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Lance is hunched over the bathroom sink washing off his face mask when he hears it. An unsettling thumping noise coming from right outside his door. Snapping his head up and meeting his own crystal blue eyes in the mirror, brows furrowed, he hurries to finish rinsing his face. Is he hearing... flapping wings?
HONK!
What? Was that a... goose? How could a goose possibly have found find its way onto the castleship in the middle of space? They must be light years from earth? But that was definitely a goose honk he just heard?
Utterly confused and still in his pajamas (signature blue lion slippers and all), he dries his face and hands on his blue bathrobe and goes to investigate. He is a paladin of Voltron after all. If there is some mystery space goose in the castle of lions he's sure he can handle it. Right?
With a woosh the doors to his room slide open to reveal what is in fact a very angry goose. It comes charging in and lunges right for Lance. He’s not sure exactly what he was expecting but with a squawk of his own he backs rears back narrowly avoiding the terrifying bill full of teeth as the unexpectedly irate goose chases him into the room. He only just manages to maneuver his way around and out the door slamming his palm into the keypad shutting the door behind him on the way. He hears the indignant squawk of the goose as it collides with the door.
Incredibly baffled Lance wastes no time hurrying off to find one of the other paladins to assist him in his feathered predicament.
He stumbles upon Hunk in the kitchen first. “Hunk! Buddy. Thank god you’re up. You’ll never believe what just happened man. I swear I must be losing it, You gotta help me” Lance rambles.
“Well good morning to you too Lance” Hunk barely glances over his shoulder with his back still turned to Lance. “Y’know if you’re gonna start the morning off yelling about some nonsense the least you could do is say good morning”
“Good morning hunk” lance deadpans. “But for real dude! I just had an angry goose show up outside my door. I'm not kidding! It interrupted my morning skincare routine and everything” he whines, slumping down at the counter.
Hunk turns and eyes him up and down, finally noting his disheveled appearance. And he is quite the sight -- hair a matted mess from the night before and one of his signature blue lion slippers missing in the chaos of the chase. “I can see that, but you know the rules Lance. No shenanigans until I’ve had my morning space coffee." He turns back to his kitchen science experiment. "You know I'm basically useless until I've had my pep juice, plus I’ve been perfecting this recipe for weeks now. I think this batch is really gonna knock your socks off, why don’t you slow down, try a cup and tell me what happened?”
Thinking he might as well try a cup of the alien coffee since he managed to trap the thing in his room for now. How would a goose get the door open anyway? It's not like it has hands to reach the keypad inside the room. “It was crazy man. I managed to trap it in my room but I swear, I’ve never seen such an angry bird before”
“A-buh-bup” hunk shushes. “Caffeine first, then explanation” he turns around to start prepping two cups of whatever this latest caffeine concoction is.
But while he is still mid preparation, lance hears the distant honk of a goose, clearly still on a mission. “Oh quiznack“ he whispers, face paling before bolting from the counter. Hunk turns around to see an empty seat and a startled looking Pidge standing in the doorway as an enraged goose goes barreling past the open door in pursuit of Lance.
Jetting through the hallways with the goose hot on his trail, he manages to slip into the med bay before the goose turns the corner for a bit of a reprieve as it continues down the hallway honking and flapping its wings. "Ah, Number three! what brings you to this corner of the castle this fine morning?" Coran happened to be in the med bay when lance slipped in.
"Shhhhhh!" Lance glanced over his shoulder worried the goose might realize it's no longer on his trail. "Coran! There's a goose in the castle!" Lance whisper yells as he makes his way towards the eccentric man.
"A goose! I am not familiar with this creature? Are they dangerous?" Coran asks at his normal boisterous volume.
"SHHHQuiet! it might hear us!" lance hisses, "Its like a big angry bird with vicious teeth in its beak. And it seems to only be after me!? What did I ever do to the goose?"
"I see! A winged beast with a toothed beak! You must be referring to your tadornini. Quite exciting indeed! And to think one of our vary own paladins, they are quite rare. I am surprised that one would appear for an earthling such as you. I remember the story of my Pop Pop Wimblton told me of when his tadornini appeared! It was quite the story, In the wild tadornini tend to be quite peaceful creatures but Pop Pop said when his (soul) tadornini showed up to lead him to Nonny it was quite aggressive. Although I always thought he was he was embellishing the tale quite a bit, he did have a knack for twisting quite the tale. But if what you say is true, and there's one here in the castle after you, it appears the story was accurate! How fascinating!" Coran rambled as he walked over and stuck his head through the door to get a glimpse of the so called tadornini. In doing so he let the damn thing in.
Lance just couldn't catch a break. Squawking himself and invoking evasive maneuvers, he skirts around the outside of the room to avoid the angry goose (tadornini?, whatever). "Don't fret young paladin!" Coran yells over the squawking as Lance races out into the open hallway ignoring him, "If the tadornini is here that would mean that your soulmate must be nearby!"
Running at top speed, Lance is desperate to loose the goose again -- the what did Coran call it? a tadornini? -- it doesn't matter, all that matters is finding a new place to hide so he can maybe catch his breathe. This thing is unyielding, flapping its wings to propel itself forward and keep up with the lanky boy as he makes his way through the castle. Skidding around the corner he can hear the sound of metal on metal coming from the training deck. The only person he knows might be training this early in the morning must be... Keith! Thank god he'll know what to do about this damn goose. -- Wait a minute, rewind. Did Coran say something just now about a soulmate? Just then the tadornini (goose? ugh! BIG ANGRY BIRD!) gets close enough to nip at his ankles and he trips over his own feet trying to pick up the pace, and loose the damn thing as he rounds the corner on his way to towards the sounds of sparring.
Busting onto the training deck out of breath Lance yells, "KEITH! Man You Gotta Help Me! there's a tadornini on my tail!" He manages to shut the doors behind him, separating himself from the angry thing once again.
Keith, who was in the middle of sparring with the gladiator, startles. Taken by surprise and his attention diverted, the bot gets past his guard and he ends up flat on his back. "End training sequence" he huffs out. "Seriously Lance!? What are you on about this time? I'm not in the mood for your games! And what the hell is a tadornini?" He stands and lifts an eyebrow as Lance continues towards him in a rush.
"A GOOSE!" Lance yells, arms flailing, "A goose has been chasing me all over the castle and its out for blood!" He ducks behind Keith using him as a human shield (Galran shield?).
Keith pinches the bridge of his nose - irritated and confused -- he sighs "Lance, how would a goose even get into the castle of lions in the middle of space? We are nowhere near earth?"
HONK
Stunned, Keith's head snaps up to find a goose sitting in front of him calmly. "Save me Keith! Its rabid and murderous!" he ducks back behind Keith grabbing his shoulders.
Keith eyes the goose with a frown, "It doesn't look like a rabid goose to me, just a regular goose. Its just sitting there looking at us."
"I swear Keith, its been attacking me and chasing me all over the castle! Hunk and Pidge saw it! I'm in mortal danger!"
"Are you seriously afraid of a goose Lance? We're paladins of Voltron, defenders of the universe and all that and you cant handle a little goose? Wait what did you call it at first? A tadornini? And how did it get on the ship?"
"I don't know how it got here Kogane! All I know is I was in the middle of my skin care routine this morning when it came busting into my room out for blood. I ran into Coran in the med bay trying to hide from it and he's the one who called it a tadornini. He didn't even try to help me just started going on about some story his Pop Pop or whatever used to tell him! You're the only one who can save me!"
"Right, because the... tadornini?" Lance nods "Is trying to kill you?"
"Yes! Well -- it was..." Lance peers around Keith to eye the goose suspiciously as it really does seem to have calmed down significantly, sitting patiently watching the two boys.
"Yeah, ok Lance, I don't have time for this, I don't know how you got a goose all the way out here in space but I've got better things to do than stand around and get involved in another one of your misguided adventures." Keith goes to make his way around the goose tired of Lance and his shenanigans. But the goose rises and snaps at him when he gets close, clearly trying to keep him where he is.
"Whoa, watch it!" He jumps back.
"See I told you!" Lance shouts, lowering his voice, "It's evil!"
The goose settles back down when Keith moves back towards lance.
"Seriously Lance call off the damn goose" Keith glares.
"Are you kidding me!?" Lance balks, "I cant control that thing!? What makes you think I can control it? I told you its been chasing me all morning!"
"Ok, fine." Keith falters, "This is ridiculous, it's just a goose, we can handle this" But Keith doesn't sound like he believes what hes saying. "You said Coran seemed to know how it got here?"
"Kinda? Not really! He just started talking about his Pop Pop and before I knew it, he let the damn thing in and didn't do anything to stop it when it chased me off! In fact I think he told me not to fret while it chased me down the hall!?" Suddenly distracted by something he remembers Coran saying, Lance starts mumbling to himself, "but he did say something kind of odd, something about a soulmate?" Oh? Coran had said something about the tadorini appearing meaning his soulmate is nearby? Keith's focus is still directed at the goose, clearly trying to find a way around the thing. The goose -- tadornini -- stopped attacking once he stumbled upon the mulleted man standing in front of him. Oh... a though (finally) occurs to him and Lance stands there a little shell shocked starring at the back of Keith's stupid head. "Of course my quiznacking alien soulmate would have a stupid fucking mullet" he murmurs to himself.
"Seriously Lance again with the insults? We're kinda dealing with something right now. Can’t we just drop this whole rivalry thing. I think we both know that it’s getting a bit old at this point and I'm tired of it, I thought we were finally moving past all this." Keith gestures to the goose who keeps rushing him every time he attempts to move away from Lance.
Honk.
Smirking, Lance decides to switch tactics to deal with the goose. Something tells him that based on what Coran had said this tadornini or whatever is looking for a specific outcome here. It did stop attacking when he found Keith and it doesn't seem to want to let Keith get away either. "Yeah ok sweetheart. I can drop the whole rivalry act but I'll be damned if I can't make fun of that pretty mop of hair of yours anymore."
Keith whips around gaping at what Lance just said and he winks at Keith. The look on Keith's face is stunned and his face flushes bright red as he tries to comprehend what is going on?
With his attention focused on Lance the goose sneaks up on him and trips Keith into his space. He reaches out and grabs hold of Keith's waist to stabilize him. "Lance? Wh- what is happening right now?" Clearly flustered by the turn of events.
“You know" Lance says lowering his voice, "all that bravado was always just a front to cover up how flustered I get around that handsome face of yours." He reaches up to run his fingers through that silky black mullet. "I may not have realized it at first but the whole rivalry was mostly just a ploy to keep those deep violet eyes on me for as long as possible."
“Oh” Keith breathes. Relaxing a little in Lance's arms, but clearly still a little unsure. "Well, I don't think I could have kept my eyes off you, even if I wanted to. No matter how hard I tried to ignore you even back at the garrison, I’ve always been drawn to you like a magnet, even if you are a thorn in my side." Keith confesses.
He brushes Keith's bangs out of his face and searches those violet depths. He finds a shy hope reflected back at him. Taking another gamble he slowly leans down to gently press his lips to Keith’s.
After a moment of hesitation Keith reaches up and wraps his arms around Lance's shoulders to pull him in closer, deepening the kiss.
Neither one of them notices as the goose turns and exits the training deck as if it was never there to begin with. The team all agrees, this new dynamic between Keith and Lance is even more insufferable than when they were constantly bickering. Even though they are relieved those two idiots finally figured their shit out, the flirting is definitely worse than the bickering.