one else to see him.
Keith's neck was bared and his Adam's apple arched magnificently towards the stars. Lance let his eyes drift up the curve of his neck and to the black paladin's lips. He tried to ignore Polaris right above them, almost nestled in the crevice between them. It's how people find their way in the night his own voice echoed back at him and he shivered even in the warm desert air.
His eyes drifted further up and locked with piercing, violet ones. Heat rose to his face even as Keith smirked. "See something you like?" He asked and his purple eyes reflected the stars brilliantly back at the red paladin.
Lance scoffed, hoping that the moon's light was dim enough and his skin dark enough to hide the blood rushing to his cheeks, warming his face. "No." He said. Yes. He thought. He turned his face back to the sky, hoping to maybe distract himself.
"Well that's a shame," Keith sighed heavily, "Because I sure do."
Lance's head swiveled to look at him, expecting to see the black looking up at the stars, or out across the flat plains. Instead, Keith was looking directly at him.
Neither of them could look away, they were caught drowning in each other. Each was pulled to the other like a magnet, their faces getting closer and closer and neither was doing anything to stop it. Neither wanted to do anything to stop it.
They could feel the other's breath on their lips, so close, so close, so close to where they both wanted to be, to touch, to feel.
Lance looked away.
He couldn't- couldn't do this. Not here, not now, not under the stars that urged him to find his way in Keith. He was leaving Voltron, wasn't he? He should be cutting all ties, not making new ones.
"I'm leaving Voltron." He whispered. The words shattered whatever peace they had created. They were like a gunshot, coming out fast and bitter, and only doing harm.
Keith looked stricken. He shook his head, hoping -praying- that he had heard Lance wrong. "What?"
"You heard me." The red paladin said, louder this time. "I'm leaving Voltron." He looked down at his dust-covered hands and down at the bottom of the cliff below him. He looked anywhere but at Keith.
"Why?" Keith choked out past the growing lump in his throat. He had just gotten back from the Blades and joined Voltron again. He had finally been reunited with his family. He couldn't lose Lance now, not when he had been so close. Hadn't he already lost enough?
Lance glared at him, real malice in his eyes. "What do you mean 'why'?" He spat. "You guys don't need me. I'm just a fifth wheel, seventh if you count Allura and Coran. I'm just along for the ride."
The black paladin shook his head. "Lance, what are you talking about? What have any of us ever said that made you think that we don't need you?"
"Oh let me think." Lance sneered sarcastically. "Would you like the list in chronological or alphabetical order? And, yes, I do know what chronological means. I'm not as dumb as you guys think I am."
"We don't think you're dumb." Keith defended dumbly.
"Yeah, you do. You just think you're being smart about it. You toss in convenient explanations whenever I'm in the room that you never would if you were alone. Every mission I'm in, you outline as carefully as you can, making sure that I understand everything that's in it. The amount of knowledge in my brain can fill a paper airplane can't it, Keith?" The words stabbed straight into him. He had said that so long ago, he barely remembered it. He never expected Lance to.
"Let's get on with the list now, shall we? Let's start with you. 'Move, Lance, I don't have time for this.' You know what Keith? A simple 'hello' is faster and easier to say. Not to mention that it's a whole lot nicer. 'I just don't want to spend eternity with Lance.' Eternity is a long-ass time, you know. I get that, you don't want to be around me for that long. I wouldn't want to be around me for that long. That doesn't mean you have to say it to my face."
"No, let me explain-"
Lance interrupted him before he could finish. "What is there to explain, Keith? And what was all of that just now? Before? You can't have Acxa, so you decide you'll settle for me? Is that it? Well, sorry, but I'm already someone's back up choice so you're going to have to find someone else."
"Would you just shut up and listen to me?!" Keith practically screamed. "I know I've said some hurtful things to you. I know that I can be impulsive and reckless and act before thinking, but believe me when I tell you that I've never thought more about what I was doing than just now.
"Acxa isn't my first choice. She isn't even on the roster. You are and always will be my first choice. The stupid game show was- I hated it. I hated Bob, I hated the game, I hated the stupid Pictionary thing that we had to do, I hated everything about it.
"I figured that if only one of us could get out, I wanted it to be you. You have the big family back home that you never shut up about and I could tell they loved you and you loved them just by the stories. I wanted you to save that. When I saw you and your family reunite here on Earth, I knew, even though it didn't happen, that I had made the right choice.
"You're too… Lance to be locked up away for all eternity to suffer at the hands of some sadistic psychopath. I couldn't condemn you to that. Then, none of the others voted for you and I couldn't believe it.
"Then when I came back with mom and Romelle and… Kosmo… I had important information about Lotor and I thought he was still on the ship. I thought you were in danger, and you were just going to try and rope me into bickering with you. I didn't have time for that. Don't ever think that I didn't have time for you."
Keith stopped talking; he was out of breath. The entire time, he hadn't looked at Lance, too afraid at how he would react. Now, he raised his gaze to look at Lance, who's skin was practically glowing in the moonlight. "That's what I really mean." He whispered.
He drew closer to Lance, slow enough that he could pull away, but fast enough that he knew what was happening. They rested their foreheads together and their fingers interlocked beneath them.
Lance stared intently at their hands, "Am I really your first choice? Is that really what you meant?"
Keith nodded instantly. "Yes."
"Then kiss me."
Without any hesitation, Keith tipped Lance's head back and captured his lips with his own. Lance's lips were perfectly soft, and he frowned slightly against Keith's chapped ones. It was like kissing sandpaper. They would have to work on that.
The red paladin reached a hand up to cup Keith's face, but their fingers were still locked together. They broke apart easily; they had been testing the waters. Keith pulled the darker hand toward him and pressed his chapped lips to it, they were still dry, even though they had just kissed.
Lance felt his face heat up as he kept his eyes on Keith.
He wanted to savor this image, looking at Keith under the light of a full moon. His skin was glowing, and he was smiling. The light of the North Star shone from straight above his head.
This is my way; my way is with Keith.
He closed his eyes and leaned in for another kiss, smiling.
And then it was gone.
He was laying in his bed in the hospital. One of the bears that his nephews had brought him was clutched in his hand like a lifeline. He felt the tears on his face with his other hand and turned over in his bed. The clock read 4:15.
4:15 in the morning was the quietest time in the Garrison.
It was also the loneliest.