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Keith had had enough. It had been weeks, months, even since he’d developed a crush. Of all the people to develop a crush on, it had been Lance. The blue paladin. His self-proclaimed ‘rival’. (Thinking about it logically, Keith wasn’t that surprised - he’s gay, so that ruled Allura and Pidge out. Shiro and Coran were too old. That left Hunk and Lance, so really, it was a fifty/fifty chance, but he wasn't going to admit that to himself.)
Lance hadn’t even noticed. Keith had thought that he of all people would spot a crush - god, how he hated that word - immediately, on himself especially. Apparently not. Pidge and Hunk figured it out almost right away, but Lance? Nope. Blind as a bat, as Pidge put it. Ironic coming from the one with glasses.
It wasn’t like Keith had actively been trying to get Lance to notice. Because he hadn’t. He was just a little confused as to how Lance hadn’t noticed when even the damn mice seemed to have worked it out. Keith’s pining had not been discreet in the least.
“You’re staring again,” Hunk told him, whispering in a hushed kind of way as to not give it away.
“I am not,” Keith replied absentmindedly, watching Lance stab at his space goo with a fork. Had Lance’s hands always been so small? They were like little baby hands. Keith wondered if they were as soft as they looked.
“Uh, you are? Castle to Keith, come in Keith? Subtlety is not your strong point, pal.” Hunk watched as Keith nodded in reply, not moving his gaze from their friend, who remained oblivious to the entire situation. He glanced at Shiro, who raised an eyebrow but said nothing, instead making conversation with Allura and Coran.
How was it that a guy who flirted with anyone couldn’t even notice someone crushing on him?
Enough was enough. Keith was done with pining. He was going to get through to Lance one way or another, and if Lance rejected him, so be it. At least getting over him would be easier after being rejected instead of lying awake night after night running through possibilities.
“I have an idea,” he announced to Pidge and Hunk, his two ever-helpful wingmen. Wingman and wingwoman. Why was the term gendered anyway? Wingperson. Wingpaladin?
“What’s the idea?” Pidge asked, and when Keith didn’t reply she added, “hey, loverboy. Stop thinking about your crush and tell us the idea.”
“I wasn’t thinking about him!” Keith protested. Hunk snickered quietly.
“Sure, buddy. Now, spill."
“Okay, so. What’s something Lance always notices?”
“Aliens?” Hunk suggested. “Danger?”
“Your mullet?”
Keith frowned. “No. Well, yes, but no. Leave my hair out of this.” He took a moment to recompose himself. “He always notices bad pickup lines.”
“They’re kind of hard to ignore, to be fair,” Pidge pointed out, crossing her legs and straightening up. “So, what? You’re gonna use horrible pickup lines on him?”
“That’s exactly what I’m going to do, Pidge! There’s no way he won’t notice. And then I can just ask him out, yeah?”
“This is Lance we’re talking about, remember.”
“Give him some credit,” Hunk spoke up. “Pickup lines should work. Lance most definitely will notice them.”
“Perfect.” Keith paused. “Do either of you know any good ones?”
“You’re telling me you don’t know any pickup lines?” Pidge folded her arms. “C’mon, Keith, surely you know some?”
“I lived in a desert, remember? What was I going to practise on, the cacti?” Keith shot back.
“You consider Lance as your type, I’d rather date a cactus than Lance.”
“He’s not bad, Pidge,” Hunk interrupted. “He’s only a little… Frustrating, sometimes.”
“I’ll say,” Keith mumbled. “This isn’t helping. I need pickup lines that he hasn’t used yet. Surely you know some?”
“Maybe I can convince Coran to make food or something that resembles limes,” Hunk said thoughtfully. “So you can make a pun based on-”
“No puns, for the love of- Please, no puns. It’ll spark another pun contest and I would not be able to take it,” Pidge interrupted. “Research some, Keith. It’s not like you’re under a time constraint.”
Keith sighed quietly. “You’re right. I’ll look into it. You’ll still help me, though, right?”
“Of course. As if we’d let you suffer on your own. Besides, we know Lance better than anyone!” she replied.
“Yeah, man. Plus, you look like a kicked puppy whenever Lance walks past you. It’s hurting my heart,” Hunk added.
“I’m really feeling the support here.”
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Researching pickup lines proved to be harder than Keith had originally thought. Most of them were degrading or bordering on offensive territory. Some were just downright alarming. It looked hopeless, but Keith wasn’t about to give up. He’d been half-tempted to get Hunk to ask Lance, but that would’ve looked really suspicious if Keith was to then use the same lines on Lance. He supposed he’d just have to use the few decent ones he’d found, even if he didn’t understand a couple. He just hoped Lance wouldn’t take them the wrong way.
It had taken some time to find the blue paladin. He wasn’t in his room, nor at the table, nor with the lions. Surprisingly, Keith located him in the training room.
Lance was focusing hard on the gladiator bot, out of his battlesuit, wearing his t-shirt alone rather than the jacket he wore any other time. He hadn’t seemed to notice Keith enter the room, instead working on blocking the bot’s attacks and striking at any possible opportunity. He stance still needed work, sure, but Keith found his eyes following Lance’s movements, noticing the shine of sweat on his face and arms. How long had he been training for?
“End training sequence,” Lance panted as he blocked another attack and Keith, caught off-guard, jumped to try and make it look as though he’d just walked in, shifting his gaze off him. Pickup lines were one thing, but he didn’t quite want Lance to discover him actively staring at him while he trained.
“Alright, alright, Hunk, I know I said I’d- Oh. It’s you,” Lance’s words made him jump again and his heart sank a little.
“No need to sound so disappointed,” Keith shot back easily, trying to hide the disappointment in his eyes at the other boy’s tone.
“Me, disappointed to see you? Never,” Lance grinned. “It’s more surprising that you weren’t here before. Aren’t you normally here every day?”
“I’ve been… busy.” Keith shrugged, scratching the back of his neck. “What are you doing here? You complain enough when we train together.”
“Well, yeah. Maybe I just wanted to practise on my own for a bit.” Lance’s expression slipped for a second before he broke into another broad smile. “Well, if you want to train, I won’t keep you. See you around, Keith.”
“Hey, wait, I wanted to talk to you.” Keith grabbed his arm as he passed before he could leave. His skin was warm and sweaty, yet not entirely unpleasant to touch. He pushed any thoughts of how it would feel to hold his hand to the back of his mind quickly.
“Oh? There’s a first. Well, I’m here, you’re here, shoot.” Lance glanced down at his arm and Keith wondered how long was considered acceptable to hold on to someone before it got weird.
“Right. Yes. Uh.” His brain froze up as he tried to rack it for the line he’d been going to use. “Um. You want to know what my two favourite letters are?”
“Um. O...Kay?” Lance squinted at him. Good job, Keith.
“E, Z. I feel they represent me.”
Lance furrowed his brow. “Who says ‘Z’ as ‘zed’? It’s ‘zee’, you heathen.”
“Since when? I’ve always said ‘zed’.” Keith protested. Wait, so if it’s not ‘eee zed’, then- Oh fuck.
“Zee!”
“Zed!”
“You’re wrong!”
“No!”
The pickup line was quickly lost amongst their bickering and Keith prayed Lance hadn’t caught it. Keith was anything but easy. He wanted absolutely nothing to do with the bedroom if he could help it. No genitals near him, no sirree. Lance seemed more focused on making fun of his letter pronunciation, thankfully.
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“It went horribly. I accidentally told him I was easy!” Keith groaned.
“Aren’t you asexual?” Pidge asked, lowering her glasses.
“Yes! I didn’t understand, I thought it was ‘eee zed’!”
“Oh man. Even I know that would be ‘eee zee’,” Hunk piped up helpfully. “So one bad pickup line went, well, bad. It’s not the end of the world! There’s plenty more horrible pickup lines.”
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The second attempt was made after a successful mission they’d completed together. Shiro and Allura had gone to look at reports and Pidge, Hunk and Coran had gone off to research the new galra tech they’d retrieved, leaving Keith and Lance to do their own things.
“Hey, Lance!” Keith started, sliding up to the taller boy.
“Yes, K? Can I call you K?” Lance turned to face him, one hand on his hip.
“... Don’t call me K. You have blue eyes, yeah? Like the ocean. And I’m-” Keith cleared his throat, about to continue before being struck with a thought. “Isn’t that weird? You’re the water paladin and your eyes are like the sea? Do you think that’s why Blue picked you?”
“Oh, great, now you’re even suggesting that I only became part of Voltron for my eyes?” Lance huffed.
“No! That’s- that’s not what I-” Keith visibly deflated. “Nevermind. I lost my train of thought.”
“Thanks,” Lance said flatly, brushing past him as he left.
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The next attempt was while Lance was attending to Blue. Keith leant against the wall near him, watching as he carefully cleaned the giant lion.
“Was your father a thief?” Keith asked, breaking the silence between them.
“What?” Lance whipped his head around to glare at him. Keith mentally winced. Okay, so that hadn’t been the best thing to open a conversation with, but there was no backing out.
“Because someone stole the sta- wait, come back, I didn’t mean that!” He called as Lance got up and stalked away. Great. He’d managed to insult Lance’s family, the one thing that meant the universe to Lance. He was running out of usable pickup lines, and fast.
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Keith was losing hope. Sat in the observatory deck together, he made another attempt.
“Was that an earthquake or did you, uh, did you just-” Keith stammered, feeling his face slowly heat up as Lance stared at him.
“We’re in space, Keith,” Lance said slowly, looking at him as though he’d somehow forgotten that fact. Which he hadn’t, as it was a little hard to forget you were in space when the only view out of the windows was space. “Why would there be an earthquake when we’re not on Earth?”
“Yeah, I… Don’t know where I was going with that,” Keith admitted. Lance nodded, letting out a small sigh.
“I miss Earth, man. I didn’t think I could miss something I saw every day, but I guess you never know what you have until it’s gone.”
“Yeah,” Keith agreed. He was starting to feel the same way about his chances with Lance.
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“There you are! I’ve been looking for you.” Keith practically skidded into Lance, who looked like a rabbit caught in headlights.
“Listen, man, whatever you think I’ve done, I haven’t done it.” Lance put his hands up as if in surrender.
“What? No, I don’t think you’ve done anything. Except maybe steal my-”
“See! You’re accusing me already. I have done nothing wrong in my life, ever,” Lance interrupted. “This is biphobia at its finest.”
The subtle reminder that Lance was bi was more comforting than it should’ve been and gave Keith a small boost of courage.
“I don’t think you’ve done anything wrong god dammit, Lance!”
Lance blinked at him. “Then why have you been acting so funny for weeks?!”
Keith looked him dead in the eyes and took a deep breath.
“I’m lost at sea.”
“... What?”
“You’ve been saying that a lot lately,” he frowned. “You’re the water paladin. Your eyes match your title, blue like the ocean, and I’m lost at sea.”
“Are you… Flirting with me?” Lance said slowly.
“I'm trying to!”
Lance was silent. Keith could feel sweat trickling down the nape of his neck and swallowed, aware that his face was slowly turning red.
“You suck at pickup lines,” Lance told him weakly, knotting his fingers together, his face dark enough to rival the colour of Keith’s jacket. Keith stayed quiet, hoping, waiting for him to go on. He was sure his face could rival a traffic light at this point.
“But, uh, I definitely wouldn’t mind you getting lost in my eyes more often, um, if you know what I’m saying?” Lance offered a bashful smile, only briefing glancing at Keith’s face as he turned redder still.
“I’m meant to be the red paladin, you know,” Keith managed to get out. “I mean, I am red, but that’s my role, so that makes sense, but you’re turning bright re-”
“Keith Kogane, was that a joke?” Lance interrupted, the awkwardness of the moment having passed in the revelation. “And here I was thinking I’d have to be the funny one in the relationship if it worked out.”
“If it worked out?”
“Uh. Us, I mean. Um. Okay, well, I’ve kinda had a thing for you for like, weeks now, but didn’t really know how to act on it so I remained content - well, not really content, but still - with daydreaming, y’know?”
“We’re both messes, then,” Keith cracked a smile.
“I guess so.”
With the conversation trailing off, silence settled between them. Awkwardly, Keith shifted on his feet, not sure whether to say something else, walk away, or wait for Lance to speak. Lance seemed to be having a similar problem, opening his mouth and then closing it several times in a manner that made him appear like a goldfish. Keith scratched the nape of his neck, wanting to fill the silence somehow but not knowing what to say.
“Does this mean we can date?” Lance blurted out, looking up at Keith with a hopeful yet embarrassed expression. “I mean, only if you’re up for it, but I’d be up for it, and-”
“Yes,” Keith interrupted, relief flowing through his body. “Yes. I’d like that.”
“Right. Okay,” Lance grinned at him. “So you’re my boyfriend.”
“Yeah,” Keith squeaked.
“And you’re my boyfriend.”
“Lance, please-” Keith’s blush had only just begun to fade when it started spreading across his face again. Lance was his boyfriend. His boyfriend.
“And we can go on space dates and hold hands and cuddle and-” Lance was silenced by Keith putting his hand over his mouth, bright red.
“I would like that,” Keith started, “but please, I’m going to combust if you carry on.”
“Aw, babe,” Lance teased.
“LANCE.”
Keith could get used to it, really. Spending time with his boyfriend. Holding hands. Cuddling. Kissing, eventually.
Yeah. Keith could definitely get used to it.