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It had been a few weeks since the Space Rock incident and things were largely going back to normal. At least, as normal as they could be after everyone but Thace and Shiro attempted to kill themselves at the behest of one of Haggar’s horrific experiments. Shiro knew that the mood around the castle was still largely sad. What had happened to these kids, Ulaz, and Coran was cruel. They all missed their families so much and to rip it away from them, it certainly didn’t help the war effort.
Shiro and Thace were also struggling, though neither really mentioned it. For Shiro (and Thace as well, he suspected) it was largely because he didn’t feel as though he had any right to complain. The kids were the ones who had been interacting with the stone for nearly a week. The kids were the ones who had to listen as their family berated them, scolded them, and manipulated them into doing anything and everything to make them proud. What did Shiro have to deal with? Just his parents saying the same old things about him they had said back on Earth.
Still, everyone was walking as if they were in some sort of trance. Despite Coran ensuring all of them that the stone’s affects had been neutralized, this kind of thing did not just go away in a day or two. Shiro himself felt worthless and helpless with all of this. He had let things get too far. He had ignored the signs for too long. He almost lost people because of it.
The black lion purred in his head, trying to comfort him.
“I know, it wasn’t my fault.” He said. Maybe if he said those words enough, he would eventually believe them.
The lion let waves of emotions and ideas pass over him. Including one about decreasing the isolation between the paladins.
Shiro pursed his lips. It was true, the kids were still largely staying away from each other. He wasn’t surprised. Keith bottled up his emotions, especially when they came to his mother, and didn’t like anyone to see him weak. Coran, Thace, and Ulaz were probably trying to remain strong for the sake of the team, not wanting to put the burden of dealing with their issues on literal children. Allura was likely going through a similar thought process, not wanting to appear as a weak and ineffectual leader, as the stone had suggested to her many times. Lance seemed like the kind of kid who would rather deal with everyone else’s problems, begging them to ignore his and trying so hard to make sure that no one feels as bad as he does. Hunk was likely trying to cope with it on his own, placing it in the same category as his anxiety but not adjusting the coping techniques to truly fit. Pidge was probably throwing herself more and more into finding her family, if only because the stone had shown her a taste of what could happen and now more than ever, she felt like she couldn’t let up.
And Shiro, Shiro knew that being isolated and trying to deal with the aftermath by himself was never going to work. He knew that he had to get the team comfortable with talking to each other once again.
He tapped on the table. It would have to be something neutral, something that could make people let their guard down and give them coping techniques. He then got an idea and grinned. It was time to visit Pidge.
oOoOoOo
When he entered the Green Lion’s hangar, he let out a sigh of relief. He knew, logically, that Pidge wasn’t likely to try and jump off the lion again (Lance and Keith were, but that was because they were stupid, not because they wanted to kill themselves), but listening to Thace recount the story to him left him more than a little worried.
“What’s up?” she asked, not taking her eyes off the screen.
Shiro sat beside her. “You have movies on that thing, right?”
“Yep. If you want it, I probably got it.”
“Great, Keith’s never seen a Disney movie so--”
“What!” Pidge whipped around to him so fast, he was afraid she would break her neck. “How can you be a responsible older sibling and not show him any Disney movies?”
“I mean, it’s not like they really have DVD players up in space… or Disney movies.”
“What’s this about Disney movies?” Hunk asked, coming in with a box of tools.
Pidge went back to typing furiously on her laptop. “Keith has never seen one. Get Lance and Keith, we’re going to watch a few!”
“If Keith’s never seen one, then Thace, Coran, Ulaz, and Allura have probably never seen one either,” Shiro mused in a way that hopefully sounded innocent and not at all like this was the exact outcome that he had planned.
Pidge threw her hands in the air. “I can’t believe I didn’t think about that. Alright, I’m downloading every single Disney movie, except for the sequels.”
“What about Toy Story Two, and Three?” Shiro asked.
“Yeah, those are good. Also Toy Story Four.” Hunk added.
“They made a fourth one?”
“Don’t forget Cinderella Three!” Pidge continued typing away on her computer.
“Um.”
“I’m allowed to have guilty pleasures.”
“Make sure to get Pixar as well. I’ll cook up a lot of junk food.” Hunk was already sprinting down the halls to get Lance.
“Shiro, go get the losers who haven’t seen a Disney movie and tell them to meet us in the lounge in an hour. I’ve got culture to share.”
Shiro chuckled and stood up. “Will do.”
oOoOoOo
“So, tell me again what we’re doing here?” Thace asked, settling into the pillows and blankets that Lance had thrown around the room, creating a cozy little nest for them all to cuddle up in.
“You uncultured swine are about to get a crash course in human entertainment,” Pidge said, setting up a projector.
“And we’re going to do that by watching children’s movies?” Keith said. He didn’t protest when Shiro had told him what was going on, which was good. Shiro wanted him to make friends with these kids.
“Um, they’re better than “children’s movies”, mullet,” Lance scoffed, throwing down a few more blankets.
“Oh, I love watching movies.” Ulaz got a wistful look in his eyes. “Flowers for Ila is one of my favorites.”
Wow, that sounded super boring and like the kind of Oscar-bait Movie that Shiro’s parents would force him to watch that was almost always about World War Two.
“Yeah, my parents never let me watch that. It’s still banned from any of our homes,” Thace said.
“Why’d they ban it? It’s not like it’s anti-empire propaganda,” Ulaz said.
“Laz, the main character shares my brother’s name.”
“Oh, yeah, come to think of it, it did portray the main character as a bit of a useless artist.”
“So, your parents didn’t want you to watch a movie because the main character was a sensitive artist and shared your brother’s name?” Hunk asked, setting down an array of sweets and drinks. Thace agreed to let them have some of the candy from the space mall, which was always a plus. Also, Hunk had managed to create something that tasted and looked almost exactly like popcorn. This kid was a genius.
“My parents are very particular in how our family is portrayed and feared it would give my brother ideas about careers other than military.”
“I for one am excited to watch this movie,” Allura said, clapping her hands together and settling back against the cushions. Lance tried to sit next to her but Thace picked him up and deposited him next to Pidge before going back to sit next to Ulaz. Lance crossed his arms and pouted but stayed put.
“Actually, there’s a lot.” Pidge said, pulling up a list.
“Yeah, we probably won’t watch all of them tonight.” Shiro didn’t think they would even finish them all in a week, not with training, fighting, sleeping and eating. “How about Hunk, Pidge, Lance and I each pick a movie and once a week we come and watch a movie so we don’t get overwhelmed.
“Oh, I want Tangled!” Hunk said excitedly. Pidge loaded it up onto the screen.
“I want Lilo and Stitch. We have to watch that one.” Lance said.
Hunk thought for a moment before nodding to himself. “Let’s go with Mulan. You can’t go wrong with a classic, and it’s got great music.”
“Wait, there’s singing?” Keith said, suddenly sounding much less sure of the whole evening.
“Yep! Lots of it, so be prepared Mullet, it’s going to get loud.” Lance smirked at him.
“You guys are forgetting the real classics,” Shiro said. “Let’s watch Cinderella tonight as well. Hands down, best of the older ones.”
Pidge finished queuing up the movies. “Alright. We have our list for tonight. I can’t wait. This is going to be great.”
The evening was great. Lance, Pidge, Hunk, and Shiro all were singing along to the songs loudly and as best they could. Despite having five aliens watching along with them, as well, they all seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely. Needless to say, Keith had the strongest reaction to Lilo and Stitch and he and Lance actually seemed to bond over the movie.
Shiro had no false expectations, they were still probably going to argue a lot, but it was nice to see that they actually could get along and agree with things. Allura seemed to like Mulan the best and there were some jokes about Shang and Thace sharing similar attitudes when it came to training. Ulaz and Coran both seemed to love Tangled the best with Thace, surprisingly, liking Cinderella.
By the end of the night, everyone was curled together, laughing and crying at all the right moments. It was by no means a perfect solution, and they would still have a lot of work to do in order to heal, but they were getting there. Plus, Shiro was abducted before he got so see Moana so that was definitely happening next week.