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As Keith turned away from his goodbye group hug, he couldn’t help but hope someone would come after him and beg him to stay. He knew they wouldn’t, he knew they didn’t really want him there, and now that he had failed at leading, failed at being part of the team, they could finally drop the act and let him go.
Keith stopped in his quarters on the way to his borrowed spacecraft, it didn’t take long to pack all his stuff into a backpack, and leave the castle far behind him.
He tried to fight the urge to look back to see if anyone was following, he knew they wouldn’t. They didn’t need him, didn’t want him. They respected his choices, he tried to tell himself, but he’d seen what they thought of his choices.
Keith noticed something out of the corner of his eye, and hope flared warm in his chest before twisting sharply. They’d opened a wormhole and were accelerating towards it.
They were gone.
~~~
“Paladins to your lions! Galra forces are attacking our allies!” Coran shouted, “We only have a few ticks!”
Alarms sounded and lights flashed, as the paladins zipped down their tunnels to the lions.
Lance felt like he should say something funny over the coms, but nothing really came to mind. He would usually be bothering Keith right about now, and he wasn’t inspired to joke around with anyone else. Shiro was really tense and Hunk and Pidge were still weepy.
He landed in Red’s room and was greeted with a loud roaring lion right in his face.
“Woah!” Lance stumbled back, nearly losing his balance, “What’s the matter, Red?”
Red was pacing the room and clearly agitated, completely ignoring Lance after that warm welcome.
“Guys?” Lance called over the coms, “Red is acting really weird.”
“Weird, how?” Hunk asked,
“Weird, roared in my face and pacing around,” Red pawed at the door, “You guys go ahead, I’ll join ASAP.”
“Be careful, Lance,” Allura said, “The Red Lion has always been the most unpredictable of the five lions.”
“Will do, try not to get in too much trouble without me!”
“Pbtttttt!!!” Pidge’s eloquent reply.
Lance turned his attention back to Red, “What’s the matter, bud?” he approached with his arms wide open, “Do you miss him too?” Red’s head snapped towards Lance, “He’ll be back soon, don’t wor….ahhhh!!”
Red bounded across the room, scooped Lance up, blasted through the airlock and was through his own wormhole in the blink of an eye.
~~~
Keith didn’t stick around to watch his home leave him behind, he sped off towards the Marmora rendez-vous point with new determination. It really was an important mission he would be helping with, and he really did admire how pragmatic the Blades were in the face of tough choices.
Try as he might to stay optimistic, he could feel dark thoughts buzzing around in the back of his mind. Pestering him like so many flies. He couldn’t wait to get to the base and the distraction it would provide.
Suddenly, a wormhole opened up directly in front of him and Keith had to reverse thrusters quickly to avoid hitting… Red?
“Woah, hey, Red” Keith murmured, hoping it would focus his thoughts so Red would understand, “What are you doing here?”
Red hovered in space, giving no indication of his intentions. Then charged at Keith full tilt.
“Stop! Stop!” Keith yelled, he swerved and dodged, but the small vessel was no match for Red, who snatched Keith’s ship in his maw like a dog with a tennis ball and zoomed off towards a nearby planetoid.
“crzzzzzz… chch.. Keith?” Keith heard Lance’s panicked voice over the onboard com’s system, “Keith are you OK?”
Keith fumbled for a moment with the controls, then replied, “Yeah, I’m fine. What the hell, man?”
“It’s not me, it’s Red! He got all freaked out when you left and kidnapped me!” Lance retorted, “This lion is as moody as you are sometimes.”
“Hmph,” Keith huffed, scowling slightly. A blinking light on his console caught his attention, “Lance, head’s up: the planetoid Red’s taking us to has an argon-rich atmosphere, entry is gonna be intense.”
“Noted.” Lance replied, “I’m picking up some hull fissures on your vessel. Do you think it’s safe to stay in there during entry? Can you get into Red?”
“Let me check…” Keith’s console was blinking more fervently now, informing him of the hull fissures and imminent pressure differential, “It’s not safe in here, but my hatch is facing into Red’s mouth. I’m going to de-pressurize and eject towards your hatch.”
“Copy… crshhh”
Keith punched in the sequence and made his way towards his hatch. The artificial gravity cut out and he felt his suit pressurize as the cabin pressure dropped. He maneuvered himself to crouch on the outside of the vessel, lining up his shot. He could feel a slight warmth on his back, an hint of the immense heat that would be generated by Red’s entry into the atmosphere. Now or never.
Keith pushed off gently from the hull, so far so good. After a few meters he tried to correct course slightly, but no response from his propulsion system.
“Lance, I don’t have propulsion! Help!”
“… chhhh…”
“Lance, did you hear me?” Keith tried to keep the panic out of his voice. The longer he went, the more off course he would be at the hatch, and if he passed the hatch he would bounce. If he bounced, he might bounce right out of Red’s mouth and hurtle through the atmosphere with only his suit for protection.
Keith swore loudly into his coms, “Lance!”
Just then, the hatch swung open and Lance rappelled down a cable, looking like a goddamned action star and Keith collided straight into his body with a solid thunk. Keith instinctively wrapped all his limbs tightly around Lance and felt Lance’s arm wrap solidly around his back.
Before he knew it, they were safe and sound, curled together on the floor of Red’s airlock, as the hatch slammed closed behind them.
Lance heaved a breath from beneath Keith which brought him back to reality, the reality that he was all up in Lance’s personal space. He rolled away and up to his feet in one smooth movement, brushing himself off unconsciously. He glanced back at Lance who hadn’t moved and was looking at him with an odd expression on the part of his face visible through the visor.
“What?” Keith asked, abruptly.
“Ha! I risk life and limb to save your sorry behind, and all I get is a ‘What?’,” Lance teased.
Keith smirked, and extended a hand to help Lance up. Lance took it and got to his feet.
“Thank you ever so much. My hero.” Keith tried for sarcasm, but it fell a little flat. He met Lance’s eye for a moment and turned away quickly, dropping Lance’s hand. But, Lance held on, pulling Keith back around and catching his other hand.
“What…?” Keith stared down at their hands, not understanding.
“Keith,” Lance began, “will you hear me out?”
Keith met Lance’s gaze and saw a soft sincerity there, something he had only seen from Lance a handful of times. Keith nodded.
The airlock beeped to let them know the air was breathable.
“One sec,” Lance used one hand to lose his helmet. Keith was tempted to use it as an excuse to put some distance between them, but he was curious. His heart was in his throat, and not just from the perilous space shenanigans. He kept his visor up.
“Ok, so,” Lance reached for Keith’s other hand again, and to Keith’s surprise, he gave it, “You know how Red got all worked up and kidnapped me and grabbed you and is taking us to some desolate space rock.”
Keith laughed, “Yes, I think I can remember that far back.”
“Ok, but like, it got me thinking, Red only gets like that when you’re in danger, and as far as I could tell, you weren’t in any danger,” Lance paused searching Keith’s face, “At least not until we showed up!”
Keith hoped his smile didn’t look too sad.
“What I mean to say is,” Lance continued softly, “I think it hurt you more than you let on that you were leaving and that we would let you leave without a fuss. I know sometimes you feel like you don’t belong in the group, but you are part of our family and you need to know that, as much as we squabble and bicker, we love you and you’re so important to us. You’re important to me, and…” he paused to collect himself, “I can’t believe it took Red putting us in this ridiculous situation to realize that… I love you.”
Keith cycled through a million emotions while he let those words hang in the air between them, he eventually settled on confused suspicion.
“You…, no, not possible.” Lance had lost it, he reasoned; there was no way a sane Lance would say anything like that.
“It’s true!” Lance claimed, “Ok, let me put it this way. Red and I don’t have a very strong connection,” Keith started to interject, “Ah, ah, ah, it’s true, our connection is not nearly as strong as yours and Red’s, but just before he grabbed me, I felt the strongest connection to him that I’ve ever felt, but it was weird, like we both felt the same love for you.”
Keith huffed, “Then that’s not… what you said, that was just you feeling his mamma hen feelings and mistaking them for the other thing.”
“I don’t think so,” Lance said, “I’ve felt it before, long before Red even bothered to notice me, I’ve had this little spark in my heart and it would grow into a little flame, then shrink then grow bigger. And just now when I thought you were going to burn up in the atmosphere, it was so huge, and I’m just realizing now that this probably wasn’t a great metaphor, ha, but just then, when I cradled you in my arms I knew I wanted to hold on to you forever and keep you safe. It’s ok if you don’t believe me, or if you think I’m too cheesy or…”
“No,” Keith surprised himself again, he stepped closer, ditched his helmet and pressed his forehead to Lance’s, letting his eyes close, enjoying Lance’s breathy inhale. Then he murmured, “I don’t think you could fake that level of cheesiness.”
Keith put his hands on Lance’s hips, his heart pounded, he felt Lance mirror him, pulling them both together, “Can I?” he pulled back a little and glanced down to Lance’s lips and back up to his eyes.
“Mmm,” Lance’s eyes lit up, and Keith closed the distance between their lips, and somehow in their sweet, inexperienced fumbling was the best kiss Keith had ever experienced, all electric tingles and chills and butterflies. They parted, all dopey smiles and shy blushing.
Keith felt a stinging in the corner of his eye, and a tear welling there. He went to brush it off, but the black glove of his suit was too bulky and not absorbent, so he just kind clonked his hand into his face. He laughed at himself and glanced back up to Lance, tear dripping undisturbed down his cheek. Lance chuckled a little, then with a very determined look on his face, lifted his own gloved thumb and carefully wiped the tear aside, and kissed the spot where it had been, the other side “For good measure,” and Keith’s lips again.
Keith felt loved.