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“It’s not my fault!” Lance protested. He found himself saying that phrase a bit more than he would like.
For the last few days, Sergeant Shirogane had been...irritable to say the least. It was unlike him to be so upset all the time, if ever. Normally, he was the one cheering up someone who was upset. They had never seen Shiro like this. The closest they’d seen was that one time when Captain Altea ate his yogurt, but even then, his pissy mood only lasted all of an hour. Like most rational human beings would, the squad believed that Lance was the cause of the Sarge’s bad mood.
“I didn’t do anything!” Lance exclaimed.
Pidge scoffed, “Lance, you flooded his desk and set him on fire Wednesday morning!”
Lance shook his head stubbornly, “Nope, he has endless patience for my shenanigans, plus , he was already in a bad mood when I went into his office that morning. We just need to figure out why he was upset,” Lance placed a finger on his chin and stroked it, as if in thought. The squad knew better than to think that, though.
“You could ask him,” Coran suggested, clearly bored of this conversation, turning his attention back to his phone. Lance thought about it for a second and decided, what the hell? Sure.
He marched over to the Sarge and knocked on his desk as though it were a door. Shiro turned to look at Lance, who had a big cavity-inducing smile on his face, “Hey Sarge, remember when I gave you a sparkler about a week ago?”
“Do I remember you dropping the sparkler and setting me on fire, setting off the sprinklers, destroying the paper crane that Adam folded for me? Yes I do,” Shiro said, his voice low like his patience.
“Right, I forgot how that ended,” Lance mumbled, fake smile faltering ever so slightly, “That’s not the reason you’ve been in a bad mood, right?” Lance asked,
Shiro’s eyebrows tightened together and he sent Lance a poisonous glare, “Bad mood?” He said, like he was tasting the way it felt on his lips, “I’m sorry, have I not been bursting into song for you enough, lately? Would you like me to click my heels together and skip like a schoolchild?”
In an attempt to alleviate some of the tension, Lance chose to respond with, “Yes, to all of that,” with a goofy grin. If Shiro’s face was any indication, it didn’t work so Lance continued, “Okay for real, what’s going on? What non-me thing happened that has upset you so much? Was it something at home? You and Adam just moved in together, right? Is he a slob? Did he throw out your yogurt? Was it mango?” Lance gasped.
“Lance, I am not going to discuss personal matters with you. We’re not family, you are not my boyfriend, you are not my doctor,” Shiro said. Lance was about to object on the grounds that he was his secret santa last year, but Shiro didn’t allow him to speak, “Dismissed,” he huffed and got up from his desk and made his way to the break room.
Lance wanted them to stay and talk, but given the fact that Shiro was already so annoyed, he decided it was better to just leave. That didn’t mean he was done with this, though. He scanned the bullpen for a partner for this case. His knee jerk reaction for a partner for the case was Keith, but things between the two of them had been kind of weird since he started dating Ryan. Okay, it was only weird on Lance’s part because he had kind of been avoiding Keith. The only other person in the bullpen was Pidge. Pidge it is , Lance decided.
“So how did it go with the Sarge?” Pidge asked, not bothering to look up from her computer.
“He won’t tell me what’s wrong because I’m not his boyfriend,” Lance said. Then the thought his, “But you know who is his boyfriend,”
“Adam,” They both said simultaneously. Lance said it with enthusiasm, whereas Pidge didn’t even bother taking her eyes off of her screen, but Lance still took that as an implicit agreement to work with him.
With that, Lance grabbed Pidge by the wrist and dragged her to his car. She wrinkled her nose in disgust and led the two of them to her car, “I’m not getting in that thing you call a car,” she said. Lance scoffed indignantly, but was silently relieved. The brakes were feeling kind of weird this morning.
Lance entered the address to Shiro and Adam’s apartment into Pidge’s fancy GPS and they were off.
When they arrived, Lance realized that there was a strong chance that Adam was at work, like every other grown up on a Tuesday afternoon, as the two of them should have been. Lance groaned, “What if he’s at work?”
“He’s a high school history teacher and it’s 4 in the afternoon. He’s home,” Pidge insisted. She pressed in their unit number into the keypad and awaited Adam’s response.
“Hello?” Adam’s voice rang through the speakers.
Pidge smirked at Lance, a silent I told you so , and said, “It’s Pidge and Lance, buzz us up.”
Adam reluctantly agreed and the doors to the building unlocked themselves for Pidge and Lance. They made their way up the elevator and down to Adam and Shiro’s apartment. Lance knocked to the rhythm of ‘The Funky Cold Medina’. Adam opened the door with a smile and gestured for them to come in.
“To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Title of your sex tape,” Lance mumbled.
Pidge rolled her eyes at Lance and sent Adam an apologetic smile on his behalf, “Lance is trying to prove that he is not the reason Shiro has been in an awful mood since Wednesday.”
“The Wednesday where you set him on fire and consequently the sprinklers, destroying the paper crane I folded for him?”
“What is with you guys and the paper crane? Like, why is it so significant?” Lance whined.
Again, Pidge ignored Lance and took it upon herself to begin the questioning, “What else did Shiro do before he got to work?”
“First, he went to his favourite cafe to get breakfast, then he had painting class, and finally he went to his karate lessons,” Adam listed without hesitation.
“Okay, then we retrace his steps and ask the people there if anything happened to him,” Lance finally said something useful.
“Adam, do you think you could come with us to investigate?” Pidge asked.
“I don’t know if I should investigate my boyfriend,” Adam said.
“Come on, if we can figure out why he’s so upset, we can figure out how to fix it,” Pidge said. Adam thought about it for a bit and finally relented.
“Sure.”
The three of them drove to their first stop: the cafe. Adam brought them over to the counter and a perky blonde girl greeted him.
“Hi Romelle, was there anything off about Takashi when he came here last Wednesday morning?” Adam asked.
Romelle shook her head, “Nope, he ordered a plain bagel and a banana.”
“That’s a sad meal,” Lance declared as though he had solved the case.
“That’s actually his great day meal,” Adam corrected the other man. He redirected his attention to Romelle, “So nothing happened here that may have upset him?”
“Not that I can remember. I let him pick the music and he put on Sousa.”
“That’s his happy composer,” Adam said, “So it appears he was in a great mood and it’s still your fault that he’s so upset,” he made a point to send Lance a pointed look.
Lance pouted and crossed his arms across his chest, “We still have two more stops.”
Adam ordered a coffee from Romelle and they left the cafe. Next stop was the painting class across the street. To Lance’s dismay, the man there, Ulaz, informed the three of them that Shiro was in a great mood during their painting session.
“There’s still one more stop,” Lance said more to himself than to Pidge and Adam.
Once they reached the karate dojo, Lance silently prayed to Beyonce that this is where Shiro was so upset. Lance could tell Adam was getting tired of asking all these people if they noticed anything off about Shiro, but he asks again.
“Sensei Iverson, how was Takashi during your sparring session last Wednesday?’
“He was in a great mood,” Iverson answered.
Pidge sent a knowing look in Lance’s direction, “Well, Lance, looks like the problem was you,” she said.
Lance shook his head, unwilling to admit defeat, “Now are you sure you’re thinking of last Wednesday?”
Iverson nodded, “I’m positive because that was the last time I saw him. He hasn’t shown up since,” he said.
One of Adam’s eyebrows went up and he said, “He hasn’t been in? Two days this week he’s told me what great sparring sessions you had.”
Iverson shook his head and confirmed that he was certain Shiro hadn’t been in. Adam’s expression, from what Lance could tell, was a mixture of confusion and anger.
“Adam, you alright?” Pidge asked softly.
“He lied to me, why would he do that?” Adam managed to get out.
“Adam, it’s gonna be fine, I’m sure there’s a good reason, we just need to figure out what it is and then-”
“-No. I didn’t want to be a part of this. I said it was a bad idea to investigate my boyfriend and you made me do this, and now I’ve uncovered something I wish I never had. I know my way home,” Adam snapped at Lance before angrily marching off.
Pidge looked at Lance with disapproval, “Hey, come on, Pidge, you know this isn’t my fault,” Lance said, or more accurately, begged.
Pidge sighed, “Lance, you’ve caused possibly irreversible repercussions to Shiro’s relationship, possibly affecting the rest of his life and happiness.”
He felt guilty, but he also felt more determined than ever. He had to fix this, and in order to fix this, he needed to figure out what really happened. Pidge, too smart for her own good, could read this from Lance’s face and rolled her eyes.
If nothing happened to Shiro in the dojo, there was still the walk to the precinct. Lance dragged Pidge along, her feet barely ever touching the ground as he marched down the street. After a few minutes, he gasped. Pidge looked around, confused.
“What?”
Lance grinned, “What do you see there?” he pointed to the door of a house across the street.
“A door?” Pidge wondered if Lance had genuinely lost it. If he had, Hunk owed her twenty bucks.
“There’s a security camera! There are security cameras everywhere! I just need to go through all of them and track the Sarge’s walk and I can see what happened!” Lance declared.
Pidge was tired, so she didn’t try to stop him.
Lance didn’t stop until he had figured out what had happened to Shiro. When he did, he figured it would be a good idea to go to the Sarge’s place unannounced and talk to Adam. Hindsight is 20/20 and Lance is impulsive.
In order to get into the building, Lance had to dial every unit and pretended to be food delivery until someone let him up. When he gets to Shiro and Adam’s place Lance raps on the door twice. Adam opens the door and his expression visibly sours when he sees Lance at the door. Before Adam has the chance to close the door in his face, Lance sticks his foot out to hold the door open and asks, “Is Shiro home?”
“No,” Adam said coldly.
“Good, I figured out what happened to him,” Lance said. Adam appeared to think about it for a second and released his grip on the door to let Lance in. Once he was inside, Lance continued, “He was mugged.”
“What? He told you this?” Adam all but shouted.
“No, I used my detective skills, as well as my spot-on Shiro impression to figure it out,” Lance said proudly, “I retraced his steps and found security footage. After he left fencing, three shady guys followed him into an alley. One of them had a knife. That's why he's been in such a bad mood. He's a police sergeant that got mugged. He's embarrassed.”
Adam was shocked, “Oh, my goodness.”
“McClain,” Shiro’s voice came from further inside the apartment.
“Oh, you are home,” Lance said.
“What are you doing in my apartment?” Shiro asked, obviously annoyed.
“Takashi, were you mugged ?” Adam asked. Shiro gives Lance an angry look and turns to Adam who is frowning and waiting for a response.
“What did you say to him?” Shiro asked.
“Sarge, it's okay. There's nothing to be embarrassed about,” Lance tried to comfort Shiro.
The sergeant scoffed at Lance, “I'm not embarrassed, and I wasn't mugged. Three men tried to mug me, but I fought them off, injuring two of them.”
Lance’s face scrunched up in confusion, “Wait, so you heroically fought off three guys, and that put you in a bad mood? If I did that, I would literally write a song about myself,” he said and started singing a tune, only stopping when Adam glares at him.
“Why would you keep this from me, and why would you lie about going to karate?” Adam asked, voice much less tinged with anger now than it was earlier.
Lance gasped with a realization, “Because he couldn't go, because he's injured,” he pointed a finger at his CO like he did with perps.
Shiro scoffed again, “I wasn't injured. I was lightly stabbed.”
Adam’s eyes widened tenfold and he looks like he just saw a dog eating a horse, “I'm sorry. You were stabbed?”
“ Lightly stabbed,” Shiro corrects, as if that makes it any better, “I didn't want to frighten you.”
“You are my boyfriend. I want you to tell me everything, especially things that might frighten me. How can you not know that? Takashi, you are unbelievable,” Adam said, before turning around to walk away and slamming a door behind him.
Shiro turned to Lance and Lance gulped quietly.
“Hey, Sarge, you look so tall,” Lance tried to distract him.
Shiro sighed in exasperation and looked at Lance with pleading eyes, “Lance, you shouldn’t be getting involved in my personal life, it is beyond unprofessional,” he said. Lance muttered some form of an apology and Shiro just sighed once more, “Lance, just go, please.”
Lance does as he’s told for once and leaves. Okay, so now he might be the cause of the Sarge’s bad mood.
The next morning, Lance was about to walk into the precinct, preparing himself to get yelled at by Shiro, when he heard a voice call out, “Lance!”
It was Shiro, and he sounded...happy? Was this a new form of anger? Being nice?
Lance spun around in the direction of the voice and saw Shiro sitting in his convertible. He waved him down and gestured for him to take a seat. A million thoughts ran through Lance’s head, and he decided that it was unlikely Shiro would kill him in his convertible. If he was going to kill Lance he would do it in the open parking lot.
All this considered, he hesitantly took a seat in the car.
“Hey, so I’m sorry about last night, I should never have gotten involved. I overstepped, I thought I was helping, but it’s clear that I wasn’t-” Lance said, but was cut off by his CO.
“Lance, it’s okay,” Shiro responded. Lance noted that there was less grit to his tone than yesterday, and some of the tension left his shoulders and he remembered to breathe.
“So you and Adam are good?”
“He’s still kind of upset that I didn’t tell him, but it’s hard to stay mad at someone who got stabbed,” Shiro told Lance. Lance chuckled a little at that. Shiro continued, “I kind of owe you guys an apology. I was upset with myself for acting like a dumb twenty-year old and I ended up getting hurt, but I took it out on the squad. That wasn’t fair of me.”
Lance accepted Shiro’s apology without the need to take a second to consider it. He wasn’t sure what came after this. Was he supposed to leave? Should he just sit there? In the end it didn’t matter because Shiro broke the silence, “Are you sure this was all just about making me feel better?”
Lance looked back at Shiro more confused now than earlier, “What do you mean?”
Shiro paused for a second and Lance could tell he was thinking whether or not he should say what he was thinking, “Lately, it seems that you’ve been trying to distract yourself. For a while, it was with work stuff, but then that didn’t really work, so it seems like you’ve been trying to distance yourself from, er, you know who,” Shiro nodded towards the building as though it were a person.
Lance played dumb, “Nope, I don’t know who.”
“You can’t avoid Keith forever,” Shiro lowered his voice as if that would coax Lance into a state where he wouldn’t deny it.
“What? No, I haven’t been avoiding Keith,” Lance said. Even he knew that didn’t sound believable at all. Shiro stared back at Lance, but Lance was nothing if not stubborn.
“Okay, fine. Well, we should get inside,” Shiro said.
The whole elevator ride up, Lance’s mind was busy. If Shiro could tell Lance had been avoiding Keith, could the others? Could Keith? His nerves weren’t eased by the fact that they were all detectives . The ride felt like forever, but the doors pinged open before Lance was done breaking down.
His eyes instinctively darted to Keith, who was sitting at his desk. The sound of the doors opening must have gained Keith’s attention, because he looked up and was met with Lance’s stare. Keith smiled and Lance felt like he was floating.
“Hey,” Keith greeted Lance. If Lance weren’t so distracted he would have noticed Shiro smirking at the two of them.