AN: Oh man, I just wanted to say that I'm super glad to know there are so many of you guys who are enjoying this (I see those follows/favorites, haha). Thank you so much! If you guys are on Tumblr, my VLD blog is dadboyshiro. Otherwise, your thoughts are always appreciated :)


"Where the hell are you!"

Message deleted.

"Shiro, I swear to god, if you don't answer your phone—"

Message deleted.

"You know what, whatever. Don't answer your phone. But at least let me know you're still alive or something. Holt's been asking about you, so I told him you were out sick—"

Message deleted.

Shiro dropped his phone into the console cupholder and sighed. He was mentally and physically beat; both from the seventeen angry voice messages that Keith had left him and from being cooped up in the front seat of their squad car for almost two nights straight. He was grungy and exhausted, desperate for a hot shower and a good night's sleep, and the longer he sat parked on the side of the plaza across from 54th National, the more he was starting to think that perhaps he'd been wrong; maybe the Paladins hadn't made a mistake. Maybe they did get what they'd came for and wouldn't be coming back. Maybe he was doing all this for nothing.

Shiro tipped his head back and closed his eyes.

That settled it—he'd give it another day, at most. There wasn't a point in murdering his back like this, not when the possibility of the Paladins showing up was steadily dwindling with every passing second and Keith had the captain breathing down his neck. Then there was Allura, who'd he'd promised to help hang the lights and rearrange the furniture in the hall for the charity dance—

The almost inaudible sound of a door clicking shut had Shiro sitting up, pin straight and eyes wide open as he scanned his surroundings from his rolled-down window. His attention automatically snapped to the alleyway across from him, where—unless he was imagining things—he could have sworn he'd seen a sliver of light pouring out from where the back door to the bank should've been, if only for a split second.

With only one way to know for sure, Shiro quietly hopped out of the car and tiptoed his way across the street, his hand rested firmly on the gun on his hip.


Lance had grabbed the wrong card.

"What do you mean it's not the right card? It was the only one in there!" he had all but yelled through a mouthful of hash browns. Once enough time had passed to be safe that the heat was sufficiently off their backs, the three of them had regrouped at the 24-hour breakfast diner that they often frequented to go over the earlier events of the night. Unfortunately, upon popping the much sought-after SD card into her laptop while waiting for her milkshake to arrive, Pidge had found that the contents weren't quite what she'd been expecting.

"There's nothing on here but a bunch of pictures and shady accounting info. Like, heaps of tax fraud," Pidge had said, scrolling through the files with furrowed brows. "I don't understand. Morvok said it'd be on here."

"People will say whatever you want 'em to say when they're being tased by a four-foot-tall gremlin—ow, hey!"

"Well, that's not so bad though, right? The tax stuff. Maybe it can help bring down Zarkon if we can somehow tie him to Morvok," Hunk had suggested, either forgetting that the evidence they'd accidentally gathered was very illegal and therefore unusable or simply just trying to distract his best friends from maiming each other.

"But that's not going to help me find my brother," Pidge reminded him bitterly. Hunk frowned and turned to smother his obvious discomfort in his pancakes, while Lance, meanwhile, had since taken refuge from Pidge's abuse in his small pile of silver and his cell phone calculator. Pidge chewed her lip, scrolling through the documents on the SD card a few more times in silence before making a decision. "We need to go back."

"What? No way!" Lance said. "We already got what we went for!"

"We didn't go for the money, Lance! We went for the card!"

"Yeah, and we got it!"

"I hate to be the one to say it, but I think Lance is right. It's way too dangerous," Hunk agreed. "Plus, don't we kinda have a rule about that? Going to the same place twice? I mean, that's like asking to be caught."

"This is different," Pidge had insisted. But despite her impassioned explanation about how it was only a matter of time before Morvok would move banks and even an attempt to bribe Lance with the prospect of additional spoils, neither of her accomplices were willing to take the risk.

"I'm sorry, Pidge, but we can't," Hunk had eventually told her, gently clasping her shoulder with one of his large, comforting hands. The threatening sting of angry tears had followed soon after.


There was no use arguing with Hunk—Pidge knew that. He might've been the token scaredy-cat of the group, but he was also the most sensible, not afraid to poke whatever holes may need be into clearly-flawed plans if only to ensure the safety and well-being of his friends. But Pidge hadn't come all that way just to give up, not when she was that much closer to finally finding her brother. So if she just so happened to swing by 54th National sometime after ten o'clock two nights later, well, Hunk didn't need to know.

"C'mon, c'mon…" Pidge grumbled as she blindly felt around Morvok's safe deposit box. Even by herself, breaking back into the bank hadn't been nearly as difficult as she'd expected. There wasn't any added security, save for an additional couple of cameras that she was able to shut off with ease, and Lance—despite his staunch disapproval of her "essentially going on a suicide mission"—had at least been smart enough to remember the vault's combination, which, whether out of pure laziness or just a total lack of regard for their clients' belongings, hadn't been changed. No matter. Pidge was only glad to have her job made that much easier.

Except that it wasn't.

"Dammit!" She slammed the box shut. Lance must've been telling the truth when he said he'd totally cleaned it out, because there wasn't a damned thing in there.

Pidge pursed her lips and glared at the drawer, her arms crossed over her chest. One more time she slid it open, just to be certain, feeling around for every little nook and crevice that she could find.

Nothing.

Pidge sighed and closed the drawer.

As hardheaded as she was, Pidge knew when to call it quits. Frustrated and discouraged but ultimately prepared to accept defeat, she hitched her bag up over her shoulder and began to make her way out; until her eyes trailed over the other deposit boxes immediately surrounding Morvok's own vacant one.

Bingo.

With a few minutes time and some very base lock-picking skills, Pidge had found Morvok's second deposit box that he'd oh so conveniently forgot to mention existed. Most of its contents were of little value to her—stacks upon stacks of forged documents and paperwork that might've held the potential to help bring down Zarkon in the grand scheme of things, but were ultimately useless when it came to her own more selfish objective—so she left them. The small black SD card, however, was coming with her.

Pidge quickly backtracked and made herself scarce, resetting both the motion detectors and the main alarm system, making sure to retrieve the proxy passcode chips that Lance had a nasty habit of leaving behind along the way. With plenty of time to spare, she was home free, the humid but welcomed night air on her face and the key to her brother's whereabouts finally in hand.

Pidge could hardly contain her excitement. She wanted nothing more than to drop to her knees right there in the middle of the alley and pull her laptop from her bag, but she knew she couldn't afford to take any more chances; it'd have to wait until she got home. Right now, she needed to get back to her motorcycle, which she'd parked over behind that dumpster around the corner, and—

"Freeze!"

Pidge's stomach dropped to the floor.

"Turn around! Hands above your head!"

Much less worried about having been caught red-handed rather than the now very real possibility of being shot in the back point-blank, Pidge did as she was told, fighting to keep her heartbeat under control as she turned around as slowly as humanly possible so as not to startle her captor with any sudden movements. She didn't need to see them to know who it was—she'd recognize that tense, unwavering voice anywhere—though the glint of the barrel of their gun pointing directly at her face only further confirmed their identity.

"I'm sorry, officer," Pidge said, trying for confused, innocent civilian, "but I think there's a misunder—"

"I said don't move!"

Pidge's arms shot up even higher above her head.

Pidge waited and watched as RoboCop observed her from the shadows, unable to see anything but the silhouette of a man and the shine of their boots reflecting off the shallow puddle that they were standing in. Eventually, RoboCop lowered his gun and slowly made his way out of the darkness, and for the first time since their initial run in nearly two months ago, Pidge finally, actually saw him.

She gasped. "Your hair—? Whoa, your face!"

The words had come tumbling out before she could stop herself, sending a burning twinge of shame down her neck as she hurried to cover her mouth before she could possibly say something even more stupid. Between the tuft of solid white hair that she'd always thought was just her eyes playing tricks on her from far enough away, or the grisly scar that stretched across his nose, practically impossible to miss up this close, even beneath the paltry glow of the moonlight, she hadn't been prepared.

Pidge didn't know what to focus on. She cycled her attention from his hair, to his scar, to his eyes, not wanting to be too obvious in her shock but neither wanting to seem as if she'd seriously let herself be intimidated by some psycho stalker cop, until she noticed the way his steely grey eyes seemed to soften the longer he looked at her and it suddenly clicked that, oh jeez, he was… actually kind of handsome.

Pidge swallowed and stared at the ground instead. Shiro, following her gaze, holstered his gun when he realized that he was still holding it.

Shiro was totally and utterly confused. Had he made a mistake? This person—no. This girl. She was certainly short enough to be the small Paladin, but…

Shiro examined her in silence, eyes darting from her adorably tiny hands to her bright, wide eyes, filled with—fear? Embarrassment? Shiro couldn't tell, but his gut had seemed to have already made up its mind; that the girl in front of him was far too innocent and unassuming to be any real threat. Cute, in a way. Pretty, even? Familiar, if nothing else, which only made him feel all the more conflicted about the whole situation.

Maybe she worked at the bank, he thought, because after all, he hadn't heard any alarms go off; she could've just been working late and was now finally heading home. But it was nearly eleven at night, and the bank had closed well before five that day—and were employees even allowed to wear hoodies to work?

Shiro cleared his throat, remembering what Captain Holt had said about one more screw up; threatening a bank employee would easily be grounds for immediate termination. He'd better tread carefully. "What are you doing out here?"

The girl looked up at him as if he'd suddenly grown two heads. "…What?"

"Are you lost? Heading home?" he continued, but was only met with the same look of disbelief. He sighed. "You shouldn't be out here alone at this time of night. It's too dangerous. This is an active crime scene, and the perp's still on the loose. Who knows what they're capable of."

She blinked. "Excuse me? Perp?"

"You know. Criminal, bad guy."

The girl's adorably tiny hands were suddenly balled fists at her side. "I'm not a fucking bad guy!" she spat, hot and entirely unprovoked, as if it'd been burning in her throat for only god knows how long, despite the two of them having only just met moments ago. Shiro, needless to say, was taken aback.

"Ma'am, no, I didn't—" He tried to calm her, hoping to correct what he might've said that had clearly upset her so badly, but it was no use; the girl was a loose cannon, cursing up a storm, jarring him from whatever fleeting thoughts he once had about her being some blameless, naïve woman.

"If anything, you fucking pigs are the bad guys!" she continued, voice only climbing higher and higher, making Shiro's skin crawl with how it echoed off the brick walls surrounding them. "Sitting around and doing—what? Pretending to be helpful while people are being murdered? Kidnapped? Jacking each other off in the Dunkin' Donuts parking lot while you hide in your cars, acting like you 'save lives,' but all you really do is hand out fucking speeding tickets! And when there's an actual fucking problem, it's always, 'oh, we don't have enough evidence,' or 'red tape this, red tape that.' Grow some fucking balls! Especially you! Don't you have anything better to do besides chasing me down like a goddamned thief all the time! Go get a fucking hobby or—"

She clamped a hand over her mouth, but the damage had already been done.

"You!" Shiro growled and lunged at her, at Pidge, wrangling her in the second he realized that she was about to make a break for it. It wasn't too hard, keeping her in place, even with only his one good arm wrapped high across her chest while the other sort of hung dead at his side. She might've been feisty and sure, it hurt like hell when she kicked her heels back into his shins, but she was also very small and easy enough to maneuver so that he could inch his hold down to her waist for a more secure grip.

"Let go of me!" she shouted, twisting and turning, making the contents of whatever was in her backpack dig uncomfortably into his stomach. "I'll scream! I swear I will!"

"That's not how this works." He grunted when she knocked her head back into his collarbone. "You have no idea how long I've been waiting for this," he said. He could already imagine the look of approval on Captain Holt's face. On everyone's face. "Let's go. You're coming with me."

A pair of sharp incisors sank through his jacket and into his forearm.

Shiro hissed and forfeited his grasp on her, laboriously palming back his sleeve with his stiff carbon fingers to examine the deep, stinging mark that Pidge had left him with. She was already halfway around the corner by the time his initial shock wore off, but he wasn't about to let her get too far.

Through the filthy, rain-soaked alleyways, Shiro chased after the Paladin, who was quick and nimble, even for her small size, easily evading him and putting more and more distance between them as if she'd made a living as an Olympic sprinter. The only time he really had a chance to make a grab for her was when she stopped for half a second to try and fumble with something from behind a dumpster; her motorcycle, he realized, when she soon gave up and left it where it was. Good. That must've been her only escape, and now that he had her on foot, almost within reach—

"Argh—dammit, Lance!" Pidge cursed as she stumbled and slid on a stray marble from the other night. When she managed to catch and steady herself as they came to a cross, Shiro was close enough to herd her into the next alley over rather than straight ahead onto the main road.

They hit a dead end.

Shiro doubled over, hand on his knee as he panted for air, watching through narrowed eyes burning from sweat as Pidge panted too, frantically glancing around like a trapped animal searching for an escape. There wasn't one. The only way out was through him, and this time, he wouldn't let her go.

"Are you done yet?" he asked once he caught his breath enough to form a coherent sentence. Pidge only scowled at him. Shiro took a few more seconds to let his heartrate settle before standing back up straight. He unclipped the handcuffs from his belt. "Here." He tossed them over to her, landing at her feet with a clink. "Put those on."

Pidge looked from him, to the handcuffs, then back up at him. "No."

"I said put them on!"

"Or what? You'll shoot me?"

"We can sit here all night if you want," he told her, earning little in the way of a response. "Or I can always just call for backup," he added, and began reaching for his walkie.

"How am I supposed to know you're really a cop and not just some weird freak with a fetish for chasing down and 'arresting' poor, unsuspecting women, anyway?"

Shiro growled. He didn't have time to play these games; she knew good and well who he was. Still, he fished out his wallet containing his badge and police ID from his back pocket and threw that over at her feet, too. He watched as she picked it up and turned it over in her hands, studying it for a long minute with an expression that he couldn't quite place. "It's real," he said, growing tired of her dragging things out.

"I know." She sighed and picked up the handcuffs, too.

"Put them on," he repeated. "No—behind your back."

"I'm not trying to tell you how to do your job or anything, but shouldn't you be the one doing this?" she asked mockingly. He didn't answer. Pidge rolled her eyes and pulled her wrists taut, jingling them. "They're on, okay?"

Shiro didn't trust her, but he had no other choice, not when he only had one arm to work with. "Now turn around and walk backwards. Slowly."

Pidge grumbled and did as she was told. When she was within arm's reach, Shiro went ahead and checked for himself, jostling the cuffs to make sure that they were, in fact, on. He locked them tighter around her wrists, netting himself a complaint and an indignant huff, then twirled her around so that he could guide her back through the alleyways and across the street to his cruiser, his hand clutched firmly over both her own for an added level of security in case she decided to try anything funny. Pidge didn't put up a fight, but that didn't mean she went willingly, either.

"I hope you know you're making a huge mistake," she told him bluntly through the metal partition cage that separated the good from the bad. "Seriously, you don't want to do this." But as Shiro buckled his seatbelt and started the car, he found himself hard pressed to imagine anything he could have possibly wanted more.