Work Text:
Matt's return was unexpected, but great, especially since the last time Shiro had seen him he was bleeding on the floor from Shiro's own hand. He was delighted for Pidge, but he was ever more conscious about the looks he couldn't help but throw her way. He second-guessed every interaction with her and had gotten weird looks from everyone. Now he found the easiest way to avoid this was to avoid her. It wasn't an ideal solution, especially considering how much he missed her, but he wasn't a good actor and sooner or later, either Pidge or her brother was bound to notice.
One morning he saw Pidge coming down the hall and was about to wave hello to her, when he noticed Matt walking beside her. He dived through an open door and slammed it shut but, unfortunately, the room wasn't as empty as he thought. Keith was sitting on the alien exercise machine similar to a bicycle, clothed in his workout gear, and staring at Shiro like he had just announced he was the king of a sandcastle and was going to forgo wearing clothes for the rest of his life.
"Do you ever stop training?" he asked but then waved Keith off as it looked like he was going to reply. "Sorry, you surprised me."
"That happens when you throw yourself into a room without looking first." Keith furrowed his eyebrows at Shiro as he swung off the bike. "What were you - " Shiro waved his hands at Keith to ask for silence and both of them could hear Pidge and Matt right outside the door. Matt said something, the words indistinct but Pidge's laughter was clear. She sounded much freer than he had ever heard since he came into the castle and it was good to hear, though he wished he could hear it under other circumstances than when he was hiding from her in a room with Keith watching at him with a far too knowing look in his eye.
"So, you're hiding from Pidge then?" Keith sat down on the edge of a strange blinking cube which turned red underneath him. Keith didn't seem to notice and Shiro ignored it for the moment.
"I'm not hiding from Pidge, I just remembered something I had to do." Shiro was not the best at thinking on his feet. "I came to train with you."
"Shiro, I've heard better excuses from Lance." Keith shifted and the cube turned blue. "We've all noticed you've been avoiding Pidge the last few days."
"You've noticed?" Shiro asked and then immediately winced. He could have at least tried to deny it. "Do you think Pidge has noticed?"
Keith snorted. "Right now the only thing Pidge is noticing is having part of her family back but soon she is going to get over the high of saving her brother from the Galra and start paying attention again."
"I'm not that bad." Keith didn't even dignify that with a response and Shiro sighed. He didn't want to imagine what Pidge's reaction will be when she found out and he didn't have faith in his ability to hide something like this for long. Pidge, when she wasn't obsessing over something, was far too observant for Shiro's peace of mind and he had a feeling she would only need a few days to work it out.
The trouble was it wasn't like back in the Garrison. If you asked someone out and got rejected, it would be awkward but you could get enough distance between the two of you to make sure one or both of you got over it. Shiro had done it before and he knew he could have handled being in the same situation again, but right now they were a small group of people sharing a castle which was a lot smaller when you were trying to avoid someone. There would be no way of avoiding Pidge after she had found out and it would make everything really awkward and strange. They couldn't afford that; the team couldn't afford that. Shiro had to hide this better.
"You need to get better at hiding your emotions," Keith said, doing the uncanny thing of reading Shiro's mind as he had done more than a few times in the Garrison. Compared to all of Shiro's other friends, Keith had been uncommonly tuned in to what Shiro was thinking. "And you have to stop avoiding her."
"I'm not that worried about Pidge realising what I feel for her," Shiro confessed. "I'm concerned about her reaction and how it would affect the team but I'm also worried about Matt seeing it." Now Keith looked surprised. "Apart from you, Matt was one of the truest friends I had but I don't know how he's going to react to me liking Pidge." Matt was different to how Shiro remembered him and he was sure Matt would say the same thing about him. Their experiences as Galra prisoners had changed them and now Matt had just been reunited with his younger sister and they were relearning each other again, figuring out who they had changed into when they were apart. While Shiro had gotten to know Pidge properly, he didn't know Matt, this Matt, well enough to say how he would react. Matt had always said that he didn't mind who Pidge dated as long as she was happy, but that was Matt who had only know a happy life with both parents and his sister. Now Pidge was the only member of his family he had left, his father God knows where and his mother light-years away back on Earth, and he might not want to share his sister right after he had gotten her back.
Understanding all of this only made his problem worse. He cared for Pidge, more than he had expected, but he also valued Matt's friendship too and he struggled to visualise a scenario where everything turned out alright between the two of them. It was a question that had been plaguing him at the back of his mind for a while and he knew he would never get a concrete answer unless he told Pidge and Matt.
"Do you want to spar?" Keith must have sensed Shiro was done talking about it and offered him an out. It was gratefully accepted, Shiro's head was already spinning and he just needed not to think for a little while.
Two hours later, Shiro felt more in control of himself, emotions balanced as they were after a good spar. Something about exercise helped to clear his head, especially when it was with someone like Keith who understood the need for silent sparring. The last thing Shiro had sparred with Lance, his punches had been weak, half-hearted things because he was too busy concentrating on what Lance wanted to tell him. Keith tuned Lance out when he was like this but Shiro lived in fear he would miss something important.
As he headed back to his quarters, he resolved to talk to Pidge as soon as he could. Avoiding her was never a long-term plan and if he told her, at least he would be able to control the manner of which she gained the information. Acknowledging what was going on would surely help Shiro to get over Pidge if she rejected him. God, he hoped she wouldn't reject him. On a purely selfish note, Shiro missed talking with Pidge but he also missed his friend and he didn't know what to do with how he felt.
He was too busy lost in his thoughts to notice one of the very people he was thinking about stepping out from behind the corner until he was blocking his path. "Matt," Shiro said in surprise. Matt was looking at him with a new strange and serious look in his eye. The Matt Shiro had known before, whether it was the cheerful colleague or the fellow terrified prisoner didn't have the serious cast to his face and Shiro felt a pang of mourning. They would never be the same again, none of them would, even if they did manage to return to Earth. Shiro wasn't as desperate as the others to get back, any family he once had been gone a long time ago and, excepting Pidge and Matt's dad, the people he was closest to were on this castle already, but he understood their desire.
"Shiro," Matt said, his voice bland and expressionless. "We have to talk."
"That sounds ominous." Shiro tried for a smile but it fell flat. He led the way to his room without any further explanation or query, there was no point in trying to cover up what this was about. The two of them stood opposite each other in Shiro's tidy, quiet bedroom. "Just before you start, I would just like to say that I'm glad you're back."
Matt raised one eyebrow. "This you trying to get on my good side?" The cynicism was new as well and Shiro grimaced as he thought it didn't suit Matt's young face.
"No, it's just the truth. You've been mostly with Pidge and I haven't had a chance to catch up." Shiro wanted to hit himself. He made it sound like he and Matt had lived in different countries for a while.
"Oh, yes." Matt leaned against the wall and crossed his arms, his gaze never coming off Shiro. "My younger sister. Pidge." It seemed like he wasn't going to say anything more. Shiro took in a breath as unobtrusively as he could and looked back at his friend.
"What about Pidge?"
"I'm guessing you two aren't together because Pidge can't lie to save her life." Now it was Shiro's turn to raise one eyebrow at Matt. Pidge had done a good job of making everyone think she was a boy, up until the mice and diary-reading got in the way. If Shiro hadn't known that Matt had a sister, rather than a brother, he might never have known. "You're interested in her? Not going to lie, that was a surprise."
"Can't help what I feel." Shiro wasn't going to apologise for it, though it was tempting when Matt was staring at him like that. "Nothing is going to happen between us, I don't think you have to worry about that."
Both of Matt's eyebrows went up this time. "And what makes you say that?"
"It's not a good idea. It was bad enough back at the Garrison where you were bound to see the person you were rejected by but here it could actually be dangerous. I mean, if I say something to Pidge and it turns out she doesn't feel the same way, I've just made everything very awkward. If we avoid each other because of it and it turns out that one of us has missed some vital information because of it, then that's on us."
"But you've been avoiding her anyway," Matt pointed out and Shiro winced.
"Yeah, I'm going to stop that. Keith pointed out that it wasn't the best way to make sure no one knew anything was wrong."
"And what happens if Pidge does like you back?" Matt's voice was neutral as if he didn't want to give Shiro a signal either way or where Katie's feelings were.
"Then what happens if we fight or get distracted? We're such a small group, we can't afford anyone being distracted." Shiro knew his logic was sound, it wasn't something he had just come with on the spot so Matt wouldn't question him about why he hadn't told Katie. The fact the logic was sound didn't help Shiro anymore though, it still hurt.
"That can happen with friendship," Matt pointed out. "Keith said to me about him being part Galra and how Allura hadn't handled it well when she found out. Keith and Allura are friends, though in a different way to how Pidge and you are friends, but they can still have arguments and become distracted from the mission." Matt stepped forward, his blank expression fading into something a lot more familiar to Shiro. He put a hand on Shiro's arm. "Shiro, you can't close away parts of you until the Galra are defeated. Believe me, I understand your need to destroy the Galra but it could take years. Suppressing everything isn't healthy and we deserve to be able to live a life at the same time as destroying the Galra."
Shiro turned his face away. Matt's argument was well-reasoned and you only had to look at Shiro's own actions to see that it was true. Pidge and Shiro weren't even in a romantic relationship and he still avoided her for days. "I don't think she feels the same way back."
"I can find out for you?" Matt asked hopefully and Shiro immediately shook his head.
"I'm fine." Subtlely was not Matt's strong point and Shiro really didn't want any interference. This was embarrassing enough without adding matchmaking to the mix. Matt looked deflated at his and Shiro gave him a pat on the back. "I'll be okay. It'll work itself out."
Matt looked doubtful and Shiro wished he didn't understand why he felt like that. "I still think you should tell her," he said but it was without the conviction of before and Shiro knew he had made his point.
Later that night, he was lying in his bed and wondering whether it was actually a good thing he had won or not. Matt was okay with how Shiro felt but it still didn't feel like Shiro was any closer to figuring out what to do about Pidge.
Shiro huffed and punched the pillow before settling down again. It didn't matter whether Pidge returned his feelings or not, he wasn't going to get into anything with her and that was that. In fact, it was probably a good thing if she didn't return his feelings because it would make things so much easier for him. Rejecting the far away possibility of a relationship was a far different thing to rejecting the certainty of a relationship. Shiro turned so he was laying on his back, staring at the ceiling.
Really, he should be thinking over how to defeat Zarkon next rather than worrying over his love life. He had meant what he had said to Matt, this could only be a distraction and there was no better proof than how he was lying awake thinking over what could possibly be and what had to be done. He wished he could have this one part of his life that wasn't dominated by Zarkon and the Galra and he had thought his relationship with Pidge would be it.
The next day, after a night of uneasy sleep, Shiro got another unexpected visitor to his room. Pidge herself.
"Hey, Shiro," she said as casually as if they were sitting across the breakfast table from each other, not Pidge strolling into Shiro's room as if she owned it.
"What happened to my lock?" Shiro gestured vaguely at the door. He was holding his shirt - he had been in the middle of dressing - and hurried to put it on as he realised he was standing bare-chested in front of Pidge.
"Oh, the door let me in." Pidge seemed to dismiss this as unimportant but Shiro made a mental note to get Coran to look at his door. The last thing he wanted was to have Lance bursting him on him or to wake up to Keith in his room sharpening his knife. Again. "I had to tell you something."
"What is it?" Shiro tried not to let the memory of the conversations with Matt and Keith show on his face as he sat down on the bed.
Pidge's face suddenly twisted into an uncertain expression. After looking confident, almost blase, about coming into Shiro's room, now she seemed to be having doubts about what she was actually going to do. "Shiro," she said before stopping again.
"It's okay, Pidge." Shiro smiled. She was cute like this, biting her lip nervously when she looked at him. Thinking about what she wanted to tell him was better than thinking about how they were both in a room together. Alone. With a bed.
"Shiro, I've been talking to Matt and he's helped me to put into words what's been going on for a while." She took another deep breath. "I like you, Shiro. A lot. And not as a friend. Believe me, I know how I feel about Lance and Hunk and it is nothing compared to what I feel compared to you. The only time I felt like was when I had a crush on Dewey back in school before the Garrison and that pales in comparison to this." She gestured between the two of them. Shiro would think it was endearing how she was babbling like she couldn't get the words out fast enough, but all he felt was cold.
"You came to this conclusion after talking to Matt, right?" Shiro said, his voice flat. Matt was his friend and Pidge's sister, he wouldn't mean to push either of them into something they didn't want but Pidge wanted her brother's approval and it wasn't like Shiro was the worst of the pick. Matt wanted Pidge to be okay and he wanted Shiro to get what he wanted - never mind that this would be the last thing Shiro would want.
"Yeah." Pidge seemed clueless about the implications and Shiro didn't want to enlighten her.
Shiro sighed. "Look, Pidge, you know I like you."
"Oh no, that does not sound like a good start." Pidge smiled but it was an uneasy kind of thing.
"Pidge." Shiro normally appreciated the jokes but right now he felt tired and fed up. Not with Pidge, more like with everyone who felt like interfering in what was Shiro's business alone. "I know Matt told you that I like you like that." He had flashbacks back to being thirteen again and saying a similar kind of thing to Belinda Mars. "But we can't."
"Wait, what?" Pidge blinked. "Matt didn't say anything about you liking me. Did he know?" Shiro stared at her, his mind stuttering over the words as he dearly wished he could take the last thirty seconds back. "Never mind that. We both like each other and want to date each other, right?"
Shiro really wished he could answer otherwise but anything else would be a lie and Pidge deserved more than that. He nodded.
"So, what's the problem?"
"Pidge, we're in the middle of an intergalactic war and no matter how much Allura and Coran talk about a coalition and an alliance of people and planets against the Galra, we're the ones on the front line. Voltron is the main weapon against the Galra and we can't jeopardise that." Shiro realised he was waving his arms around and hastily dropped them onto his lap.
"Oh, I understand." Pidge didn't sound like she understood at all. Instead, she looked like she wanted to attack Shiro with her bayard. "You're thinking the entire universe is resting on your shoulders and dating me would be a huge distraction."
"That's... not exactly what I meant."
"Did you ever stop to ask me what I thought? Shiro, we're five teenagers fighting in a giant space robot in order to save the universe from the Galra. Us dating anyone is going to be a distraction and I would have thought it'll be better if we kept the dating within the castle." Pidge held up a finger as she saw Shiro was about to speak. Right now, her eyes were glaring from behind her glasses and her mouth set in a mutinous line. She looked nothing like her brother right now and Shiro was scared about what she was going to say next. "If you don't want to date me because you find it awkward with my brother living here or you don't like how I fall asleep on my computer sometimes or the time I decided to hack Lance's bayard to singe his hair - "
Both of them cut off from the conversation to snigger at the memory of Lance's overreaction. The gun had barely touched his hair, leaving a few burnt ends which had to be cut out but it had been nearly impossible to tear Lance away from the mirror for two days afterwards.
The tension was broken slightly at their shared laughter and Pidge stepped closer. "We all get distracted by something. Lance by cute aliens, Keith wanting to find out more about his past, Hunk by his stomach and me by the chance to check out new tech. You and Matt both get lost under the memories of Galra control but that doesn't make you any worse at fighters against them. If anything, it makes you more determined than ever to defeat them. Yes, our relationship might be a distraction at times but at least it'll be a good one."
Shiro hesitated. He saw the logic in what Pidge said and he really wanted to say yes, but the thought of the rest of their team held him back.
"Unless you don't want to and this is just an excuse." Pidge's tone stayed soft but her eyes hardened as she looked at him.
"It's not that." Shiro ran a hand through his hair, trying to verbalise what was going on with him. What he saw in his nightmares sometimes. "I know what you're saying about distractions, I know you're right, but I can't bear the thought of one of you being hurt because of what's going on between us. I dream about it, about being blamed for what happens to you." Somehow he didn't think Matt would be so happy with their relationship if it ended up getting his little sister, the only family member he had left in reach, killed.
"I'm sorry that's adding to your dreams." Pidge's hand was comforting and torturous at the same time. Shiro wanted to pull her closer and be able to forget, just for a little while, the horrifying images his mind conjured up. His time in the Galra gladiator arena had improved his fighting skills but the memories like to sneak out at him at random times. Pidge was right, they had been a distraction, though it was one he could not control.
"I want this to be a good thing, Pidge and I am worried that, with the way things are in the world right now, it won't end up like that." Shiro gripped her hand with his flesh one, feeling the warmth underneath it and wondering if he would be able to kiss her without it being too weird.
"Shiro, some things are worth the risk. Relationships could always implode, but it's not just romantic relationships that could do that. Lance could betray us to the Galra, Keith could decide we don't care about him finding out about his past, Hunk could accidentally poison half of us one day and the other half would blame him - I'm never going to be in a romantic relationship with any of them but they could still be a distraction from fighting the Galra. It's what happens when you love someone, even if it's just platonic."
Shiro had to clench his jaw at the automatic reaction to Pidge with their friends like that. It was stupid of him, they weren't in a relationship and he had no right to react like that to even the thought of her with other guys. "Pidge, I want to be with you, I'm just concerned about the risks." Even to him, this excuse sounded weak. To try and make it seem less obvious, he pulled Pidge into a hug.
This was a big mistake. Pidge was shorter than him by about half a head and so was easily able to tuck her head into his neck and nuzzle him there lightly. The feel of Pidge in his arms, the perfect fit, did not help him to gain control of himself or help to persuade him he was making the right choice.
"Shiro, I'm not going to try and talk you into this anymore," Pidge said quietly against his chest. She had slipped her arms around his waist and was holding him in a light grip, though Shiro thought it would be as impossible to break as steel bands. "The last thing I want is a relationship where the guy had to be convinced to be with me. If you say no..." Pidge took a shaky breath and Shiro felt his heart break a little at the sound of it. "If you say no, it'll be awkward, yeah, but I can be professional about these things. It won't get in the way of the team or the fight against the Galra."
Shiro hugged her tighter. He didn't know what he wanted to say to her but he knew he had to hug her as she was now. She was right, she shouldn't have to convince Shiro they were a good idea. At the same time, he was still unsure about everything that was going on between them. "Pidge, I want to be with you. I don't want to be alone and watch you and wish I could have been a little braver."
"I feel like there's a but coming," Pidge said, her voice a little lighter than before.
Shiro closed his eyes and summoned up whatever courage he had left. "I'm so scared." It sounded weak and feeble and everything Shiro had tried not to be, long before he had even known about the Galra.
"I know, me too." Pidge's simple answer had Shiro's breath hurrying out of him in a rush. The acknowledgement and the empathy in her answer made something lighten in Shiro's heart and he wondered if this was what being in a relationship was all about. "We can do it together, Shiro. We're helping to defeat an evil empire, but that doesn't mean we have to let our own lives stop. We've given the fight against the Galra so much, can we not give them this as well?"
"You don't have to try and persuade me anymore," Shiro said quietly. "I was already convinced long ago. I just wanted to hear you say it."
Pidge's gentle thump against his arm had Shiro laughing, though he still didn't let go of Pidge. "We'll take it slow." It was both a promise and an entreaty and Shiro kissed the side of Pidge's head in gratitude. He wasn't entirely sure what he was going to do for dates but hopefully Pidge had some ideas.
A thought suddenly occurred to him. "What are we going to tell the others?"
Pidge had the same wide-eyed look on her face that Shiro was sure he had. "I'm not sure but I vote for never telling them and letting them find out if we end up getting married in the future."
Shiro laughed, more out of the look on Pidge's face as she just realised what she had joked about than the actual joke itself. "Maybe not until we're old and grey. Then we can let the grandkids tell them."
Pidge laughed too, though there was some relief in her laugh. "So, I was thinking a lion walk for our first date? Either that or we find some deserted corner of the castle and have food but I feel like there's a chance Hunk could find us then."
"I think Hunk could find us on a crowded planet," Shiro remarked. "He's like a bloodhound."
"Plus we would want him to make the food." Pidge grinned at Shiro wrinkling his nose. He found the recipes Hunk tried far nicer than anything he had had in space, especially after eating prison food for a year, but they would never match up to his favourite Earth recipes. "Shiro?" Pidge's voice had grown serious now.
"What is it?"
"I'm glad we're doing this."
Shiro felt something wonderfully painful set up root in his chest. "Me too." He pulled away slightly in order to kiss Pidge lightly. It was gentle, a mere brush of lips, but Shiro's heart was beating as hard as it had when he had run marathons back at the Garrison. "I'm looking forward to our date."