Work Text:
It had started because Lance had arbitrarily declared this day to be April Fools a week ago (or thereabouts; Shiro had yet to get a handle on the Altean clocks). It was close enough abouts, according to Pidge’s computer, though it’s time and date feature had been put through more than one test since they had found themselves on Altea (wormholes did not agree with it). And some levity would be good for them all, or so Shiro tried to tell himself as he prepared for what he just knew would be a long morning.
Unsurprisingly, chaos had descended on the ship due to a certain Blue Paladin. Well, most of it. What no one had prepared for, though Shiro had a bit of an inkling to thanks to Keith’s smug silence on the issue, was the fact that Keith and Pidge teamed up and got Lance.
After wading through small pranks and cautiously testing the food machines, just wanting the alien version of coffee but getting green goo instead, Shiro thought that Lance’s march into the lounge, covered in what looked like foam bubbles, was fair play.
“New hair treatment go wrong Lance?” Keith asked innocently, or tried to. Allura snorted, trying to hide her laughter behind her hand; Coran and Hunk didn’t even bother, bursting out into hearty laughter. Pidge snickered, held out her fist for Keith to bump.
“Bubblegate for the win,” she grinned, and Shiro had to laugh at Lance’s face. Lance loved puns, the worse the better; to have one used against him? That was probably worse than the room full of bubbles he had obviously walked into. Keith’s answering grin was wickedly pleased at their success.
Turns out, not only had Pidge hacked into the controls for Lance’s room and filled it soap bubbles but that before she did that Keith had installed a trip wire so that Lance would be sure to fall into said bubbles. And they did this all while Lance was out getting the rest of the ship so that it would be ready for when he returned.
“Shiro!” Lance complained as the comments about Lance’s hair products continued, turning to face him as he hastily held his hands up in a don’t drag me into this, I still haven’t had coffee yet way. “Tell your boyfriend to shut up!”
The room stilled. Lance stopped, looking confused, and then suddenly Pidge whooped and punched Keith in the arm, who was trying not to choke on his drink.
“I win!”
“There is no way he figured it out on his own,” Keith grumbled, “I call foul.”
“Wait, what? You’re actually dating?!?”
“You didn’t know?” Allura asked, eyes twinkling. Keith rolled his eyes and caught Shiro doing the same: or what counts for it out here having gone through both of their heads.
After a moment of stunned silence, making the same face he had when Pidge announced she was actually Katie Holt, Lance launched back into action. “Why would you date a mullet Shiro?!” he demanded, voice strained as Keith groaned and pressed his hands against his eyes. “I thought better of you!”
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Keith muttered. “At least I win. You’re out Pidge; he didn’t know.” Pidge grumbled, but acquiesced.
Shiro had to laugh; Lance’s face as Keith’s and Pidge’s pronouncements about winning sunk in, with the slowly disintegrating bubbles all over him, was too funny not to.
“Win what?”
“The bet,” Coran answered, twirling his mustache. “About whether or not you would figure it out after we all did. Hunk went out early, then myself before the Princess. Shiro didn’t make a bet.”
“Someone had to referee,” he said evenly, grinning as Lance deflated, having obviously taken the abstinence for support.
“I had the longest time,” Pidge inserted, giving Keith a side scowl. “Keith bet that you wouldn’t figure it out until somebody spilled.”
“You wound me Mullet-man.” He feigned arrow to the chest and everything. Keith just snorted, clearly enjoying himself. “I’ll live,” he promised Lance, who stuck his tongue out at him. “Come on, you were oblivious that Pidge was pretending to be a guy. You had to expect this.” Lance still looked wounded, not that anyone had any sympathy for him after a morning of failing to get coffee, sitting down to find noise makers attached to chairs, and all the spoons replaced with knives. They still hadn’t found the spoons (and it would take them several days, for Lance forgot where he hid them).
The noon hour rule held for space April Fools, thankfully Shiro thought, and the rest of the day passed fairly normally. Hunk managed to right the machine Lance had talked him into tweaking so they could finally get space coffee, and Lance spent a good part of the day righting his room, grumbling as he did so according to Hunk, whose room was across the hall from Lance. Keith and Pidge grinned wickedly when Hunk mentioned it. Shiro still wasn’t letting the lack of coffee this morning go, but he had to maintain the impartial position of a leader, so he didn’t say anything.
But he did have a third cup of coffee (or Kanvill, as Coran always corrected) because he had to do without earlier.
Lance had recovered from bubblegate by the evening, though Shiro suspected it was because his small pranks that he had salted the castle with were still being felt. Coran was particularly put out about the spoons, because he had been planning on making the protein goo for dinner and didn’t like changing his cooking plans (the result had them all, silently, thanking Lance for hiding the spoons and saving them from another night, then nights, of the goo).
So far Lance had been too preoccupied to comment on him and Keith, something both of them were grateful for. It’s not that they had tried to keep it a secret, they were just both private people, and the longer they could put off Lance’s teasing, the better. But when they took off early from the lounge where everyone inevitably ended up in the evening, as they had been on a fairly regular basis now, Lance’s head popped up, his attention refocused on the morning’s revelation.
“Wait, is this why you’ve been taking off early?” Shiro stared at him; Keith face-palmed and groaned. “Cause, like, I just thought you two were being lame and old or something.”
“Good-night Lance,” Shiro sighed as he steered Keith out before he could say anything.
“He can’t really be that oblivious, can he?” Keith asked as they entered the hallway, heading for the observation deck. Shiro could only shrug, “Seems so.” Keith just shook his head, exasperated.
Suddenly wanting all of Keith’s attention, Shiro pulled him close, grinning as Keith raised an eyebrow at him but fell in against Shiro’s side nonetheless, wrapping his arm around Shiro’s waist as he did so. And the conversation turned to other, Lance-free matters. They stayed up late watching the stars on the observation deck, a quiet evening this night, not just saying much, simply enjoying the other’s company.
Neither realized that under the steps that they were using as seats lay the missing spoons.