Chapter Text
CHAPTER 8
Lance
“So”
Lance’s dazed voice cut through the stagnant quiet that had settled in between them for an hour
“Was it a collective hallucination or did that all actually happen?”
All they remembered from the last night after got out of the (burning why did it always have to do that) castle was frantically piling up in Shiro’s car riding as fast as they could to get away from that place. It was a miracle they didn’t crash into a tree.
As soon as they all got to the house they crashed, exhaustion and shock finally taking their toll on them. Hunk, Keith and him had crashed right there on the living room, Pidge taking the couch and Shiro, tired after all the needling, took the bed.
Pidge slumped forward, dropping her head heavily on her hands. “I really don’t know which of the two options would make us not look crazy.”
Shiro sighed, rubbing his forehead with his fingers, still in disbelief. “So we all spent the night in a haunted castle, searching for little, ancient, colour-coded lions to protect them from a power-thirsty ghost.”
Keith leaned back against Lance’s chest, making him shiver a little. “And you fought the ghost. Can’t forget that.”
Hunk piped up from where he was sitting below the couch, anxiously adjusting his headband. “And watched as the whole castle burned down in flames. Again. Hopefully for the last time.”
“I for one would like that to be our last time.” Lance declared, throwing up his hands. “I am not stepping inside there again.” Suddenly he looked at Keith, remembering the whole purple spirit, great uncle, family knife thing that happened before everything went to shit. “Um, unless you wanna, y’know-”
Keith looked up, noticing Lance’s abrupt word vomit and what he was getting at. Shiro and the others looked at them confused.
Keith sighed, fully getting up which was a damn loss. “I, I can explain it later just-”
He looked outside his face suddenly clearing as he looked at all of their faces, littered with cuts, soot marks and bone-weary exhaustion.
“Do you guys wanna try the blueberry tarts here?”
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Pidge
They were all at Shay’s café, practically inhaling her fresh from the oven blueberry tarts that were practically shining in front of her eyes, along with the other breakfast goodies Shay had supplied them with.
Pidge honestly couldn’t remember a time where she had been this hungry, devouring the food as the few morning customers watched them with horrified fascination.
Keith and Shiro were at the counter, trying to explain what the absolute clusterfuck had happed yesterday, excluding the parts that made them sound like complete nut cases.
Thankfully, Hunk distracted Shay by praising her on the food, both of them looking disgustingly lovesick as they talked about recipes.
To be fair, if Shay came with an endless supply of (delicious) food, Pidge would pull out a ring too.
Speaking of being lovesick, Pidge fixed her laser-eyed stare on Lance, who was probably on his way to beat the blueberry tart eating record. With the others away, this was the perfect chance.
Lance, probably having his fight or flight senses triggered, cautiously looked from his plate, his throat bobbing as he noticed Pidge looking at him. “Wha-” Lance’s voice cracked, so he started again, clearing his throat. “Do you want something?”
Pidge sat back coolly, her look never wavering.
“Oh nothing.” Lance scoffed, disbelieving. “Just wondering if seeing actual ghosts made you brace enough to ask Keith out.”
Lance chocked on air, his face becoming almost as blue as the berries. Pidge reached over, patting his arm sympathetically.
Lance finally managed to overcome whatever that dying whale thing was, looking at her in betrayal (why, Pidge couldn’t possibly imagine)
He leaned across the table, his voice a high pitched whisper. “I don’t know what you’re talking about?!”
Pidge folded her arms, calmly looking back at him. Lance squirmed a little, finally blurting out “It’s nothing!”
Pidge raised an eyebrow. Seriously? They’d practically been attached together last night and this morning.
Lance narrowed his eyes pouting. “It could’ve just been the adrenaline you know? We were all in a tough situation and not thinking straight. Heat of the moment and all. It’s probably nothing now that everything is over.”
That was a great point, if Lance actually believed in everything he just said. Pidge was pretty sure that idiot had crushed a little, before the said traumatic event. They obviously trusted each other, if getting through all this, having each other’s back said anything about it. And really, horrifying event or not, Keith was a feral cat. If he was comfortable with Lance like he had been this morning, no impending doom lurking near, it was worth a shot.
Pidge finally relaxed, letting Lance off the hook. “I’m not gonna pressure you Lance. I know we’re all shaken by everything that happened. And I understand not wanting to immediately get into a relationship.” Lance nodded at her, though he looked a little forlorn.
“Having said that, I still think you should at least talk to Keith. Keep in touch.”
Lance looked back at her, conflicted. “He might not want anything to do with me Pidge. We’re, I’m the reason we got into the whole mess-”
The table suddenly jolted as Pidge reached out and gripped Lance’s shoulders, her eyes flashing with anger as she stared at him. “No. No you don’t get to do that yeah? If we’re gonna go on this route, I’m the one that called in a favour with him, making him our tour guide.” Lance’s eyes widened, as he shook his head, protesting.
“Exactly. Keith won’t blame us for an ancient house being haunted by some shitty power hungry ghost. He sure as hell won’t blame you because we all wanted to do this. What happened was terrifying and I’m never setting foot in that castle, don’t get me wrong. But we all got through it and we’re okay now. At least not at the risk of a haunted house. We didn’t assign blame when we were stuck in that shitty burning mess and this is not the time to start.”
Lance feebly nodded at her, his lips wobbling as a few tears slipped out. He squeezed Pidge’s hand as she wiped the tears in her eyes too.
She looked in front of her to see the others coming back, so she squeezed Lance’s hand again, leaning back but her gaze still intense.
“We all got out of that together Lance. We didn’t give up then yeah?” Lance’s blue eyes looked back at her, a little of its previous shine coming back.
“So don’t give up now.”
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Shiro
They all finally left the café, practically falling over their feet as they bowed down for Shay’s amazing treats, Shay smiling back warmly at them.
Hunk, Lance and Pidge were walking a little ways ahead, Hunk intently talking to them about something as Pidge and Lance grew more and more animated.
But before he could find out about that, he had another thing to talk about first.
“So” Keith looked back at him, his purple eyes a little stormy in thought, but a little happy after their trip to Shay’s.
Keith sighed a little and reached out to pull out his knife. Shiro knew how important that knife was to him, the only physical remainder of his mother he had left.
Keith straightened his shoulders, his eyes glinting with single-minded determination.
“Before we came to find you, Lance and I stumbled into a room that was filled with portraits. Of the royal family and castle residence. The uh, spirit that I saw led me to one.” He took in a deep breath, preparing. “Kolivan Marmora. Marmora was the name from my mother’s side of family. We know that she moved away from this town when she was young and didn’t really know anything about her family line but now we found the Marmorans record and maybe we can-” Keith suddenly looked back him, his eyes unsure for the first time. “Maybe we can find her.”
Keith suddenly stopped, his chest shuddering as he tried to control a sob. “I don’t know where she is or even know if she’s alive- what happened to her? I think I want to know more Shiro. But I’m not leaving you. You’ll always be more important to me. I just, I don’t know what to do.” His voice had grown smaller at this point and Shiro pulled him in.
Shiro looked at his little brother, proud of how much he has grown. “Keith. Whatever you decide to do. If you want to trace your mother or if you want to know more about the Marmorans or hell, even if you want to throw this whole thing away and forget about it, I’ll have your back okay? I’ll always have your back. I love you.”
Keith hugged him harder, burying his face in his shirt. “Thank you Shiro. You’re my brother. I love you too.”
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Hunk
Hunk felt like he was gonna burst just thinking about this.
They were all walking for a little while, partially to dispel some of their pent up energy, partially because they ate enough to feed an army and had to walk it off.
Hunk felt warm just thinking about that. Everything had been amazing and Shay was really sweet too. It was nice to meet someone who was passionate about cooking too.
But he felt all the giddy feeling vanish away as he was reminded about it again. He really had to talk to someone about it.
Lance, who had been walking beside him, stopped and turned around, looking at Hunk with raised eyebrows. “Ok spill now. What are you thinking about big guy?”
Pidge had stopped too, looking back at him in curiosity.
Was this really the time to talk about this? Hunk was pretty sure this was like not even on their priority lists now (getting out of the castle practically overtaking everything). He wasn’t even sure how they were going to react. Hunk felt like all these were completely valid reason to not have this conversation at all, but he could feel himself cracking under both their gazes.
Hunk put his hands up, preparing himself. “Before I tell you guys about this, I just want you to know that we don’t have to do anything about this if you don’t want to.”
Baffled faces stared back at him. “Uh, what are you talking about man?”
Hunk felt all the air leave his lungs. This was it.
“I got the footage from the castle!” he blurted out, feeling his heart pound.
A stunned silence fell around them.
Pidge was the first to snap out of it, her eyes widening as she looked at him.
“Wait what?! How? You didn’t somehow magically go back there did you?”
Lance was still in shock, opening and closing his mouth.
Hunk frantically shook his head at that. “No, no I definitely didn’t. You guys know the equipment we set up right. I wanted to try out this upgrade that directly sent all the recording, the um, motion scanners, videos, everything even with barely any signal. I wasn’t even sure if it would work but-” Hunk met both of their eyes, as shocked at this as they were.
“It worked. I got them this morning. We have the recordings.”
Lance finally got out of his shock, furrowing his eyebrows. “But we didn’t record any of the lion stuff at all.”
Hunk shook his head, already anticipating this question. “No. The recordings are from before the whole ‘find the ancient lions’ thing. Just the intro, our spirit box session and the time when you were still recording when you, uh, fell through the walls. And we also have shots of the first fire. That’s it.”
Hunk could tell they were all pretty overwhelmed by this. It all seemed wild even if they were the ones who went through it. But actual footage of it was…
“We’re not gonna talk about the lions at all right?” I mean the family history’s fine, but those lions seem a little personal to their lives.” Pidge asked her face scrunched. They both nodded at that. “Not like anyone would believe that.”
“It doesn’t seem right either.” Lance added, shrugging.
Hunk nodded again, feeling a little lighter after letting this out. “We have to talk to Shiro and Keith too. If they’re not cool we’re not gonna do this we’re not gonna do it. But if they are…”
They all looked at each other; eyes filled with disbelief and wonder.
“We’ve got an actual story in our hands.”
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Keith
Keith felt like he could finally breathe.
After everything that happened, from being separated from their friends, seeing ghosts, almost losing Shiro and finding the portrait, he felt like for every mess they escaped from, another one bombarded right into their faces, pulling them in every direction, almost breaking them apart.
But they got out. Together.
Keith took in a deep breath another time, the conversation with Shiro still like a warm blanket over him.
He just had one more thing to cover.
“Hey”
Lance came over to him; his hands shuffling nervously as he finally reached him.
Concerned blue eyes looked at him, probably at his red eyes and splotched cheek. “Are you ok?”
Keith smiled a little at that, walking closer to him. “Yeah. I will be at least.” Seeing Lance’s still worried face he added. “Are you guys gonna do it?”
Lance’s eyes brightened a little as he smiled back at Hunk and Pidge. “Ok, um, we still have to go over all the footage to see if it would be conclusive y’know? And it'll be a lot of work but yeah" His eyes suddenly widened and he looked back at Keith. “Unless you don’t want us to. That’s completely fine and we’ll burn everything.” His eyes widened even more. “Ok maybe not burn! Something else that’s not burning. That was too soon. I’ll just shut up now.”
Keith couldn’t help it; he burst out laughing, helpless giggles coming out as he looked at Lance’s embarrassed face.
Lance was rubbing his neck sheepishly, looking at Keith with a small smile in his face.
Keith finally looked back at him, his laughter mostly under control. “It’s fine Lance. You know Shiro and I are okay with it. You asked us at least a hundred times. Just as long as you don’t mention about the- y’know…” Keith shrugged, trailing off.
Lance nodded earnestly. “I definitely won’t. You don’t have to worry about that.” He shuffled his feet, suddenly looking nervous. “If you don’t mind you can tell me about what you’re planning to do. It’s cool if you don’t want to but uh-” Lance looked back at him, blue eyes soft. “We can keep in touch. Talk about the regular stuff too.”
Keith couldn’t help the giddy feeling in his chest. He really, really liked it.
Reaching up on his toes, he pressed a kiss to Lance’s cheek, his own face burning a little as he looked at Lance’s blushing face.
“You promise not to forget me if you became a famous ghost hunting expert?” Keith teased him, trying to ignore Hunk and Pidge’s frantic squawking behind Lance.
Lance suddenly grinned back at him, his flushed cheeks bright in the sunlight. As his fingers hooked onto his own, Keith felt like he was seeing him all over again, bright smiles and blue eyes.
“Nah. I don’t think I can forget my favourite partner yeah?”
Lance fully looked at him, the smile still tugging at his lips. “We’re a good team.”
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