Chapter Text
It’s late.
Later than is wise to be awake, hours after the rest of the paladins have fallen asleep, strewn across loose mattresses and cushions around him. Keith doesn’t know how long he has until the soft indigo of night in space gets shot through with manufactured sunrise, and the day cycle resets. But he’s the last man standing, upright on his haunches like a doberman, blinking slowly with his temple pressed to the window.
Tonight wasn’t the first paladin slumber party, but it was the first one Keith had attended, after being pestered all day by Lance and Pidge, and bribed by Hunk with the promise of something that was basically space chocolate, but tasted a little more like black tea.
Everyone else is asleep. Keith could sleep too, if he wanted, but all the open spaces are too close to someone else. Keith has never slept beside another person before. So he sits upright, perched on the window seat, and keeps his unofficial watch over the team, steadfastly ignoring how each blink grows heavier than the last.
A rumbling groan interrupts his train of thought, and Keith turns back to the bundle of paladins and odd blankets spread out between the couches. To the left of the group, Lance stretches out his arms, humming and rolling onto his back before pushing up onto his elbows. Keith watches him blink awake, shove the satin eye mask off his face and take in his surroundings. The minute start of his limbs before the events of the night register. Keith gets the same; each time he wakes in the castle, it takes him a moment to understand if the alarms are blaring, or if he’s safe.
Lance’s eyes land on him, meeting across the sleeping forms of their friends, and he sniffs out a quiet laugh.
‘Bad dream?’ He whispers into the silence, rolling off the mattress to his feet. Keith shrugs, scoots up on the window seat to make room for him. Lance settles down beside him with an exaggerated groan, rolling the tiredness out of his neck, shoulderblades pressing back against the glass, against the emptiness of space behind it. It looks so fragile right now.
Lance waits for an answer, face half turned his way, head resting back against the window. Keith momentarily forgets the question, reminds himself, and shakes his head.
‘Nah,’ he shrugs again, glancing down to pull at a loose thread on his glove, ‘Just can’t sleep.’ Lance nods sagely, as if he’s not the first one zonked out every night and the last one up each morning.
The blue paladin turns to look out over their teammates, the side of his mouth quirking up, ‘Feels so stupid sometimes, doesn’t it?’ he asks, chuckling more to himself than to Keith, ‘Watching movies, braiding each other's hair. Having slumber parties. Like it’s all some fucking,’ he waves lazily in the dark, ‘Summer camp, or whatever.’
‘Wasn’t this your idea?’ Keith raises an eyebrow at him. Lance smiles and shoots him a sly wink, but it looks thin.
‘Gotta keep morale up, samurai,’ he jokes, ‘Take our minds off the ever increasing trauma we’re definitely getting from all this war junk.’
Keith’s never really thought of that before. Sure, the battles are hard, he bleeds more than he used to, and maybe he’s more on edge than before, but Keith was pretty on edge in the desert, too. And as cold and slimy as the food goo can get, anything’s better than hunting lizards.
‘Guess so,’ he concedes the point regardless, ‘You think it’s getting to you?’
Lance hums a lack of answer. Instead, he says, ‘Wonder what I’d be doing right now, if we never left.’ He purses his lips, ‘Probably what I was doing before, really. Classes, simulators. Still trying to beat you.’ Another one of those empty chuckles, ‘Maybe Hunk and I would sneak into town again. Lay down some sweet lines on all the military brats doing the same.’
Keith stares at him, noticing how he avoids the question. Lance is usually all fun, games, and glory-hunting. He isn’t quite sure how to navigate him beyond it. Carefully, he tries to match Lance’s sudden change of route.
‘I’d probably still be in the shack. Still losing my mind,’ That makes Lance laugh, and Keith feels a spark of pride at managing it. Most of the time Lance laughs around Keith, he’s really laughing at him, ‘Trying to find Blue. Figuring out what happened to Shiro. Picking the spines out of cacti.’
‘For real?’ Lance raises his eyebrows, ‘Man, I forget you were Bear Grylls out there, huh.’
‘Wouldn’t go that far,’ Keith frowns in disgust, ‘Never drank my own piss, for one.’
Another laugh, louder this time, loud enough to make Pidge turn in her sleep, and Keith feels on top of the world. Or, space, he guesses. Lance knots his hands behind his head, gazing over at Keith.
‘Wow, that was a joke. The great Keith Kogane, brooding stoic extraordinaire, making an actual joke. Since when did you know how to do that?’
Keith stretches out his foot and kicks Lance gently, ‘Can’t let you have all the fun.’ Lance lunges out to grab his ankle, tries to tickle his foot, and Keith kicks him for real. He curses under his breath and pouts.
‘No violence!’ He whines, ‘I’ll wake up Allura, and she’ll throw you in the castle dungeon for slumber party crimes.’
‘Wake her then,’ Keith snorts, ‘I promise I won’t be the only one in the dungeon.’
Lance bats his eyes and smirks, ‘Don’t threaten me with a good time, Red.’
Keith’s stomach flips. ‘Gross,’ he mutters, looking away. Beside him Lance shakes his head, sighing softly. It’s quiet for a moment, before he speaks again.
‘You’re a lot nicer when you’re tired,’ he observes, ‘Probably would have hit me and stormed off by now, if it was daytime.’
‘M’not tired,’ Keith lies, blinking slowly. Lance rolls his eyes.
‘Whatever you say,’ he scoots closer to Keith, poking him in the ribs, ‘What’s keeping you up anyway?’
‘Nothing,’ he lies again, but one look at Lance says it wasn’t convincing. Keith huffs, crosses his arms, ‘Don’t laugh. Or I will hit you and storm off.’
Lance draws a cross in the middle of his chest, biting back a grin, ‘Scout’s honor,’ he says solemnly. Keith eyes him for a moment longer then stares up at the ceiling, listening to the background hum of the castle drone on, the constant machinery of air recyclers and millennia old generators that keep them alive.
‘It’s just… I’ve never been to a slumber party before.’
‘No shit.’
‘I said don’t laugh,’ he snaps, head whipping back to frown harder.
‘Who’s laughing? You see this face,’ Lance points at himself, expression carefully blank, save a thin, arched eyebrow, ‘This is my serious face. Super serious. It is seriously no surprise that this is your first one, dude. You nearly took Shiro’s head off during the pillow fight. Go on.’
Keith scowls at him, but keeps talking. He doesn’t know why. Maybe because this is the longest he and Lance have spoken without hurling insults or being forcibly separated. Maybe because, now that he’s gotten this far, it seems like a waste to throw it away.
‘I dunno,’ he shrugs his shoulders, ‘Doesn’t it all just seem a little… vulnerable? Like, if the Galra attack us now, we’re sitting ducks. In our pajamas, for god’s sake, all, all curled up together. It’s weird.’
Lance regards him for a minute, eyes scanning over his face with an intensity Keith isn't used to. Usually when Lance stares at him, he’s glaring, finding something to make fun of him over. This is closer to Lance’s battle face, when he’s looking for sniper perches or exit routes, looking at Keith like he’s a map Lance is tracing a path through.
‘Can I ask you something?’ he says eventually. Keith swallows around a dry throat and nods. Lance tilts his head a degree and asks, ‘Did you - like, as a kid - have you had friends before?’
Keith blinks, utterly blindsided, ‘What does that have to do with anything?’
‘Humor me. Example, right; when’s the last time you got a hug - yesterday? Last week? Last month? If you had to ballpark it, how many did you average a year? There is a wrong answer, by the way. No pressure.’
He shrinks away and Lance leans forward, chasing him into his space, ‘I don’t know,’ he says, folding his arms closer over his chest, ‘I… I gave Shiro a hug when we found him, I’m pretty sure-’
‘Jesus Christ man, that was like six months ago!’
‘Well,’ Keith scrambles, realizing just how pathetic he sounds, ‘I… Hunk gave me a hug after the shootout with the R&D ship the other day, that’s recent. And it has nothing to do with sleeping here!’
‘That was a one-armed hug, I was literally there, and it so doesn’t count. Oh my god,’ the blue paladin’s eyes are wide, shaking his head in amazement, ‘You’re totally freaking out about a puppy pile! I fucking knew it. Big bad samurai’s afraid of a lil snuggle!’
He jabs a finger in Keith's chest, face lit up in delight. Keith smacks it away, ‘Shut the fuck up,’ he hisses, ‘I am not afraid. I just think it’s stupid, and I sleep better without listening to you snore.’
Lance gasps, laying his palm on his chest, ‘How dare you! I know for a fact I do not snore, because me and Rachel took turns watching each other to check when we were twelve; I am the perfect freaking bedfellow, I’ll have you know.’ He shoves Keith, Keith shoves him back, and they swat at each other as quietly as possible until Lance hisses out, ‘Okay okay, what-fucking-ever, you’re gonna wake the others.’
‘You started it,’ Keith huffs, but his heart’s not really in it. Lance sits upright, stretching his back into a curve and yawning. Then he stands, holding his hand out to Keith.
‘Come on, Red,’ Keith stifles a yawn of his own, glancing warily at Lance’s outstretched palm, ‘I’m gonna give you a Professor McClain anthropology crash course.’
When Keith doesn’t take his offer, Lance mutters under his breath and snatches up his wrist, dragging Keith to his feet and marching him back to the next of mattresses, pillows and blankets where the rest of the team sleeps on. He kneels over where he was sleeping, just ten minutes ago, and shuffles the cushions around to make some more space, ‘Lie down,’ he orders in a whisper.
Keith shuffles on his feet for a moment, just long enough for Lance to shoot him a withering glare. He’s too tired to start another fight. Goddammit. Keith rolls his eyes and sits cross legged in the empty space. Lance stretches out on his back beside him, tugging harshly at Keith’s elbow.
‘Now, dipshit. Humans, even stubborn idiot humans, are pack animals.’ With another eyeroll, Keith goes down, until they’re lying face to face on their sides, noses half a foot apart. Around him, he can hear his teammates breathing, deep and slow.
‘I’m part Galra,’ Keith mumbles, more out of obstinacy than anything. Lance tuts at him.
‘Oh, my sincerest apologies,’ he packs an impressive amount of snark in while speaking so quietly, ‘Let me correct myself. Any fucking species social enough to build society is a pack animal, because obviously. Welcome to the middle school biology class you were probably too busy kicking rocks to attend. And pack animals, also obviously, need to keep strong social bonds with the other members of their pack. They need-’
Keith narrows his eyes, ‘Don’t you dare.’
‘Bonding moments,’ a big fat grin settles over his lips, dripping with smugness, ‘It’s called oxytocin, smartass,’ he pokes his finger in the center of Keith’s forehead, the floats it down to push up one of the corners of his frown, ‘Ya see, when you get it, it makes you happy. Lowers stress, improves cognition - bet you got the cortisol rates of, like, a really big rabbit or something. Never relaxed a second in your life.’
‘We’re at war,’ he says pointlessly. They all know that. Lance just looks at him, sighs, and does something deranged. Something Keith never really imagined anyone, much less the guy who declared himself Keith’s archrival mere months ago, would do.
He throws his arm over Keith’s torso and pulls Keith towards his chest, hand resting and stroking gently between his shoulderblades.
‘I know,’ he murmurs. Keith remains stiff and frozen with his head tucked under Lance’s chin. If he listens closely, he can hear the other boy’s heartbeat. ‘Sucks, doesn’t it? But you can either fight all the time, or fight well. Can’t do both, not even you. Heart attack’s gonna take you out before the Galra at this rate.’
Keith doesn’t respond, just feels Lance’s fingers trace up and down his t-shirt, hears the thud of his pulse, their teammates’ breathing, and the hum of the castleship. Sees the shape of the darkness with half his face smushed against Lance’s pajamas.
‘This is weird,’ he says eventually. Lance chuckles again, soft but warm.
‘Duh,’ he stops stroking Keith’s back to flick his ear, ‘Because you’re doing your best impression of a wooden board, dude. You gotta actually relax for it to work. Here, roll over.’
‘Why?’
‘Oh my god, do I have to explain every little thing? Just do it.’
Keith frowns, but rolls over anyway. Lance’s other arm sneaks under his pillow, in the hollow of his neck, and the one thrown over him remains, curling into Keith’s sternum. He can feel Lance’s body behind him, but it’s easier to manage when they can’t see each other’s faces.
Lance shuffles forward, pulling one of the many blankets over them both, ‘Usually I call little spoon, but seeing as this is your tutorial I’ll be generous.’
His front presses up against Keith’s back, and Keith is suddenly too aware of every place they’re touching.
‘Get your dick away from me,’ he grunts, trying to hide how fast his heart is beating, ‘Or I’m cutting it off.’
With a muttered curse Lance reaches out with one hand to fumble for a cushion, and shoves it between their hips, ‘There, is that not-gay enough for you? Go the fuck to sleep, Red. You’re welcome.’
Keith squirms in his spot, mashing the lumps out of his pillow with his fist until Lance thumps his shoulder, and he settles down. He forces himself to breathe slower, to match the speed of Lance behind him, and unfortunately - utterly horrifically - feels himself relax, sinking deeper into the mattress.
When Keith can forget exactly who is behind him, whose arm is flung over his chest and tucked under his neck, it feels nice. Warm and solid. Someone quite literally watching his back, the weight of the arm holding him down just enough to keep from wriggling too much.
It’s not the first time Keith has thought that his first impression of Lance McClain may be wrong. This is, however, the longest it’s held. The boy gives just enough glimpses of something else, something a little smarter, a little kinder than he seems, every now and then. But he always snatches them away, shoving them under the rug of his bravado before Keith can follow the trail too far.
He strains his ears to try and figure out if Lance is asleep. Tentatively, he whispers out into the common room.
‘Why do you hate me so much?’
He feels Lance tense behind him, and wishes he’d said something else. Lance’s thumb taps idly against his chest, the way he’s seen it do against tables and counters when the blue paladin gets antsy.
‘I don’t hate you,’ he says after a beat.
‘That’s not what you’re always telling me,’ Keith’s started now, so he might as well see it through, even if it makes him cringe, hearing himself throw the doors open and point to all the places Lance affects him. But Lance can’t see his face, and he can’t see Lance’s. They can’t start yelling without waking everyone up. Worst case scenario, Lance will take his arms back and roll over. That sounds worse than it should, ‘You say it all the time. You said it three days ago.’
‘I say a lot of things,’ he counters, ‘You call bullshit on half of them anyway. Why’s this the one you suddenly believe?’
‘Fine, don’t answer.’
‘No, I-’ he cuts himself off with another sigh, so strong Keith can feel it on the back of his neck. The hairs on his arms raise, ‘You piss me off, sure. Definitely. All the time, in fact. But we couldn’t form Voltron if I actually hated you, I thought you knew that. That I was just being dramatic or whatever.’
Keith doesn’t really know how to respond. It’s not the answer he was expecting. He was expecting more of an itemized list, perhaps even alphabetized, of all the forgotten sins he’d committed against Lance, spanning from their first day at the Garrison up until five minutes ago. Yet another glimpse, another breadcrumb through the forest of all the times Keith’s been wrong about him.
‘Oh,’ he decides to say, hoping that it’s better than silence.
‘Yeah,’ Lance agrees, squeezing his arm tighter around Keith’s chest, ‘You just, like, get under my skin. Without even trying honestly; it’s almost impressive.’
This time Keith chooses quiet. He thinks of telling Lance that he understands. That even now, with the other boy’s fingers grazing his arm, he can feel its reflection pressing out from the inside too. That Lance pisses him off when he’s late to breakfast, or takes forty minute showers after training, or drapes himself over Hunk’s lap insisting on ‘team-building activities’ like a slumber party.
Keith thinks of telling him that winning one of their stupid bets feels better than winning a dogfight, that Lance gets under his skin as much as Keith gets under his and he never knows how to manage it. But he isn’t sure where that would leave them, and he keeps quiet.
The quiet lasts too long, and the opportunity passes. Lance’s arm relaxes over Keith’s chest, and for a moment Keith thinks he’s asleep. It’s the only reason he speaks again.
‘For what it counts,’ he whispers, ‘I don’t hate you either.’
Lance doesn’t answer him, but wraps his arm tighter over Keith, nosing against the back of his hair.