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proximity
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It's something like the space equivalent of one am when Shiro finally gives up trying to get any sleep.
He's already woken up twice in a cold sweat, trying to shake off the remnants of unsettling dreams. Or memories, maybe. He doesn't like to think about it and he has no desire to repeat the process. He makes the bed, needlessly tidies up the room, and then leaves it. He tells himself that it's less wandering just to release some of the restless, anxious tension rising in his body and more doing a night patrol - something productive, if not entirely necessary. The whole castle is powered down for some well-deserved rest and recovery. And Shiro knows they're all safe, probably sleeping more soundly than he has any chance of, but he wants to check on the others anyway.
Faint blue light glows from the pillars up and down the hall where the paladins are quartered, taking the edge off the darkness. Shiro's footsteps are soft and careful so the silence goes undisturbed. The first door on his right hardly makes a noise as he pushes the button to open it, and enough dim light to see by slides across the floor of the room.
Hunk is snoring, one leg thrown off the side of the bed. He doesn't heed the light anymore than the draft, and he only turns over, mumbling in his sleep when Shiro lifts his leg back up and secures the blanket over him. In his room across the hall, Lance is piled into the corner with his head under his pillow. When Shiro steps inside to be sure Lance is actually there among the shadow of the bunk and the twisted sheets, he can faintly hear music coming from the headset that has slipped off in Lance's long-limbed spread for comfort. Shiro disentangles it from Lance without waking him and sets it on the bedside shelf.
Keith stirs and looks up before his door is even all the way open, rolling forward onto his elbows, and Shiro feels a pang of guilt for intruding.
"Shiro." Keith is groggy, but trying to be alert, "What's wrong?"
"Just counting heads." Shiro comes in to ruffle Keith's hair and uses the gesture to push his head back down into the pillow. "Get some sleep, Keith. Everything's fine."
Keith makes an uncertain noise, but is evidently not so awake that he cares to argue with any calm reassurance as long as it's coming from Shiro. It helps that there's no alarm going off. Keith curls his arms around the pillow to smother a drowsy exhale, and relaxes again almost at once. Shiro pulls the blanket up to his shoulders and checks Pidge's room next.
It's the only one that's empty.
Shiro hesitates in the door, "Pidge?"
The overhead light reveals the same thing as the semi-darkness: an unmade bed, and some clothes and gadgets, wires, and tools littering the floor. Stepping back out into the hall, Shiro glances up, then down it, and waits a few ticks just to see if they slipped past him to the bathroom and are going to make their way back. When they don't, he extends his search, more curious than worried. Except for that one experience with the tainted galra crystal (and prisoner, but Shiro quickly puts that out of his mind) the castle has proved time and again that it is probably one of the safest places in the universe.
He finds Pidge sitting in the pitch dark in the common room, illuminated by the glow of their active laptop. They're too absorbed in what they're doing to even look up when he comes in, their fingers moving fluidly across the keys, glasses reflecting the screen. Shiro wonders if they can see anything beyond it and clears his throat as he approaches.
Pidge jumps and squeaks, then sighs.
"Oh it's just you, Shiro."
"Yeah, it's just me," Shiro says deprecatingly. He sits beside them on the couch, leans back into the computer light and smiles, "What're you doing up so late?"
"I couldn't sleep," Pidge says.
They're already hammering away at the computer again.
Blocks of coding, both alien and familiar (galra, altean, and earthen), flutter across the screen. Shiro watches with mild interest, trying to parse out what they're doing, but it's a little too fast for him; windows blink into existence, fill with text, a loading bar, flash, and then vanish. Pidge is expressionless, pecking away, but it's without any of their usual enthusiasm.
Shiro has a hunch that there's more to it than couldn't sleep, so he bumps them with an elbow and asks, "Everything okay?"
"I'm fine."
That comes out a little too rehearsed for Shiro's liking, a little too specific, but he doesn't want to put them off by prying. He puts his hands on his knees and slowly rises from the couch.
"If you're sure," he says. Pidge's fingers pause their frenetic tumble over the keyboard and they half look up. Shiro touches their shoulder gently as he steps away and urges, "Just don't stay up too late, Pidge. We've got a busy day ahead of us."
He's halfway to the door when Pidge blurts out, "Wait! Shiro!"
Shiro turns and Pidge clams up, looking uncertain. They sigh again, fiddling with the cable at the side of their computer. They keep their head ducked, then lift one hand to fold the laptop down halfway, so they aren't so fully caught in the light of it. Maybe that helps a little.
"I had a nightmare," Pidge admits, and then quickly adds, "It was dumb. Whatever. But I didn't wanna keep lying there thinking about it, so I thought maybe I'd get some work done, instead…"
Shiro is suddenly very glad to be standing in the dark. He feels his stomach drop a little and is worried it might show on his face. He doesn't even hesitate,
"That isn't dumb, Pidge."
"Yeah, it kinda is," they say, attitude halfhearted at best. They're still fiddling with the laptop, still avoiding looking up, still trying rapidly to brush it off, "I'm a paladin of Voltron! Only babies and Hunk have nightmares - and Hunk's mostly involve food coming to life any trying to eat him and if that isn't totally Classic Hunk I don't know what - "
"Pidge," Shiro insists, and they stop, "It's not dumb."
It's quiet for a full minute.
Pidge scrubs a hand through their hair.
"Okay," they say softly, "Would you - sit up with me a while? I mean," they smirk, lift a shoulder, "Unless you've got something better to do?"
Shiro smiles. "Nothing comes to mind."
He returns to the couch and takes up his seat beside them again, only this time he slumps deeper into the couch than he usually would, so his head is level with Pidge's shoulder instead of the other way around. He folds his arms over his chest once he's comfortable. Pidge reopens their laptop and sets back to work, only to stop, aghast, when Shiro reaches out on a whim to touch the keyboard. He lowers the contrast so that it's no longer blinding the two of them - a beacon of brightness glaring out of the surrounding dark - and wordlessly withdraws his hand.
Pidge shoots him an exasperated look that Shiro makes a point of ignoring, but he decides to play it up and ask, anyway, "You need a light on in here so you can see what you're doing?"
Pidge throws their head back and groans, "It's a backlit screen, grandma, I can see just fine!"
"You'll hurt your eyes."
"I really will not."
"If you say so." He waits a beat. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"About what, my retinas? They're just fine."
"I meant, do you want to talk about your dream maybe?"
Pidge fires back with, "You want to talk about yours?" and Shiro has to relent.
"...Fair enough." He nods to the computer. "Care to explain what you're working on, then?"
That does the trick: Pidge launches into an in-depth explanation, easily finding a rhythm that requires very little audience participation. Shiro does his best to listen, even if he isn't fully processing all of it. The distraction is more for Pidge's benefit than his, anyway. Sometimes talking about something is better than talking about nothing. And he does have to admit - hearing someone else's self-assured, enthusiastic voice stops Shiro's own mind from going back to places that it shouldn't.
Someone's warmth and close proximity puts his body at ease, and he breathes easier, sinking further into the couch.
He closes his eyes without thinking about it.
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By the time Pidge is yawning into their hand and feeling tired again, Shiro is asleep with his chin on his chest, leaning slightly sideways into their shoulder. Belatedly noticing this, Pidge snaps their fingers in his ear, then pinches the bridge of Shiro's nose just to see if he's faking. Shiro's prosthetic arm lifts aimlessly when he huffs for air, but otherwise he doesn't stir.
Pidge lets him go and sits back, and after giving it some thought, moves to get more comfortable. Picking up their laptop, Pidge slips out from under Shiro's weight and props him up better against the cushions so he doesn't slide sideways and startle himself awake. Then they lay down with the laptop resting on their stomach, throwing their legs out across Shiro's lap.
Just because Shiro is going to wake up with a crick in his neck doesn't mean they have to.
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(A/n) Written platonic vld month; day 13 - nightmares. s4 released today and im a mixed bag of emotions so here's this...!
-BobTAC