I Fall in the Dark (your love lights the way) Part Two:
"Blackbody Radiation: Your Soul Shines in the Dark"
And when I tried it
I could see you fall
And I decided
It's not a trip at all
✧・゚: *✧・゚。・:*:・゚: ゚ :・*:・゚✧
So.
Sleep was a scarce commodity on the castle.
Keith knew this first hand. Considering that he was currently traversing the length of a dark hallway well past two hundred hours, castle time, six hundred Earth time, he thought that was a fair statement to make.
Now, he only knew Earth time because Hunk and Pidge had quickly calibrated the clocks on the castle to also synchronize with their old time zone back at the Garrison. Why they had all insisted on this custom was beyond him. Perhaps it was a way to keep themselves grounded in the nebulous, stretching and twisting relativity of space. Perhaps it was a way to keep Pidge and Hunk and Lance's home close. Perhaps it was just simple sentimentality that prompted them to do so.
The hallway was also cold, unlike in the mornings, and oh so quiet. The only company he had was his own soft breathing, and he dared not even to make a sound with the soles of his boots. It made Keith feel formless, like a ghost haunting the ancient halls, only present because something detained him there on the castle. He never knew what that was exactly, but when he sat at the breakfast table with his friends the following morning, he always remembered.
These hallway treks were undertaken after Keith had given up on training for the day – it filled the time before Keith became tired enough to lie down, but it didn't give him a chance to think. He simply existed, allowed himself to forget about his obligations and responsibilities for a short while. Keith literally lived for those responsibilities, of course, but he felt it was healthy to just be for some small amount of time. In many ways it was similar to Shiro's daily meditation session, albeit more active. Keith could never find it within himself to sit still for long periods.
This probably tied in with the fact that Keith had never been able to pull a ten-hour night, had never been able to spend even a third of his life lying in bed; it went against his nature. At some point in his life, Keith had lost that ability to remain passive when he had the option to do something . Perhaps it was a result of being shuffled around from home to home, his own desires and wants rarely considered. He had no control over his own life at that time, so maybe he tried to enact control over all the the things about himself that he could , and it stuck.
It was also the silence of the castle late at night that Keith enjoyed. Perhaps it was less the silence itself, and more so the lack of people. For most of his life, even if he was physically surrounded by people, he was truly and completely alone. Isolation was a treat for Keith, a comfortable, familiar state of being that he reveled in.
Or at least, it had been…
The castle at this time of night wasn't always Keith's solitary domain: Everyone knew first hand that sleep was a precious rarity, like religion in a fascist society, like plant growth in a mountain's rain shadow, like love in a shallowly uncaring world.
Keith stepped through the residence hall, quiet enough that he could hear someone shuffling about in their room… it might have been Pidge. She lived off fiery rage and diehard enthusiasm for tech-related work of any sort, so it made sense that she refused to keep normal active hours – she was far too busy.
Keith often found her in the lab, incessantly tapping away at her laptop. Did she ever actually sleep? Or did she just plug herself into the internet and offload her consciousness into the mainframe for a few hours every night? Keith realistically knew she had to sleep, knew Hunk to come in at ass o' clock and rouse Pidge from her code-induced trance so she could stumble to bed for a precious few hours of shuteye. She's technically still growing , Hunk had said to Keith one night after she had left. She's only fifteen, after all . And they both knew she had an understandably burning desire to be helpful , wanted to update this and fix that and make life easier on them all. Stay one step ahead of the Galra, of whatever electrical disasters were looming over them at any given point in the ancient castle. Keith could understand that.
As a result, she stayed up.
Of course, Hunk had to be up as well to press Pidge to get some sleep. Although Pidge always seemed to stay up the latest out of them all (perhaps even Keith), it was a frequent occurrence that Hunk would stay up as well like a good-natured hypocrite, tinkering with this, drawing up some vaguely comprehensible CAD models that only he, and probably Coran and Pidge, fully understood. Other times he would secrete himself in the kitchen, experimenting with oddball ingredients, icing strange cookies with a sharp eye and a practiced steadiness from years of handling soldering irons, applying heat sink compound, or manipulating deceivingly delicate brambles of wire without shocking himself or stabbing the calloused skin on his fingers. When questioned about his habits, Hunk simply said he worked better at night, when there were fewer distractions. He had said his mother was like that, as well.
Hunk occasionally worked with Pidge overnight, Hunk building some project, Pidge maybe writing the code to make said project actually work. In that way, they communicated in a sort of electrical-engineering pidgin, the field they were both comfortable in even though Hunk was more of a mechanical-engineering guy and Pidge was focused more on abstractions, algorithms, and unintelligible things like automata theory – the computerized, digital half of electrical-engineering.
It was a partnership that worked well, and if it weren't for those two and their late nights, the castle would malfunction far more often than it actually did.
Though it would've been nice, Keith supposed, if Hunk had a mechanical-engineering-minded companion in his work, but the similarly good-natured Coran was potentially the only person on the ship who got any significant amount of sleep; he went to bed and rose early and frequently said he 'slept like a well-fed nuzark in its ritualistic twenty-year hibernation period'. If so, it explained his limitless verve.
But how come his cheery declaration sounded forced?
Now Allura, despite also being Altean, was almost the complete opposite of Coran. She was perpetually up late, filled with the tormenting dread that late nights have the unique ability of pulling out of people. So, she would take sleep-inducers when it got too bad, when she knew she needed to be at her mental peak to lead the rest of them, when the reprieve of unconsciousness was a preferable alternative to the cold-sweat-inducing horrors of reality. She very rarely left her large, empty quarters once she entered them for the night; the only reason Keith knew of her troubles was from overhearing a conversation between Shiro and her: Allura was offering him some sleep-inducers as well.
Shiro graciously declined, and Keith instantly knew why – getting to sleep wasn't the problem; it was sleeping through the nightmares and PTSD-induced visions laced through the night that caused trouble. Fitful and restless sleep wasn't real, wasn't worth shit and the purplish circles under Shiro's gray eyes lent credence to that fact. It always hurt Keith to see Shiro like that – he was too young to have such great burdens. But weren't they all?
At Shiro's refusal, Allura simply nodded somberly. Maybe she understood too.
So:
In all of Keith's nocturnal hours spent at the training deck or wandering around the cold and lonely halls, he ran into everyone at one point or another, even Allura rarely – sometimes there would be just a weary 'hey' while passing by in the halls, like so many times with Shiro. Other times, he would run into Pidge, who was heading either to or from her lab. Sometimes, when she wasn't working with Hunk (which was the norm, as she truly did work best alone), she would invite Keith to keep her company in the lab, that room of odd-colored computer screen lighting, that perfect example of organized chaos. It happened rarely enough that Keith would never decline her offer - how could he deny someone, who willingly spent so much time alone, the occasional comfort of companionship? It wasn't that Keith didn't like Pidge's company – they had something of a mutual understanding, both had insatiable drives and harsh logic hardwired into their brains, both had the capability to be vicious and cold-hearted. Both could easily, yet somewhat inaccurately, be labeled as loners, the characteristic that most effectively yet ironically tied them together.
So:
No one on this ship slept through the night (or what passed for it in the depths of space, far away from the regular, twisting patterns of binary stars and glowing ionized gasses, far away from natural, dopamine-producing light, far away from any regularly orbiting planet), that Keith knew of.
Except for Coran, and to absolutely no one's surprise, Lance.
So:
Bearing all this in mind – all the winding thought processes, all the spinning, clashing jolts of memories and ideas and sleep-deprived, almost hallucinogenic imagery that occasionally marked his vertical-ambulatory-meditations when his anxiety was as bad as it was tonight…
Keith could very easily justify his absolute shock at reaching the end of the hall that spilled out into the common area, and finding – out of all the people on this ship – that very boy. Keith could very well be forgiven for the slight pause he took while deciding whether to flee for whence he came, or to quickly pass through the room to merciful escape into the opposite corridor.
Unfortunately, Keith chose to press forward, because for Lance to be out here, awake and alive and not in his bed ? Something was amiss.
Now, this was the unfortunate choice because Keith had been… pretty effectively avoiding Lance.
…for a couple of days, by then.
The lack of structured group training as Shiro and Allura regrouped made it very easy to do so, to focus inward on his concerns and anxieties relating to his newfound awareness of Lance while simultaneously avoiding the problem altogether. Keith was quite skilled at that – for unimportant, trivial matters such as this, such as feelings , Keith could ruminate, ponder, and come up with nothing because he kept running in mental circles. For things like battles, it was almost the opposite. It was like he was programmed to do it, one of Pidge's algorithms designed to do one thing.
Fight.
Survive.
Win.
But feelings? Shove them in the back, on ice, melting and pooling in the stupidest part of his brain. Sometimes there would be so much pooling that he would drown in it. Keith had felt that way for the past few days, so he locked up the mental shed with a heavy brass bolt and willed it to stay put. It didn't work.
All he had running through his mind this week was an amalgamation of abstract, feverish concepts, pointless to-do lists, and those damn pooling emotions. That was probably what confused Keith the most, out of all of this. It seemed so simple – just forget about his feelings. Just ignore them, keep that bolt locked tight, focus on real life. It was simpler that way. Nevertheless, it consumed his life, took up a good portion of his mental capacity, made him get sick with anxiety. His current lack of structure and routine was compounding the issue. Despite – or perhaps due to – his irregular upbringing, the times when he didn't know where he was going to sleep, he thrived on routine. Like a mathematic, musical pattern that gave him balance and purpose.
Wasn't liking someone supposed to be nice? Supposed to make you feel… good? Somehow? Keith had never consumed media of the romantic sort, or had any experience with relationships. Friendship, or whatever he had with the other occupants of this ship, was treacherous waters enough. The last fucking thing he needed was whatever you would call this. This, this obsession that was as one-sided as Keith and Lance's old 'rivalry'. What was wrong with him? That was the million-dollar question…
Just then, Keith shifted slightly from his position at the precipice of the darkened room. Lance lifted his gaze from whatever he was holding, only to narrow his eyes when he saw the originator of the noise. He turned back to whatever he was looking at, his shoulders hunching inward.
Keith winced internally. He supposed he deserved that.
He knew Lance thrived on attention, knew he hated being alone. Growing up with a thousand relatives probably ensured that he was going to despise being excluded, given that he was probably never ignored once, always had someone to interact with.
So yeah, Keith could admit that he was a dick for indirectly taking his shortcomings out on Lance, and especially in the one way that Keith knew Lance would hate the most. Giving him the cold shoulder was probably the worst way Keith could've dealt with it. However, isolating himself was the best way Keith could have thought of to deal with his emotions – it used to make him feel less stressed, more at ease when he could hide out by himself for a while. It didn't work this time, and Keith didn't know why.
He had to fix this.
Sighing quietly, Keith geared himself up to move forward and sit on the unyielding couch as far away from Lance as possible. It was still, and dark, just like in the hallway, but it wasn't calming now.
It was common knowledge that Keith was not good with The Words. This was well known. But this was an especially rough time for him, considering he had two equally poor options – apologize, or pretend like nothing happened. He couldn't pretend nothing happened, because it was obvious that Lance was pissed, and… something did happen. But he also didn't feel like apologizing because he didn't do anything wrong per se; just because he didn't talk to Lance for a while and actively avoided him and kind of ignored him even after their progress as friends didn't mean he was in the wrong.
Keith sighed again.
Okay, fine. He screwed up.
Not for the first time.
Or the last.
Frowning, Keith glanced over at the boy next to him, who was staunchly focused on his Altean datapad, tapping away at something that Keith couldn't see. The amber light illuminated his face, creating soft shadows on his cheekbones and making his eyes seem more ocean-green than blue. It was still dark, and Keith was quite a ways away, so he couldn't see the smattering of freckles he knew was there.
For some reason, covertly scrutinizing Lance's face calmed Keith down enough to press forward. He breathed in and out, then threw the words out before the silence became any more stifling.
"So," he started, the words piercing through the silence, vibrating the still air molecules, shooting and bouncing against reflective walls and giving them no place to hide, to be absorbed forever. "Lance, I really… I mean- shit,"
Six words so far and he hadn't said a thing. Lance was still ignoring him with incredible resolution. Keith clenched his fists in irritation, then started over, trying a different tack.
"Sorry," he mumbled over the barely-audible hum of the life support system. Predictably, Lance couldn't shut up for very long, although he still had that sulky look on his face as he stared at the screen.
"Oh, I see you've finally chosen to acknowledge my existence. To what do I owe this high honor and distinction?" his voice, heavily laced in bitter sarcasm, was loud in the quiet of the common room. Keith frowned, but secretly felt relief – Lance actually speaking to him meant he was probably off the hook. Keith knew Lance wasn't one to hold a grudge for very long.
"I know I screwed up, okay? Not the first time in my life," Or the last. "I just…" he supposed he owed Lance an explanation, but he didn't know exactly how to word it.
I had a meltdown when I realized how hot you were.
I had another meltdown when I made that pathetic descent into having a crush .
Don't worry, I'm better now. I decided to just shove my feelings deep down. Works great! Buddies?
Keith grimaced.
"I was just working through some stuff," he said, trying to convey sincerity with each carefully chosen word. "It had nothing to do with you," Something like a lie, but an acceptable one. At this, Lance finally looked him in the eye, the light from the tablet casting dancing shadows over his face. He saw the upturn of Lance's eyebrows and felt a pang of remorse. It was almost like when he disappoints Shiro, but not quite as bad, thankfully. Even though Lance was clearly still offended, yet another emotion surfaced – concern? His eyebrows furrowed, the line of his mouth twisted, and his eyes roved over Keith's face. Lance opened and closed his mouth before trying again.
"Is everything okay?"
Is everything okay.
Is everything okay?
That 's what Lance asks Keith?
Shit. Lance had been treated horribly, had been treated like shit and now he was offering support despite everything? Keith hunched over a bit more, his elbows digging into his knees. Lance was too… too selfless. Like, he was always trying to bring the mood up during those dinners where everyone was too tired and sore from a day's worth of training to exert any effort in good conversation. He would do things that would seem annoying at face value, like bugging Pidge in her lab (when she had been working alone too long), or whining about being starving (so Hunk could use him as a guinea pig for his new creations when all the others were too scared to do so), or even flirting with Allura light-heartedly (when she was too stressed with all her duties, so she could laugh for once, so he could lighten her burdens for just one second ).
"I'm alright, now…" Keith said slowly. "Aren't you… aren't you mad?" Keith glanced over at Lance through his bangs, hating how childish he sounded, like when he stole from a run-down thrift shop on Main Street when he was nine and he was being scolded by his caretaker.
Lance crossed his arms, the initially open expression replaced with his normal half-annoyed, half-amused one. It seemed off.
"Yeah, well," he said, turning away from Keith. "Shiro seemed bothered the other day by the 'distinct lack of communication' between you and me, and I don't wanna bother him. So, I forgive you. For Shiro's sake," he added, that all-important excuse for his caring behavior.
Lance and Keith were similar in that way – always putting up walls to hide behind when things got too… much. Too much, and Lance would hide his insecurities behind his cocky sharpshooter persona. Too much, and Keith would hide his anxieties behind an air of determined indifference.
He had always been like that, for many, many years: if he just stayed quiet, the other, bigger kids wouldn't pick on him. If he would give those vulture-like people that filled the darkened back alleys careless looks, they wouldn't try and mug him. If he would ignore the other students, they would leave him to do his best.
"Alright. For Shiro," he said, sticking his hand out to lance. Lance appraised the offer for a second before scooting over, meshing his own hand with Keith's and holding it up between them, some weird bro-shake he probably picked up from his 'cool' older cousins or something. Keith accepted it for what it was. He was really just happy to have gotten over this whole mess.
Lance and Keith, friends again, Keith's stupid-ass crush not quite stamped out on the wooden floors of the old shack in the back of his mind. Not gone, but could be converted into another form that was more easily manageable, like a flame reduced to embers. Yeah, he could do this. No problem.
But of course, his mouth ran before his brain could keep up.
"What are you doing up this late, anyways?" he asked. "Don't you need, like, twelve hours of sleep?"
Lance blinked in surprise, then rolled his eyes exaggeratedly. "No, asshole," He got quieter. "Just… don't need as much sleep when we're not training,"
"I thought we were training!" Keith cried, instantly distracted and leaning forward. "I'm in there every day!"
"And has Allura asked you about it?" Lance tilted his head, as if listening intently for an answer he already knows.
"Well, no, but-"
"See? What Allura doesn't know…" he winked, then turned back to his phone, turning the display on by tapping it twice. Keith huffed, cheeks burning in the darkness. Stupid winking Lance.
A few moments passed, and Keith looked over Lance's shoulder – they got really close when they shook – in curiosity. Lance glanced at him out of the corner of his eye in mild confusion, but stayed silent. It looked like he was playing a game… Keith actually recognized it – a rarity for someone as out of touch with popular culture as he was.
"Is that Tetris?" He said disbelievingly, leaning back so he wouldn't be talking directly into Lance's ear.
"Yeah, dude!" Lance nodded emphatically. "It's like, this weird Altean equivalent – can you believe they have it in space, too? But it's in like three dimensions so you have to eye the falling piece and hope it – ah, crap," he pressed a button rapidly, "…gets in the right slot. Also, the pieces are constantly changing shape so it's really hard to…" he trailed off, trying to regain his streak. He was rotating the tablet back and forth, a seemingly unnecessary gesture.
Keith huffed in amusement. Tetris was one of the few video games he actually knew of (before meeting Pidge and Lance) and enjoyed – mostly because Shiro played it a few times when he had some rare downtime. Sometimes Keith would watch him play from the hard chair in his office, watch the near-permanent crease in Shiro's brow smooth out as he let his mind blank and simply focus on the game. Keith smiled at the memory – it was one of the events that truly made Keith feel like he had gotten close to Shiro. He was probably the only person in that wretched, fucked-up military installment who had ever seen Shiro so unguarded, like a regular twenty-three year old rather than an ageless titan who was featured in propaganda posters urging prospective cadets to look to the stars. Shiro was secretly uncomfortable with the campaign – he had just wanted to fly.
Just like Keith.
An elbow materialized in his field of vision then, gently bumping him in the ribs. He looked over at Lance with a scowl. Lance had an eyebrow raised, the game paused and screen dimmed.
"Dude, you're totally zonin'. You sure you're okay?"
He imagined he had been doing that a lot, lately. Nonetheless, he cleared his throat discreetly. "Yeah, just thinking…"
"Thinking…?" Lance dragged the word out, a question but not really, moreso a choice of whether or not to respond.
Keith crossed his leg and leaned back – he didn't recall hunching into himself. "Well…" he started, making a split-section decision. "Like… did you know that Shiro used to play Tetris, too?"
"No shit!" Lance cried, eyes wide with humor.
"Yeah, he actually got pretty good at it. Sometimes I would try, too… I don't actually remember how good I was at it. Unimportant, I guess,"
Lance leaned back, eyes narrowed, as if he were evaluating Keith. Keith folded his arms, returning Lance's look with a questioning one.
"The great Keith Kogane… not good at something?"
Keith groaned, lolling his head onto the back of the couch. Leave up to Lance to get distracted in a milli-tick. I thought we were past this, he mumbled, but Keith also knew that he was going to take the obvious bait, so he simply gave in. "I never said that,"
Predictably, Lance shoved the tablet into Keith's chest with little ceremony. "Then prove it!"
There was the Lance Keith had come to know and… like. Finally, relief washed over Keith, causing his shoulders to loosen and his breathing to become lighter – a challenging, competitive Lance is a healthy Lance. So many times, when Keith was first getting to know Lance, he had noticed periods of Lance retracting from the others – he wouldn't be his joking, lame self, and would become more reserved and quiet. Keith initially enjoyed the silence, the conversations that flowed between the paladins without juvenile interruptions. But Keith hadn't understood how vital Lance was to strategy during mission plans; how Allura , Hunk, and Coran had seemed to be more depressed, too, during these periods; how Lance was really, truly hurting and sometimes it would take days for him to crawl out of these bouts.
Keith still wasn't entirely sure what had happened; all he knew was that it was more the homesickness. Or maybe more. Something else entirely. Keith didn't really know. Seeing Lance like this, now, just cemented how important this was. Keith smiled inwardly, glad that he didn't run away tonight.
Rolling his eyes for show, Keith grabbed for the game, rather awkwardly considering it was literally right above his crossed arms. Lance resettled next to him, throwing his legs up on the couch carelessly. Keith glanced over, and seeing Lance curled up next to him proved to be too much; he quickly averted his eyes. Tapping the display, he restarted the game, bypassing the translated instructions. He'd fly by the seat of his pants. Immediately, the pieces started twisting and turning, rapidly falling into geometric piles – oh shit, too fast, too fast …
He furrowed his eyebrows at Lance's silent laughter next to him, and then started tapping on the screen with abandon, hoping it would save his ass from total failure.
"Dude, don't button-mash, you cheater!" Lance squawked, flapping his hand at Keith.
Keith grinned devilishly at him. "Whatever works, works, right?"
"Well, normally, yeah, but you're gonna –"
Quiet beeping came from the tablet, causing both Keith and Lance to freeze. Keith turned his head, then groaned – play over , it said in poorly-translated Altean . Video games weren't exactly top-priority for Pidge and Coran's joint translation efforts, but god forbid that Pidge didn't make a significant effort to make it at least number two on their (itemized, color-coded) list. Pidge and Coran had loud, amusing arguments that lasted late into the night over the nuances of one particularly esoteric Altean saying, over the true meaning of an English statement, over slight details of technical concepts.
Nonetheless, Keith was almost appalled at his loss. This quick? Some kind of record, he was sure.
Lance laughed then, probably ready to make fun of Keith, and Keith's first instinct was to grumble, but… it was pretty funny. An epic failure on such a simple game when he had beaten perhaps hundreds of flight sims at the garrison. He snorted softly, his previous anxieties almost dissipated in Lance's lighthearted company.
"Look," Lance started then, surprisingly gentle in tone. Keith glanced over at him, their faces only inches apart – he could feel his own heat up from their proximity, but he refused to give in. Lance was focused on the screen, anyway, gesturing and poking buttons, his shoulder knocking into Keith's.
"You gotta… start at like level one. You were on twenty,"
"That's where you were?"
"Yup," Lance popped the word. "Buuuut… I did kinda suck too. At first,"
Keith widened his eyes fractionally. Was Lance trying to console him? He didn't think about that much, however- Lance was pulling the tablet from his grip, leaning back so Keith could see the screen too, and saying something like watch and learn . Keith blinked, clearing his head, and focused on the game.
It turned out that Lance was actually pretty good at this game; of course, he spoke throughout the gameplay. Keith learned that Lance used to play video games with his older siblings, learning tricks and special button sequences to kill more aliens at once or get a speed boost or whatever it is you do in games. It struck Keith that maybe, like Shiro, Lance was doing this to clear his mind, just for a bit, just for a brief reprieve from life in general. Keith followed after him, letting himself fall into their competition, trying to clear lines faster, trying to avoid Lance's sabotage attempts, trying to steal the tablet from Lance himself.
Unbelievably, or perhaps not, Keith picked up much from their (mostly one-sided) idle chit-chat: abstract paintings of cool sea breeze clouds, burning summer suns that refused to set, skinned knees on hot pavement, shorts even in December, moss on telephone wires, solitary bicycle rides during warm, windy nights. It occurred to Keith that they both had memories they kept close to their hearts, both had gunshot-like flashes of emotion pulled out from the depths of their minds when faced with something vaguely home-shaped.
Keith even told some embarrassing stories about Shiro – it wasn't hard to make Lance laugh, but it did unfortunate things to his heart to have done so himself. He felt lighter than he had in days. The anxieties, despite being in such proximity to their indirect cause, were wiped away. The time he spent on the couch became a carefree blur in the darkened room.
When they finally decided to pack it up – Keith, intent on being responsible, was the one who suggested it, despite the fun they were having – Lance clicked the tablet off, causing the darkness to eagerly rush in and make it impossible for Keith to see. He rapidly blinked a few times, like a cat, in a practiced method of improving his night vision – he was used to the freeing darkness of his shack at night, used to the only illumination on dirt roads being from the stars, used to reading long after lights-out in the group home.
"Hey, you better be careful," Lance said from by the door. Keith blinked again– how was Lance so comfortable quickly maneuvering around this room in the dark? Even Keith wasn't completely used to the layout of the blackened room, and was forced to half-blindly grope around the sectional as he caught up.
"Yeah," he belatedly responded. He was developing a bad habit of not responding to people quickly enough…
When he finally reached Lance – he was waiting for him, and Keith was having a hard time not making a big deal out of that – they silently made their way down the hall that was just as dark as it had been earlier; there was just enough enough light for Keith to walk next to Lance without running into him. The hush of the hallway created a natural silence between them, but quiet and Lance rarely kept company, were rarely in the same galaxy quadrant.
If a tree falls down in a forest, and Lance isn't there to complain about it, where is this metaphor going?
Keith crossed his arms, glancing at Lance out of the corner of his eye to gauge his expression. It currently tended towards contemplative, if Keith wasn't horribly mistaken. Was he still thinking about home? Or was it something else? Keith could never hope to know, as he wasn't about to ask. Still, what a sharp turn from the mood in the common area.
"Where're you going, dude?" Lance called, clearly trying to dampen the volume of his voice even though Keith knew damn well nobody in this hall was asleep. Keith realized Lance had stopped behind him almost ten feet ago, and was waiting in front of Keith's room. He awkwardly half-jogged back, staunchly ignoring Lance's vaguely amused expression.
Keith stood for a second when he reached him, still trying to parse the change in atmosphere, prodding the aura like a mystic with poor people-skills.
"Thanks. Well, see you tomorrow," Keith abruptly said with a small, meaningless gesture. He was never one for drawn out farewells, especially considering that Lance literally lived right across the hall from him. Lance nodded mutely, and Keith ducked his head to type in the code for his room.
"Hey, Keith," Lance said with uncharacteristic hesitancy. He hadn't moved yet, apparently.
Keith turned; Lance shuffled his feet; Keith raised his eyebrows in silent questioning; Lance looked away.
"I'm sorry, man, but I gotta ask. You said you were ignoring me because you had some problems you had to work through. And that's cool, I'm not gonna pry unless you wanna talk about it or something," he paused then, shoving his hands in his hoodie pockets, but then looked Keith in the eye and stood straighter.
"Is there a reason you ignored me in particular?"
Keith's mouth went dry, but if there was one thing he was good at in all his years in the desert, it was thinking on his feet; he had gotten into too many alleyway scuffles and encounters with cops who were above the law to not be able to do so. Temporarily ignoring how damned perceptive this boy was, Keith schooled his features into something mask-like and shrugged nonchalantly. The gears in his mind whirred, trying to find a way to word it without flat-out lying to this boy who deserved so much more. Keith refused to deceive for his own selfishness.
Honestly, Keith never really could.
"I withdrew from everyone, Lance. Definitely not just you."
A truth, not necessarily an answer; less than Lance was owed, all that Keith could give.
Lance nodded for a second, regarding him with a serious expression on his face, and then smiled openly and with understanding. It was as if he had no doubt in his mind the truthfulness of the statement. It made Keith's heart hurt suddenly, his vagus nerve violently constricting to a very innocuous gesture.
"Alright, cool, cool. See you tomorrow,"
And then Lance was gone, a bright afterimage of green and blue and tan.
And Keith was alone.
And until he fell asleep much, much later, eyes focusing and unfocusing on the smooth ceiling of his room, he would question whether or not he was doing the right thing.
But that was fine.
Keith's lying through his teeth was acceptable.
Friendship, as he knew intimately, doesn't come easily.
✧・゚: *✧・゚。・:*:・゚: ゚ :・*:・゚✧
Okay, so.
Keith knew the night prior was a one-off event; yet another aberration during a time when things were heavily off-balance for Keith. He had patched things up between him and Lance, a friendship that had gotten stronger and could bounce back from troubles more easily. Overall, a very productive evening.
Still.
Still.
The following day had been mindless: solo exercises, meals without Allura or Shiro or even Pidge, who according to Hunk didn't come to breakfast when she didn't have to, "which is when Shiro doesn't make her come". Lance came of course, and relations continued to be easy between them, to Keith's subdued relief.
But Keith knew, during his nightly walk, that he shouldn't have come out at all that night. There would be no boy to be seen roaming the halls as well, reaching outwards for another insomniac to relate to, to keep each other company during the parts of the night where one is most vulnerable, to make the night as lively as the day. Keith had been spoiled by a single night with him.
So when Keith was inevitably drawn to the common area like a lost soul seeking its purpose, he had to fight off the wave of disappointment when he didn't find any amber tones beaming around the still room. He bit the inside of his cheek in punishment, angry that he would make a big deal about this as well – he hated how emotional he had been lately. He hated everything about… this. Ironically, selfishly, pathetically, Lance was the only one he knew could make him feel better.
He went to bed early to spite himself, roughly hanging his jacket up on it's dull metal hook but leaving his shoes on as usual. He frowned at the top of his bunk, deeply disappointed that he wasn't what others thought he was.
He wasn't cold, indifferent, ruthlessly logical. He wasn't a soldier. His priorities were far too skewed.
Still, he only came here to save the universe, his friends, didn't he? That was his purpose here, wasn't it?
It was.
But his knife felt hard through his pillow.
✧・゚: *✧・゚。・:*:・゚: ゚ :・*:・゚✧
Pidge flopped down onto the hard floor next to Keith. He drew the juice from the pouch in his hand, idly listening to that unique brand of late-night banter taking place between the younger paladins.
"It's got the best visuals, and I really like the sort of gray morality they exhibit. You gotta do what you gotta do when you're out in Space Wild West. Can't just jet off in your fancy spaceship like everyone else," she was saying, chest still heaving from where she and Lance were wrestling on the floor. Lance had crawled on his hands and knees to the other side of the room, and when he sat next to Hunk he rubbed his hand petulantly. Pidge had bitten the shit out of him when it looked like he was going to beat her and Keith did not give her a high-five, nope, nope.
Yes, this was what training devolved to when Shiro or Allura wasn't there to keep them in line. Only Hunk and Keith managed to get any orthodox training in by doing some simple sparring.
Really, the adults should've known as much.
Keith blinked, tuning out of the conversation. Did they expect him to keep everyone motivated? Controlling Pidge and Lance is like herding strong-willed cats who want to be literally anywhere but here. It was a miracle that Keith was able to get them all together in the first place.
Keith did it partially because, well, he was forcing himself to remember what his priorities were. He was a paladin of Voltron, pilot of the Red Lion, teammate and friend of Pidge, Hunk, and Lance. Some good old-fashioned training would serve to cement their friendship.
"Right, Keith?"
Keith looked up at Pidge's expectant expression. Her face was red, so maybe this less-organized training was still good enough. Exertion is exertion, after all...right? Energy use, muscle-building, balance...
Keith still had no clue why Shiro believed him to be a good leader.
Keith shook his head slightly, trying to be aware and present and all that good stuff, and rewound the conversation as far back as he could remember. Hunk, Lance, and Pidge's mid-training conversation had dissolved into an evidently well-worn argument about which Star Trek series was the best. The arguments had a rehearsed quality to them, and each seemed to know what the other was going to respond with. Keith could only imagine when the debate was fresh – fiery arguments taking place in the Garrison's cramped dorms over who was the best captain, internet forum searches completed to prove trivial points, all in the name of good-natured banter.
Surprisingly, Keith had his own memories of the show: dimly recalled late nights with his father, the artifacts on the analog television casting strange shadows in the darkened room. It was always cloudy on those nights, making it impossible to watch the skies but still possible to watch the fake ones in the dusty CRT. His father would sit on the old leather couch, cracked and worn from the air's ceaseless aridity and his continual, self-inflicted poverty. His father would watch the TV; Keith would watch his father, the flickering lights in the darkness highlighting the distant look in his eyes; neither of them would watch the show. Keith honestly wasn't even sure if it was Star Trek.
"Uh, yeah, the second series, with, uh… the bald guy?" he tried for vagueness as he responded to Pidge, forcibly injecting himself back into reality yet again. "It was just… way too preachy. The crew was pretty much always right," Keith said, resting his forearms on his knees. Pidge looked vindicated, nodding as if Keith was the expert on really old science fiction TV shows that were somehow still on the air.
Lance, from his spot next to Hunk on the other wall, threw his (suddenly healed and painless) hand out, barely missing Hunk. Hunk gave him a dirty look, scooting over to give Lance his necessary thirty-acre field. After all, aren't all stories told with broad and meaningless gesticulations?
"Uh, hello?" Lance cried, eyes wide and bright in the harsh overhead lighting. "No, dude! That's what Star Trek is all about! Being the hero, doing the right thing even when it's hard and all that jazz,"
"You can't always be the hero, Lance, it's unrealistic," Keith replied with little amusement, otherwise occupied with passing Pidge her own pouch from the collection next to him. She reached for it with little grabby hands.
"I have no interest in realism as we hurtle through space in a giant castle ," Lance shot back, making an expansive gesture with his arms, as if to highlight exactly where they were. Like Keith had forgotten.
Pidge rolled her eyes, stabbing the pouch with the straw formerly attached to the back. "I think the time to feel any disbelief at our current situation has long passed,"
Hunk crosses his arms, looking at each of them imploringly. "Guys? I'm honestly just wondering why no one likes Voyager? Janeway is such an underrated captain,"
Keith couldn't help but agree… or perhaps it was simply that he didn't care enough one way or the other.
"Ooh, yeah, Seven-of-Nine was a real hottie," Lance waggled his eyebrows. He looked at Hunk. "Can I change my vote?"
Pidge sucked the last of her juice through her straw with an obnoxiously loud, drawn-out sound.
✧・゚: *✧・゚。・:*:・゚: ゚ :・*:・゚✧
It was late, but at the same time not late at all – that period between late night and early morning that defies universal definition. It was also when, back on Earth, the moon was at its highest, forcing the stars to dim so it could shine more brightly, using stolen light to detract from the other bodies in the sky.
In other words – too goddamn late because he was getting moody again and personifying a small satellite. Of course, that could be because he was drawing said satellite hanging low against the sharp relief of the Davis Mountains, a regular, pale moon turned huge and wheat-yellow by atmospheric diffraction. Keith frowned; he didn't have the right shade of drab brown-green for the mountain's highlights.
The dusty little art shop he had found weeks prior on an ancient trading planet was packed full of pastel chalks and charcoal pencils, needle-sharp lithograph pens, watercolors, strange not-oil paints and even stranger lasers that would turn the color of your paper different colors based on the frequency of the beam. Despite the occasional futuristic oddities found within, it had felt so much like an art store on Earth that Keith half wanted to go fetch Lance so he could breathe in the smell of real graphite pencils.
Despite all this, they hadn't had that very specific, high-desert brown-green that Keith needed – some things were too Earth-specific, he figured. But, using some money Allura had given him, he bought up a bunch of paper and pencils and pastels to bring back to his room anyway. The shriveled-up person running the shop gave him a small plastic discount-voucher card in return for his large purchase; Keith pocketed it with the knowledge that he was more than likely never going to return to the planet. He felt a brief surge of euphoria at that – he had finally, inconceivably achieved his goal of hurtling through the stars, never looking behind him, going farther, farther…
One drawback, however minor, was that paper was understandably in short supply in the distinctly treeless space; you can't draw on really thin nebulas. But Keith had longed for the feel of burnished powder on his fingertips, for the satisfaction of having created something tangible. He wanted to create something that couldn't get wiped out with chance data corruption, something that would age and experience the effects of entropy and would slowly morph into something completely different and more unique than what you had initially produced. It was a collaboration between you and the universe.
So Keith sunk deeper into the couch, his valuable pad of paper resting on his lap. The overhead light, brighter than the previous nights, kept him awake and alert. He didn't want to screw this piece up; he was hoping to pour out some of this baseless nostalgia he had been harboring for the past couple of days into a drawing, keep it trapped there instead of in his mind. It was therapeutic, meditative.
Scritch scratch, the pencil dragged across the tooth of the paper, the only sound in the room.
He partially erased the jagged slope of a roof – the perspective was off just a bit…
"Hey, what'cha got there?"
Keith lurched upwards, quickly flipping the pad's cover over his work and pawing at it so the papers he pulled from the adhesive strip wouldn't slip out onto the floor.
"Lance? What are you-" his heart was racing as he swiveled on the heel of his boot, sizing up the intruder of his private moment with wide eyes. He felt like Hunk had temporarily possessed him.
Lance held his hands up, that universal gesture of don't tackle me, bro . "Dude, it's just me," he said, partially in surprise and partially in an intentionally calming tone. Shiro would adopt the same tone whenever Keith got really pissed off and was liable to do something rash. Keith blinked at his own comparison, then relaxed his shoulders.
"Hey, sorry," he said, voice hoarse from lack of use. He cleared his throat. "What are you doing up?"
He was legitimately surprised Lance was out of bed; that first night he had said he was only awake because they hadn't been training that day, hadn't he?
Lance shrugged easily, hands shoved in the pockets of those really slim-cut jeans. Keith hated himself for focusing on that, and instead stepped aside so Lance could sit down too, a rush of cool air displaced from Lance's unceremonious collapse.
Keith felt his insides twist up from nerves; it was almost a burning sensation as he battled his immediate instinct to be joyous at Lance's appearance. He forced himself to be outwardly calm, even though his initial cat-like startle screwed any chances he had at looking unperturbed by Lance's arrival, and perched on the edge. Keith felt like he was waiting for something.
"Just, y'know, up and around," Lance said, looking vaguely skittish. Keith racked his brain for what he was responding to, then distantly remembered he literally just asked Lance what he was doing out. Oh.
"Ah," Keith got out.
Ah?
That's what I respond with? Keith thought bitterly, but Lance seemed to relax at Keith's noncommittal response.
Why wasn't he initially relaxed, anyway?
"How about you?" Lance asked, looking at the pad trapped underneath Keith's forearms with thinly veiled interest. Lance had always been nosy, but surprisingly not as much as Pidge; the youngest Paladin was a surprising gossip and was always in the loop via Allura and those damned mice. And, of course, Hunk couldn't keep a secret to save his life... Actually, the whole damned bunch was nosy – always up in each other's business, always giving unwarranted advice on this or their misguided opinion on that. Shiro was especially bad about the latter, but was always, always well meaning.
They all were.
Keith didn't know what he did, to be allowed to be surrounded by such good fucking people.
"You know I'm always up," Keith grumbled, dodging the question and looking down at the floor, at the shadows cast by the legs, at the slight sparkle in the floor that gave it depth and interest. There were many interesting, attention-grabbing artifacts to be seen if one looked hard enough.
"Well, I didn't know that, actually, but okay, fine ," Lance said with a light huff, a caricature of a pout on his face. "Keith, were you drawing?" he said with mocking (or perhaps genuine) interest, "Because I have never, in the time that you have been graced by my presence, seen you do that and I am intensely curious,"
Keith snorted despite himself. Lance was mocking him, but it was a gentle mock. Was that a thing? A gentle mock? Nonetheless, Lance grinned in victory at Keith's response, further reclining into the couch.
Keith smiled, still fighting down the excitement rising up in his chest like carbonation bubbles - he literally saw Lance four hours prior, in the training room. What made these nighttime meetings any different? Keith glanced at Lance, who was now smiling softly at him. The warmth in that expression did unspeakable things to Keith's heart.
I want to kiss him , came a voice that was far too smitten and idealistic to belong to Keith. The true Keith violently shoved that thought, along with all other related paraphernalia, to the back of what he had recently dubbed the Feelings For Lance Shed.
But Lance was still looking at him, expectant in a restrained way, and the true Keith was perhaps slightly affected by the traitorous voice in his head, because he decided to humor Lance. "I do draw," he said to his lap, a small smile still curving without his consent. "I just haven't had any materials to do so until we went to that trading planet a while back. There was an art store there - I think...," he added as an afterthought, gripping the pad tighter. "I think you would've liked it. Apparently pencils are a universal constant?"
"Woah," Lance was genuinely, absolutely awestruck. He blinked in wonder, as if this was the most interesting goddamn news he had heard all day. Keith gave an ironic laugh as he watched him. "I can't believe you're getting excited over number two pencils. What the hell, Lance?" he said, shaking his head.
Lance tilted his head, making a high-pitched contemplative noise that might've been a drawn-out "well" if it was made by a cat trying to speak English. "It's…" he started, shifting closer to Keith as he crossed his legs. It drew his eye, but Keith would be completely lacking in self-awareness if he judged Lance for his inability to sit still for more than twenty seconds.
"It's kinda the small things that are important," he was saying, flapping a hand around, and Keith was already far behind in the conversation. Introspection does not pair well with socialization.
"Like, a tree in your neighborhood that you like a lot, or getting to go to your favorite coffee shop with someone cute, or when it was excursion day at the Garrison. It's little things that make life worth it," he finished with yet another shrug.
"Little things like space pencils?" Keith challenged, an eyebrow raised.
"Like space pencils," Lance affirmed with a righteous nod.
Keith smiled again, a far too frequent occurrence as of late. Keith wasn't entirely sure what lance was getting at, but it made sense in a vague way. Keith sure as hell wasn't going to tell him that, though, and instead knocked his shoulder against Lance's, an action somewhat hard to complete on a mushy couch.
"Well, I'll tell you that the next time you want a parade in your honor,"
"You do that, Keith. You do that. Hmph. Maybe I've changed. Maybe I don't want a parade,"
You've never wanted a parade , Keith immediately thought.
But then Keith studied Lance's face, past his chin, pointed upwards in mock snootiness, past his eyelashes that fanned over his cheekbones, past his dark skin. When Keith looked hard enough, deep enough , especially when Lance opened his eyes and gazed back into his, Keith could only think one thing:
You haven't changed.
I've just been blind.
In the end, after all their conversations about nothing, and despite Lance (surprisingly) not whining to see it, Keith opened up the pad that had been exiled to the other end of the couch during the prior conversations.
"Here," he said, folding it over so Lance could hold it more easily. Lance turned, giving him a questioning look, but Keith made an insistent gesture with it, a nonverbal take it . Lance did - take it, that is - with an expression that frighteningly bordered on reverent, like it was his turn to hold the newest member of the family.
The piece wasn't finished, but Keith was relatively satisfied with it so far. He felt nervous, oddly enough, but when he thought more about it he realized that he had never shown anyone his drawings, let alone got caught creating them. They were always so personal, even if they didn't superficially seem so. The pencil became an extension of himself, like his knife, like Lance's rifle. Whatever flowed forth was also his, a unique abstraction of how he viewed his world. Unlike with his knife, however, you could make with a pencil.
It's infinitely easier to destroy than to create.
But Lance, Lance just took it in, eyes darting over every detail like he was committing it to memory. Glancing up at Keith, his face split into a grin rivaling... Keith wanted to say 'the sun', but he had always been fond of the moon – at first glance it was smooth and perfect, but if you looked closely enough you could see the convolutions and intricacies on it's surface that gave it depth and complexity; it had mysteries and secrets of its own as it looked upon the earth.
In other words, it was beautiful, just like Lance's smile (especially when it was directed at him ).
"Keith," Lance breathed out, looking at him in awe. "You can seriously draw. I had no clue, dude!"
Keith shrugged, glancing elsewhere but not really seeing anything at all. "It's no big deal, I just sketch sometimes,"
Lance shook his head vigorously. "Don't give me that. Listen," he said, gingerly handing the piece back to him. Keith folded it up quickly, placing it behind his leg again.
"My sister… have I ever told you about her?" Lance asked, staring up at the ceiling as if it held all the records of his past conversations with Keith. Depending on the extent of Altean technology, it very well may have.
"It depends on which one," Keith said neutrally.
"Well," Lance waved his hand dismissively. "Selena is like, the best fucking artist ever. She got accepted to CalArts, like, last year? Probably, I don't know, relativity is strange. Anyway, she mostly drew figures and portraits but she was also into this kind of stuff, too… and I kinda passively absorbed some of her knowledge even though I didn't get any of her art skills, I don't even know where she got hers but my point is –" he breathed in.
"You're good, my man,"
Keith blinked at the flat-out compliment and shifted slightly in his seat. He somehow managed to get out a thanks , because he was very close to having a highly internalized fit of some sort. A few quiet moments passed, and Keith was all for redirecting the conversation elsewhere when Lance managed to do it for him, bless him.
"I think you and she would've gotten along,"
Keith glanced over at Lance's thoughtful tone, a lilting that whispered of a thousand chapters of Lance's life that Keith had no knowledge of, a long back-story that unpacked every nuance in that singular, forlorn sentence. Keith wondered if he'd ever get anything beyond the first and last couple of pages, and then chided himself for thinking in metaphors (and also for their ridiculous, unrealistic content).
"Oh, yeah?" he prompted, an implied invitation for elaboration.
"Yeah. You're both badass bitches with a vendetta against the world,"
"I do not have a vendetta," Keith grumbled, more out of habit than anything. Lance gave him a look. Keith sometimes wondered if he practiced these in a mirror.
"You argue about that, but I call you a bitch and you don't bat an eye?"
Keith snorted softly. "I know you didn't mean it," he blinked in consideration, "Also, I'm not even sure if 'badass bitch' is an insult or a compliment,"
"Who knows?" Lance said breezily, shooting him one of those deadly smirks, and Keith stared for a beat longer than technically socially acceptable. He refused to blush, he refused, he was not going to –
He had to turn his head because of the heat in his cheeks. He wished the lights weren't so bright. He wished his skin weren't so pale, showing every lilac vein and traitorous capillary. He wished Lance wouldn't look at him like that. He wished Lance would look at him like that. He wished Lance would look at him like that but only if he meant it.
He wished he could get a fucking lobotomy… god, no… he felt like he had already had one.
"But, yeah. What was strange, though," Lance continued on, blissfully oblivious to Keith's panic-filled suffering. He wasn't watching Keith too closely, thank whomever. "Is that she and I always got along really well. She was – is – only a couple of years older than me, and we were like the middle children of the family, y'know? Even though she's kinda introverted and I'm not," he glanced over at Keith.
"…'Though I guess you already knew that, huh,"
Keith raised his eyebrows at Lance's self-deprecating tone, but said nothing. He was pretty sure there was a point to this conversation? Maybe not. Lance rambled when he was nervous. But why would he be nervous now ? He was rather anxious when he first came in. But that went away, so…
Shit, Keith was rambling now, internally at least.
"It's just kinda weird how the dumbest things tie people together," Lance said.
"It's not dumb," Keith blurted, leaning towards Lance with wide eyes. Lance tapped his fingertips against his thighs absently as he waited for Keith to elaborate.
"I just…" Keith sighed, looking down at their knees, dark jeans contrasting with light. Lance's legs jutted farther off the couch; Keith's bumped up against the cushioned edge. "What I'm getting at is…"
Keith didn't know what he was trying to say. He just thought that the ability to relate and bond to someone is important, no matter how it occured.
But Keith wouldn't know anything about family, would he? Lance does.
"I, nevermind. I don't know anything," he got out, shifty under the weight of Lance's gaze.
"Aw, and I thought we were getting somewhere," Lance said, voice playfully mocking, obviously making fun of Keith's still-infamous-to-this-fucking-day 'bonding moment' debacle.
"Shut up, Lance!" Keith growled, shoving against Lance's arm to push him towards contact with the couch. Lance laughed loudly, swiping his long arm at Keith. What Keith didn't have in arm length, he made up in strength, and he used that to his full advantage. If the asshole got just a bit further down, he could be suffocated swiftly and quietly in the cushion material. It'd solve a lot of Keith's problems, at least temporarily.
"Keith! Quit it!" he laughed some more, flailing about. "I'm gonna tell on you!" he cried in imitation of a child. Keith laughed, ready to let the idiot go.
"Oh! Thought we heard someone!"
"Oof,"
Keith lost his grip, torso barreling into Lance's side. They toppled like some half-rate comedy act, like twenty-first century sitcom characters, like the idiots they were and would always be for better or for worse. Lance gave into Keith's weight, falling backwards with wide eyes; he latched onto Keith's jacket, yanking them both into a tangled pile on the cold, hard floor. Somehow, Lance ended up with his face pushed into Keith's upper abdomen, hands gripped around his waist - Keith planted his hands on the floor so he wouldn't break Lance's nose, but Keith still refused to open his eyes and see what kind of ridiculous, compromising, suggestive position they found themselves in. He could feel Lance's calf wrapped around his own thigh, could feel Lance's slim waist trapped between his knees, and that was more than enough to set his cheeks to broil .
"Ow," Lance drew the word out, roughly yanking Keith out of his ill-timed memory. He opened his eyes quickly, his dark hair thankfully obfuscating his line of sight.
Keith shot up like a prairie dog, literally – literally – leaping off Lance's supine form. Lance was rubbing his arched back, a groan escaping his lips before he heaved himself up into a sitting position.
"Fuck, dude, you're heavy ," he said as Keith leaned forward on his knees, ready to extend a hand outward. Keith chose to ignore the fact that Lance pulled him down in the first place and Keith was supporting all of his own weight himself.
"Shit, sor-" he started, but Lance was laughing, chuckling, whatever – he was grinning up at Keith like this was something to be expected when you're half-assed wrestling on a couch with somebody.
Which.
Might actually be a reasonable outcome.
If you gave it any forethought whatsoever.
Lance accepted Keith's outstretched hand, standing up in front of him and grinning down at him, now.
"Thank you, sir,"
Keith rolled his eyes, dropping Lance's hand dramatically, then caught movement out of the corner of his vision.
He belatedly turned with the crushing, soul-sucking realization that comes when you suddenly recall that there is an audience to your blatant stupidity. Lance stilled, as well, but immediately loosened up when he saw who it was.
Pidge was standing still in the corridor, brain clearly whirring with a fight-or-flight decision like a small cornered animal. Keith had seen that expression many times, from possums to coyotes staring into headlight beams, and it looked exactly the same on people.
She was hunched over the tangle of cords and clear bags of processors held in her arms, such a sight that Keith barely registered Hunk, her oversized shadow – he, too, had metal parts, clear vials, and packages of dried food goo stuffed in his work-bag, and his mouth was slightly agape.
"You guys… okay? Is this… is this something to be concerned about?" he said, hesitation and unmistakable confusion etched into his features as he glanced at them, then down at Pidge, and back again.
Pidge let her shoulders droop, and rolled her eyes with exaggerated suffering and an amused lilt to her words.
"Let's go, Hunk. I don't really care to know what's happening here,"
She adjusted her payload then stalked off, co-ax cables trailing behind her. Hunk shot one final worried glance at Keith and Lance and scurried off after Pidge, lifting up the cables behind her like a tiny steampunk wedding procession.
"Well, I'm sure that didn't seem strange at all," Lance said, his voice a strange concoction of facetiousness laced with humor.
Keith wrenched his gaze from the now-empty corridor, the burning in his cheeks receding in the face of Lance's cavalier attitude. He suddenly remembered that, yes, there were other people on this ship at this time. The world did not, in actuality, revolve around Lance; did not slingshot out of orbit in his absence; did not respond to him like he was a massive gravity well and they were a small asteroid, continually making a spinning descent until crashing into its orbit, like a Kamikaze-pilot electron in a death spiral towards the nucleus of the atom. No one here was an icy meteor with no self-preservation instincts, outer layer burning off as they rocketed into Lance's atmosphere, dying to burn up into nothingness just to get one final, closer look at the surface.
See, that was Keith's thing.
"… Yeah,"
"… Yeah," Lance reiterated carelessly, stepping back from Keith to stretch with a scandalous grunt. Keith absently glanced at the time stamped on the corner of the blank wall display, the one used to watch boring Altean movies, and physically cringed when the value registered in his dulled, abused mind.
Lance tugged on Keith's jacket sleeve, startling him slightly. Keith allowed himself to be pulled forwards – but not without questioning. Never without questioning.
" I'm going to bed. Some of us could actually use beauty sleep,"
Keith scowled at the insult – Lance always has to get a jab in, doesn't he? Implying that… that…
Keith blinked…
Let himself be pulled forwards…
Implying that…
That… Keith doesn't need beauty sleep? Or that he does and Lance just worded it poorly? Or was he saying that only some of them care about getting the sleep, suggesting that Keith doesn't care about his appearance like Lance does?
"Error four-oh-four, Keith's brain not found,"
Keith blinked, gazing up at Lance from where he was padding next to him, arm still in Lance's. He was looking down at him, a fondly amused expression on his face, and had shifted so their arms were more tightly wrapped up in each other. Keith stared at their linked elbows.
"Dude, what's wrong? Why're you staring?"
"I'm not,"
An automatic response. Walls built of cold, hard words.
"Uh huh,"
Keith looked away, most of his processing power devoted to analyzing the precise pressure of Lance's arm on his, the way their hips infrequently brushed against each other, because Lance could never walk in a straight line to save his life. He hoped Pidge and Hunk didn't appear again, like nosy apparitions.
"Y'should show 'Llura," Lance said, apropos of nothing, completely out of the blue in typical Lance fashion, as he stared in front of them blankly.
Keith looked up at him in confusion, almost tripping over his boots with the quick change in conversation direction. He thought for sure he could walk and talk at the same time.
"Show Allura what?"
"Your drawings?"
More confusion.
"...Why?"
"Oh, I guess you don't know, sorry. Yeah, apparently Allura used to paint? Back before… everything. She was pretty good at it, too. Even better than you at drawing, probably," he added, factually rather than offensively.
Lance looked upwards. "At least that's what Coran tells me. God, I've spent way too much time listening to his long-winded anecdotes,"
Keith frowned – he had always thought Coran's stories were interesting, and he told Lance as much. "Coran really likes you. Always has,"
Lance smiled slightly, almost sadly, lolling his head over to look at Keith.
"I know," he said, the fondness in his voice barely hidden. "Pidge and I would call him Uncle Coran just to mess with the guy, but it didn't really bother him and it kinda…" he circled his free hand in the air pointlessly, "stuck. At least in my head."
More walking.
More arm quantum-entanglement.
Thoughtful silence.
"... I miss my uncles, and my relatives, yeah. But it's scary, Keith... my old friends…?"
Lance gave a slight wobbly breath, a far-away, almost dreamy look in his eyes, his sleepiness allowing his mind to go places he wouldn't normally allow it to. Thoughts like restless horses escaping from the wooden corral in the dead of night, finally freed from their bondage in the pale moonlight, legs stretching out and hooves dully thudding in the silence. Allowed to chase their dreams up grassy hills and to fly up rocky mountainsides like ethereal, floating apparitions, they stare up at the dancing stars but never quite reach, can't soar like they want to but they always get closer, closer, closer…
Lance looked at him, and Keith saw something breathtakingly, painfully, hauntingly familiar in his eyes.
"I don't miss them as much as I used to,"
Keith sucked in a breath.
✧・゚: *✧・゚。・:*:・゚: ゚ :・*:・゚✧
"Dad…"
Keith's father looked up from his crumpled star charts as he sat across from him, the corners torn and frayed with use, the paper yellowed like the sun beaming in through the dusty panes of glass. He was writing something on their squat table, coordinates, Keith was sure, but whether they were for Earth or space was another question entirely.
His father appraised him silently, then folded the paper into a tight roll: a cylinder of space territory, a treasure map for astronomical pirates, a two-dimensional abstraction that couldn't hope to capture the complexities of the region it symbolized. Apparently it was useful enough.
A long moment passed, an eternity in stretched and warped kid-time, before his father responded.
"What's amatter, Keith?" he said, quietly, almost resigned, as if he knew this had been coming all along, as if he was simultaneously trying to put it off and get it over with.
Keith glared down at his matte paperboard book, the kind that had lots of paintings of dinosaurs with captions that told you exactly how to pronounce their names.
Cree-toh-sore-us
His dad had purchased the book for him years prior, a laughable choice when Keith had read so much more in his informal studies since then. The tall riveted bookshelf in the corner, dust-covered except for the lowest and most reachable shelves, wasn't there simply for looks.
Keith shifted from his spot on the striped woven rug. At some point in time it had probably been bright and colorful, alternating strips of cream and burgundy, geometric triangles and chevrons that probably took forever to make. It nearly matched the color of the flooring by now.
He kept his gaze lowered, and let the book clatter onto the rug. It opened to the final page.
Al-am-oh-sore-us
"I don't want you to go again, Dad,"
He didn't. He did. He hated these trips that his father went on, disappearing for days at a time, no contact, nothing for Keith but the knowledge that his father was true to his word. He didn't know where he went, what he did, and it didn't matter, did it?
A shuffling from across the table. A shift in weight on creaky floors. A sigh, world-weary and so tired that Keith felt compelled to snap his head up, to see his father running his hand through his short hair. He was gazing out the window, staring beyond the fence, beyond the road, the scraggly treeline, the sharp mountain. Beyond the horizon, so far beyond the oblate spheroid ricocheting through space that some of them called home.
"Well?" Keith pressed, tiny hands balled up to grasp rumpled cargo shorts. Keith's father uncrossed his legs, standing up and circling the table. Dull thuds from heavy work boots echoed in the mid-morning quiet, all worn and dull brown like their owner's hair. They were laced tightly but not cleanly, like work done by shaky hands, like work done by a man with no outlet for his anxieties.
His father crouched down closer to eye level. Keith pushed his lips into a wobbly pout, studying the wan face that was studying him back. Broad jaw, three-day-old stubble, thin, chapped lips pulled taut. Wide shoulders that relayed false security, steadiness, and strength. A scarred eyebrow, marred from an event never spoken of.
Those eyes, falsely clear in the light, opaque in a way that hadn't ever been before.
Those eyes, falsely unwavering, torn between two decisions, wanting and wishing and longing for something Keith couldn't imagine; something young Keith had no point of reference to relate it to.
Those eyes, terrifying in how close they looked to those which Keith saw in the mirror.
Keith widened his own eyes, and quickly broke contact to stand on unsteady fawn legs. His father must've seen something in his eyes, as well, because he set his hand on his shoulder, then righted himself with cracking knees to step across the room.
"Keith, you know I have to go. But don't worry, okay? About me, or anything. You're too young. You're too young for all of this,"
Keith didn't know what he was saying, knew there was something he was missing but unable to grasp it, like sandstone sediment through spread fingers, like well water trickling back down into the aquifer from whence it came.
Somehow, he knew it wasn't about his trips, all the times his father went across the line to New Mexico, went further north, or went down south across the border. He thought of how, sometimes, he would look out the window in the middle of the night, with the wind blowing mercilessly and his father staring up at the sky like it had answers, his tears reflected in the cold moonlight.
"Dad…"
His father dragged the tall radio forwards, leaving a trail of dust-free flooring, and pulled a loose ash panel free from the wall. He pulled something out, and like in a dream, he was back in front of Keith within seconds. He held a glinting metallic object, holding it in both hands reverently; it was a religious artifact, an urn of ashes, a memento of something long lost.
"This was your mother's."
It was a knife, it's deep purple clashing with the natural tones of their shack, the dust moats twirling through the air and attaching themselves to it's surface. It seemed a shame that something so fantastical should/would be exposed to the dullness of their reality, it's alien eternalness disfigured by the transience of their minute existence.
Keith's breath hitched. "Mom?" He had never known her, didn't know if he wanted to know her but he had his dad, his dad had always been there for him so that didn't matter…. It didn't matter… right?
His dad would always be there, wouldn't he?
But then why was his dad giving him that look?
"I'm giving this to you, Keith. Take care of it, and don't let anyone know that you have it," He said, giving Keith a subtly pleading look, a question rather than a demand, the product of a man who had been broken long before Keith knew its extent.
Keith furrowed his eyebrows, felt tears pricking the back of his eyes for reasons indiscernible to himself. The superposition of two sine waves, distinct neural oscillation patterns interfering like waves in an otherwise still pond, forming something greater than the constituent parts, auras and emotions melding and blending into each other.
"But it's yours…" he said, saying something but not really saying anything at all, wanting to say things he didn't know how to say yet, wishing he had the words to describe his fears. He tried to stand tall, his too-small striped shirt riding up; his father smiled in response, forlorn and haunted, vaguely fond and very ashamed.
"It never really was, Keith,"
And then his father thrust the knife into his hand, forcibly yet gently wrapping Keith's smaller hand around it.
And then he grabbed his olive-colored canvas duffel.
And then the door opened with a creak, letting in the sound of the wind through the mesquite trees, the golden-yellow sunlight, and the song of the solitary mockingbird, forever alone by his own nature.
And then the door shut, and Keith was alone.
And he would be, for a very long time.
The Orionids came that night, their fiery, fleeting entrance into the atmosphere heralding the beginning of the Southwestern fall, that brief transitory period of change, that continuation of a cycle that has occurred since Earth graduated from proto-planetary status.
They streaked through the sky like Keith's tears, circular motions and indistinguishable patterns that ruthlessly hid the ever-present Milky Way, the stars that had twinkled since the dawn of time. They selfishly brought all the focus onto them, those astrological drops of ephemeral beauty.
But sometimes, Keith knew, those meteors struck the earth, forming deep craters and scars that would remain far longer than the transient meteorites themselves, creating enduring ramifications that were, perhaps, bound by fate to occur anyway. The continual dance of galaxies. Were they worth the damage they caused?
And then Keith pulled the rough blanket further around his hunched form to try and fail to sleep.
And then his father didn't come back, and he tried to remember if he had even said that he would.
And then the people came, not many days later, to take Keith away for good.
And Keith was still alone.
And he would be, for a very long time.
