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The second time it happens…he might have been jealous.
They were at some banquet celebrating the newest addition to the coalition. Lance and Pidge at what had become their respective spots at his side. Shiro was gratefully sitting at the head of the table with the planet leaders and Allura as usual, Coran not far off.
The term is grateful because ever since word got out about Keith crawling into Lance’s lap Shiro had been…insufferable.
Not that he had anything bad to say about it. Just that he was Shiro and Lance was Lance and honestly Keith wished Lance was as interested in the whole affair as Shiro was but as it stood Lance was flippant at best.
Shiro would nudge him in the shoulder, wink (poorly, mind you) suggestively, and constantly ask Keith where Lance was or what they were planning to do later.
As Keith often had very little to say on the matter it mostly just irritated him.
Of course, Shiro was like a brother to him so he figured this was part of it and couldn’t really be too upset.
…Really, he just wished he had something to say.
But, since Lance hadn’t…
Since they hadn’t…
Should he bring it up?
Should he talk about it?
What should he say?
“Hey can I do that more often? Maybe. Like. In a more than friends kind of way?”
Yeah, sure. That would work.
Was Lance even really attracted to Keith? Or was he really just “touch starved” and desperate?
His spork scratched at his plate and made an awkward noise that made Pidge flinch, but Lance hadn’t even looked up.
“You good Keith?” Pidge asked.
Hunk leaned across the table to try and hide his judgmental whisper of, “I know, the foods pretty gross, if you give me a little time I can sneak off and whip us up something tolerable.”
His whisper still managed to be heard by two of the nearby aliens. One scoffed and turned its nose up at the yellow paladin while the other chuckled and mumbled a quick, “Could you really?” but his friend nudged him and he didn’t push the matter.
These aliens, like a lot of the races they’d seen lately, were mostly humanoid in shape though their skin varied from shades of blues and greens, they had horns and gills implying they were semi aquatic, and they had four eyes, the two extra ones appearing almost gemstone like beneath their more human eyes. Those eyes were supposed to sea heat or something like that. Honestly, Keith didn’t pay too much attention and he really didn’t care all that much. There were simply too many planets and too many species of alien to start committing them all to memory right now. After the war he could come back and start chronicling them all, for the time being he had different priorities.
…Like Lance.
God, why was he like this?
“T-the food is fine. Sorry. I was just thinking.”
“Bout?” Pidge asked.
Lance was making small talk with the alien on his other side, chuckling every now and again when the alien would say something particularly animated.
He was a good listener. Observant. Caring.
Why the fuck didn’t that apply when it concerned Keith?!
When Keith didn’t verbally respond and instead let his eyes dart to Lance’s face and down and back again, Pidge rolled her eyes.
Then she kicked him under the table, “Have you talked yet?”
“About?”
“You know what about!”
Keith shook his head and Hunk raised a quizzical brow from his spot across the table, “…Seriously dude?”
Before Keith could respond, Lance pushed his chair away from the table, “Hey, I’m gonna check out the other room with Prindar, apparently that’s where the dancing is. Anyone wanna come with?”
Prindar, the alien with two red crystals under their dark violet eyes who had been excitedly telling Lance all about their peoples style of dance beamed at the other paladins, “It can get a little too rowdy though so we can’t really dance where we eat, you understand.”
“Sounds like my kind of party!” Lance beamed right back before shooting a look at Hunk, “Come on, you weren’t eating anyway.”
Hunk shrugs before getting to his feet. He passes Keith a skeptical look but doesn’t push it.
Lance does though, “Keith, Pidge?”
Pidge says nothing and when Keith considers it, even vaguely makes to push his chair away from the table, Pidge kicks him again.
Okay. So she didn’t want him to leave. Fair.
“W-we’ll catch up, I guess.”
Once Lance and Hunk have disappeared into the other room, Pidge reaches over and tugs on Keith’s hair, “You’re going to talk to him. Seriously. This is. Stupid. You’re being stupid. I thought you were the smarter one of the two of you.”
Keith thought about it briefly, because Lance was plenty smart. Brilliant, actually. All kinds of diligent and hardworking and quick on his feet and just—
He must have had a funny expression on because Pidge simply narrowed her eyes at him, “You have ten minutes before I send Shiro after you.”
Oh fuck.
He glanced up to the head of the table where Shiro was starting to notice two of his paladins had left. When his eyes met Keith’s, Shiro did a little finger guns motion with his hands while his face remained confused. This of course translated to, “And Lance?”
Keith groaned.
“Make it fifteen?”
“And not a second more,” Pidge accepted. They both pushed away from the table and darted off in different directions. Pidge to pretend to be involved with politics and distract Shiro and Keith to go… confront Lance.
Unfortunately, the other room was a sea of green and blue antlered creatures all laughing and spinning and jumping, broad happy dancing that made Keith want to curl up into himself as tiny as possible. Maybe even hide under a table.
And to his immense joy, there were still tables here, but they were only for large bowls of something akin to punch only it was lighter, possibly to keep from hindering the happy dancers too much.
Finding Lance proved… difficult.
He spotted Hunk first but that was because he had come out of the crowd for a drink, “These guys sure like to move. If we’re not careful Lance might want to stay.”
Keith may have let his lower lip jut out just a bit at this.
Hunk amended this statement, “Well, unless you gave him a reason not to. Which I thiiiink you could.”
At the implication, Keith scoffed, “Please. As if Lance would ever leave the war effort for anything but his own family.”
Hunk rolled his eyes, “Or you could totally make shit serious. I’m just saying Keith, you should really go talk to him.”
Keith bit the inside of his cheek and waited another minute or two before trying to brave the crowd in search of his blue paladin.
The crowd was not where he’d found him. Instead, he’d spotted him by a table on the far side of this crazy dance hall, a glass in hand, a flush on his cheeks, out of breath and once again laughing carelessly at something Prindar was saying.
And Prindar was standing awfully close to him too.
Close enough to graze one pale green hand against Lance’s arm in a way that was very clearly flirtatious.
Keith isn’t sure how he made it across the hall in such a short amount of time with such little obstacle. Perhaps the people who would have potentially stood in his way could see the heat his body was giving off and decided they didn’t want to trifle with the fiery red paladin.
By the time Keith made it to Lance and his new alien friend Lance had perched himself on the free space of the table, long legs slightly parted his glass up to his lips as he smiled at his conversation partner while Prindar stepped in close, almost close enough to step between Lance’s legs.
Which. Was frankly unacceptable.
Lance’s eyes landed on Keith and he got to watch them widen in surprise, flicker to a softer expression for just a second, and then melt into some kind of confusion.
“Oh hey Keith! When did you get here?”
Keith said nothing. Logically, he could have. He could have made small talk, he could have casually and slowly attempted to steer Lance away from the alien. But Keith didn’t do things casually. He had the subtlety of a freight train and occasionally stopped caring about the repercussions of said train crashing.
Choo Choo motherfuckers.
Without much thought, Keith stepped right between Lance’s legs. His blush, Keith noticed, suddenly seemed to switch gears from exertion to flustered, clarified only by Lance’s oh so beautifully expressive eyebrows.
“Hi there…?” Lance squeaked.
Keith stared him straight in the face as he lifted both of his hands to wrap around Lance’s and his glass. One hand carefully and easily slipped the glass out of Lance’s grasp and placed it down on the table behind him while the other held onto Lance’s just a bit longer.
“Hi.” He replied, a little breathier than intended.
Not that Keith had a lot of intentions right now. None of this was exactly premeditated.
He turned, still between Lance’s legs and still holding Lance’s hand though he used his new position to pull his arm around him, as he pressed his back into Lance’s chest and settled comfortably between the other boys knees.
Keith could already see that he was making Prindar uncomfortable with the way the alien’s facial muscles seemed to tighten, but frankly he didn’t care.
Instead, he did one better and leaned his head back against Lance’s shoulder, tilting just a bit to the side so his bangs brushed against Lance’s neck as he kept his eyes on the alien, “So…What are we talking about?”
He could feel Lance’s body shudder beneath him and it just made him feel so damn proud of himself.
Even better when Lance breathed deeply before wrapping his other arm around Keith’s waist, mirroring the first and holding him tightly.
And when he bowed his head, his cheek brushing against Keith’s forehead, a light curse on his lips Keith might have melted.
Prindar, bless his soul for trying, did attempt to explain the conversation he’d been previously having with Lance at Keith’s request, but neither one of them acknowledged the alien.
“So is this just going to be a thing that happens or…” Lance mumbled, squeezing him tighter still.
Keith tried not to give in to the strength of his arms and the warmth of his chest and the depths of Lance’s voice speaking in that tone he just couldn’t place.
“Maybe…if that’s cool with you.” Keith offered quietly.
Lance breathed again, his thighs tightened around Keith, his head dipped a little lower, he whispered the word “Fuck” in a way that did not sound at all annoyed, and then nodded, “Yeah. Yeah, if its you it’s cool. This is cool.”
“Cool.”
Probably not what Pidge had in mind when she told him to talk to Lance but you know what? They could get to that.