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***
Lance leans forward in the pilot’s seat, one leg tucked underneath him. The other foot is anchored securely on the floor of the red lion’s cockpit, giving him the stability he needs. His hands are steady, mouth screwed up in concentration as he gingerly adds yet another spoon to the Castle of Spoons (Mark: II). The tower wobbles precariously on the dash, but it doesn’t fall.
Lance leans back, just a little, enough to let out a breath. He continues his rant to Hunk: “Two years!”
Hunk looks up from the floor of the yellow lion where he’s sitting cross legged. He squints into the comms, probably deciding how seriously he should take Lance’s latest tirade. With a shrug, he goes back to whatever wires he’s jumbling into something amazing, “Yeah. Two years. What’s your point?”
“My point,” Lance says, picking up yet another spoon from the armament of Altean cutlery Red was assigned to transport (now that the Castle of Lions is kaput), “is that two years changes a man.”
It changes a man. That’s for sure. Keith returned taller, chest filling out his armor in a way that Lance didn’t know was lacking before, but now….well, from his collarbones down, it’s nothing short of distracting. And it’s not just his MORE toned arms and broadER shoulders and tightER ass, no, it’s Keith in general . Keith has always been cool (a fact which Lance will admit to zero people, regardless of its irrefutability). He can outfly pretty much anyone or anything; he wields a goddamn magic alien sword; he’s self-reliant, focused, logical. In a word: cool. But before, that ‘coolness’ was tempered with an awkwardness, a weird half-shy, half-bullheaded way of dealing with things that made him easier for Lance to handle, despite the fact that Keith was always way, waaaaay out of Lance’s league.
But, now. Nope. Now, Keith’s hesitancy has been replaced with self-assurance. He looks at Lance and, whereas before there was a tentative, begrudging trust, now he’s just...comfortable. If Lance didn’t know any better, he would almost say that Keith...doesn’t hate him?
If he may be so bold: Keith, maybe, sorta, kinda likes him?
Like, for real?
Is that a joke?
He thinks about Keith...kissing...him. Him, Lance McClain. And Keith Kogane’s lips. That happened. Outside of Lance’s fantasies. In the real world. That was a thing that happened. Once Lance’s brain stopped short circuiting, he realized: There’s no logical explanation for it.
He jabs the spoon in the air towards Hunk, attempting to make a point. “Two years, dude. That’s a long time. He might’ve picked up some pretty bizarre alien customs. Who knows what goes on in Galra---”
“Yeah. No.” Hunk sighs and leans backward on his hands, giving Lance a stern look. “There’s only one reason why Keith would willingly swap spit.---”
(Lance chokes)
“You need to stop acting like---”
A red icon unfurls on the screen, bringing with it a pleasant jingle. It takes a year off of Lance’s life.
“Ohmigod, he’s calling, what should I do? Hunk!” Lance waves his hands in the air in utter despair. “Help!”
Hunk is increasingly incredulous. “Lance. Accept the call.” When he sees Lance respond by shaking his head wildly, Hunk gives him a mischievous grin.
“Wait, no, Hunk, I look like shit!!” Lance yelps. He’s in just his boxers and his hair is a mess and he has untold numbers of alien snack wrappers scattered all around him.
The call connects. Keith’s face pops up on the screen next to the rectangle containing Hunk. “Keith!”
Hunk makes a kissy face at him. Lance violently jabs the button to close the comm with him, mouthing the word ‘ traitor ’ before he does so.
“W-what’s up, buttercup?” Lance greets Keith, leaning forward on the dash with what he hopes is a suave smile. It causes all the spoons of the Castle of Spoons to come crashing down. They---all thirty-nine of them---clatter over the controls, the floor, Lance’s lap.
Keith looks at him like he has two heads.
“Lance. Shiro has hailed you. Three times. Turn your comms to public again.”
Right. Right.
“Riiiight, can do, will do.” Lance gives Keith a nervous smile, absent mindedly fluffing his hair back into place. It’s probably a lost cause. He gets decent, pulling the closest shirt over his head, and turns the comms back to the public channel they all share.
“---znar Circuit was never known for being easy to naviga---”
Coran raises a hand in protest, “Certainly not. You----”
“Alright, alright,” Lance waves the conversation down, placating. “Relax everybody! Lance has arrived. The party can start.”
The groans practically harmonize by this point.
“Sorry we’re late, guys,” Hunk chimes in. “Lance was having his Daily Denial Crises. His regularly scheduled ‘I don’t have a crush on---”
Lance cuts him off, practically shouting: “Nice weather we’re having today, huh? Gosh, wow, the vacuum of never ending space is really great this time of year...”
He trails off. Shiro’s giving him a knowing look. Hunk is smug. Allura and Pidge, funnily enough, are both pinching the bridges of their noses in an almost identical fashion.
And Keith. Keith is sitting in the black lion, head slightly lowered, his attention focused on giving the cosmic wolf-dog at his feet a really good under-the-chin scratch. He flicks his eyes upward towards Lance, looking at him through dark lashes.
It makes Lance’s mouth dry.
“Soooo,” he says, turning his attention back to the group with great effort. “What are we talking about again?”
Turns out, they’re talking about the fact that the one and only Voltron---the ragtag, the weary, but the thus far triumphant defenders of the universe----is lost.
Like, really lost.
Like, Coran thought Allura was navigating and Allura thought Coran was navigating and Shiro’s been napping the last six varga (as he should be) and Pidge is already working on the specs of the new ship and, and----well. They got off at the wrong turnpike near Kelgoth and took a wrong turn at Blaznas and now. They are just royally, unequivocablly, inexorably, lost.
The situation isn’t dire----no one is attacking them, they’re not actively dying, et cetera---but it’s still not great. None of them are overly familiar with this sector of space, and the maps they are using from the Castle are very out of date.
Hunk and Pidge start throwing out ideas for what to do next, but without a functioning Teledove, getting un-lost might take awhile. Lance flops over in his seat tapping a spoon against his mouth, deep in thought. “Too bad we can’t just pull over and ask for directions.” he muses.
“Huh.” Pidge states, cutting through the rest of the discussion. “We could---”
“Pidge. I’m flattered that after yeaaars of denial, you’re finally starting to accept that I’m the whole package----good looks and smarts---but do you really think---”
“Lance.” Pidge’s tone is one of warning. She resumes. “I might be able to run a system update on the navigation software….” the sound of her voice dies down into the clacking of keys. “But…”
“What do we need to do, Pidge?” Shiro’s voice is clear and firm, ready to take action.
“The thing is,” the clacking stops. “We’ll need to do a full reboot after the update, so we’d be flying blind…” Pidge wrinkles her nose before pushing up her glasses and looking back into the comms, “For at least 30 varga. Give or take.”
“Everything will be completely offline?” Hunk asks. “Like, everything everything?”
“Sounds bad.” Keith says.
“We’ll be left quivering in deep space as helpless as a newborn Nulblarry!” Coran shouts with great satisfaction.
“We will land.” Allura decides. “We can set up a small camp for the time being, then once the navigation functionality is restored, we will resume.” She sniffs. “And we will not lose our way again.”
“Camping!?” Lance exclaims, ready to protest, because….camping? Really? He’s a zillion miles away from home, saving the dang universe, and they expect him to willingly sleep in a tent? Uh, how about no, Scott.
“No offense Princess, but I’d rather not camp .” Pidge says, the word dripping with as much disdain as Lance feels. Not for the first time, Lance thanks his lucky stars for the genius that is Pidge. A datapage showing a nearby rest stop pops up on each of their tablets. “This place isn’t far. We can stop here for the night.”
“Seems…..cute.” Allura says, nose wrinkled as she scrolls down the page with one perfectly manicured finger.
“There’s a diner!” Hunk exclaims. “Oh, I’m down. I’m so down. This is the best worst thing to happen to us so far!”
Lance grins. This place seems chill! They can eat and explore a little and Hunk and Pidge can work their computer-y mumbo jumbo and then they’ll be on their way, no prob! He beams leaning forward in his seat, about to say something, but he falters.
Because, before he can say anything, he sees Keith. Keith who is almost mirroring his position exactly: he’s leaned forward in his seat, grinning, nodding along to Hunk.
“I’m stoked!” Keith says. And he really does look happy, the smile he tosses over his shoulder at Shiro is almost childlike, it’s so painfully genuine.
It makes everything in Lance just….trip up, the way Keith brushes the hair out of his eyes, always so intense, but now just intensely excited. He listens as Pidge gives them the coordinates for where they can park their lions, the dimples from his smile never quite disappearing.
“Holy crow,” Lance swears under his breath. Holy crow, is he in deep. How did it get this bad?
“And Lance.”
Lance’s head snaps up as Allura addresses him. “Yes?” he responds, his voice cracking, although not for the reason she might think.
“I know that’s not my grandmother’s Pegulian silverware all over the floor of your lion.”
Lance opens his eyes wide and vaguely motions to his ears and then the ceiling of his lion, mouthing what, sorry, can’t hear you, something’s wrong with my comm, hmm, the darndest thing, huh, well, gotta go! Before he closes the comm, the last thing he sees is the smile playing at Keith’s lips.
*
‘The Hasty Tasty’ is what the garish neon pink sign spells out over the front of the diner. The lettering on the glass door says it’s home of ‘the best cup of coffee in six galaxies,’ which Lance thinks is a pretty weighty claim for a place with floors this sticky.
A long counter spans the length of the diner, with booths in the middle and around the perimeter. The fluorescent lighting hums overhead, illuminating the pink and purple and white interior in an almost sickly hue. The smell of fryer oil and pie permeates the air.
“This place is cool,” Keith breathes, taking it all in.
Lance raises an eyebrow at him in response, because really? cool?, but soon drops it in a squawk as Keith catches his hand, giving it an excited squeeze, before walking inside.
He, Shiro and Keith are the first to enter, with the rest of the group still working on getting their shared navigational system ready for the reconfiguration. The sign at the front says ‘Please seat yourself’ in three different languages, so that’s what they do, choosing one of the plastic-y looking white and purple booths at random.
Lance slides into one side of the spacious booth, assuming Keith will sit across from him with Shiro on the other side. What he doesn’t expect is for Keith to slide in next to him, dangerously close. He gets closer still as he leans across Lance to snag a menu from the far side of the table---close enough that Lance catches a hint of the cherry smell of his shampoo, the faint musk from his sweatshirt.
Keith, unfortunately, for several days now, has been sporting a gray hoodie that reads in a terribly kitschy font: “what happens in Velgaz stays in Velgaz” which is ridiculous because the only thing that happened in Velgaz was that Pidge got food poisoning and the rest of the team doted on her while Coran won fifteen hundred GAC in a card game...then promptly lost it all on a yelmore race.
Anyways, he has on that horrible sweatshirt, making him look all soft and cozy, especially because Keith doesn’t have the presence of mind to fix his hair after pulling the sweatshirt over his head, so his already shaggy hair is mussed as soon as he pulls it on. And he has a bad habit of leaving the hood up, while he slinks around, hands in the front pocket, looking far more relaxed than he ever has before. Completely at odds with the sweatshirt is the fact that he’s wearing what appear to be...gym shorts? They look silky soft in the way that they pool around Keith’s toned...muscular...perfect...thighs....
What was Lance talking about again?
Oh yeah, Keith’s awful outfit. He’s still wearing the red flip flops.
“Take that hood off,” Lance chides, tugging the sweatshirt down around Keith’s neck. His hair really is a wreck from it, all flattened around the crown of his head. “Where do you think you are, some secret undercover alien organization?”
Keith laughs, a quiet snort behind his hand. But its a real laugh, nonetheless. His eyes crinkle and everything.
It shouldn’t be that easy to make him laugh.
Keith shouldn’t be sitting this close to him, close enough that their arms are smooshed together and he clearly means for Lance to be sharing the menu he placed on the table in front of them. Keith shouldn’t want to be this close. He should be embarrassed that his knee is bumping Lance’s under the table. He’s not.
“Lance,” Keith says, voice serious, tucking his hair back behind his hair. “They have cheeseburgers.”
And that’s all it takes, because if Lance wasn’t remembering before---the lookout spot, their easy conversation, fast food preferences and Garrison stories, Keith’s soft laugh, the kiss ---he certainly is now.
“Yeah?” he responds, gaze lingering too long on Keith’s mouth. He looks up in time to see Keith’s dark eyes track his gaze.
Keith nods, leaning closer.
The angle isn’t good, side-by-side in a fiberglass booth, but Keith is nothing if not determined. He drops one hand down to rest on Lance’s thigh between them and leans over, his other hand angling Lance’s jaw just right. He’s so gentle as he closes the distance between their mouths.
It’s just as chaste as their first kiss, but longer, softer, more relaxed--- definitely not a Galran greeting , the part of Lance’s brain that sounds like Hunk supplies. But, although it’s marginally less of a shock, it creates just as much tumult in Lance’s chest. His heart is beating so fast he can’t really enjoy it, he still can’t wrap his mind around it, Keith is kissing----
-----but I SET FIIIIIIRE TO THE RAIN-----
Keith pulls away, brow furrowed. “Is that---?”
----WATCHED IT POUR----
Lance blinks, senses somewhat returning to normal. A song, distinctly familiar, can be heard above the clatter of the other customers and the din of the kitchen. “Adele---?”
---as I touched your FAAACE---
Keith scoots away and Lance immediately misses the weight of his hand. Keith’s looking around the diner. “Actually...where is Shiro?”
“Um?”
THWAP
A teensy tiny hand with a very angry Pidge attached to it smacks down on their table. Lance and Keith jump in unison. “Forget something?” she asks.
When they give her a blank look in reply, she slides both of their mobile comms across the table. “I have been trying to call you for the last ten dobashes!!”
Keith opens up his mouth to apologize, but she’s already turned to Lance: “Can you please do something about your lion, for once ? Even with Allura there, Red is completely belligerent! I can’t even get into the cockpit!”
“Excuse you,” Lance says cooly, before his pitch rises, “I won’t tolerate this slander! Red is an absolute sweetheart , you just don’t know how to charm her!”
To which Keith snickers, and Pidge whirls around---
“Don’t even get me started on Black,” she says, flinging a finger in Keith’s face. “Where is Shiro, at the very least, he’ll be able to---”
“Probably the one controlling the jukebox, by the sounds of it,” Hunk says, already bringing a family-sized order of fries to the table. He squirts ketchup and mayo in an exacting ratio into the teal colored paper boat the fries came in. At the incredulous looks of his teammates, he continues, “Hey, you know it’s not me or Lance whose always singing ‘Hello’ in the showers. And Keith is more of a Fleetwood Mac kinda guy.”
Keith narrows his eyes. “How did you---”
“Keith!” Shiro rushes up to the table. He motions to the massive jukebox, a neon colored monster that takes up the equivalent of three booths’ worth of space.
“Use your words,” Lance says sagely in response to Shiro’s wild expression.
“The entire discography of Destiny’s Child,” he gasps out.
“Shit.” Keith leans over, pressing his shoulder close to Lance’s chest. When he whispers, his breath is hot against Lance’s ear: “Now, we’ll never get him off this planet,”
Lance giggles and Keith looks so satisfied in response---like, he may as well have just beaten Allura’s high score on a level eight gladiator, satisfied. His whole face is just lit up ‘smug.’ It’s unspeakably cute. If it’s going to put that expression on Keith’s face, Lance would laugh at every bad joke there ever was, forever. Just lay them on him, he can take it. Puns and all.
Shiro slides into their side of the booth and Keith relaxes in between him and Lance as if there’s no place in the whole universe he’d rather be. When Lance’s pinky touches his hand, Keith doesn’t pull away.
*
They don’t get kicked out of the diner.
Which is kind of a miracle because once Coran discovers there’s a pinball machine in the diner’s arcade--well. It all goes downhill from there. There’s a local with too many hands on each of his five arms and Coran gets it into his head that all is lost unless he takes him down a notch , his words, of course. (Coran definitely cheats. Lance doesn’t know how you can cheat at pinball, but those skills…they can’t be natural).
Collectively, they eat a ton---that might be why the owner of the establishment lets them be, despite Coran’s colorful, and loud, trash talking----Allura eats so many waffles she gives herself an extra few inches of height to accommodate. Hunk and Keith both agree that, in terms of space burgers, this place is tough to beat. Lance eats so much boysenberry pie he feels sick. Pidge puts their differences aside to give his shoulder a sympathetic pat. (She also takes and sends incriminating candid pics to Matt, the little gremlin.)
By the time they’ve finished, they can barely roll themselves back to their lions to pack it in for the night. They’re used to sleeping in them by now, and although each one is non-operational, all the lions are pretty close together, so it’s not lonely or anything. Not that Lance gets lonely, per se---it’s just---
A noise. Lance cocks his head.
A knock, muffled then louder---knuckles rapping metal. Lance pushes the sleeping mask to his forehead, peeking outside.
“Hey! Lance, you awake?” Keith’s voice is a loud whisper. Then, “It’s me, Keith!” Lance bites back a smile at that, because, honestly, who else would it be?
Lance pulls some sweats over his boxers and shuffles into his trusty hightops. He hops down with practiced ease. “What’s cookin’ good lookin’?”
Keith snorts a laugh at that and Lance feels his whole face go hot, despite the cool night air. It’s not an unpleasant feeling.
“We’re supposed to be sleeping,” Lance supplies, although neither he nor Keith have ever been one for rules. Keith starts on a slow path away from the glittery asphalt of the docking area where their lions are positioned. Lance follows him.
“We are,” Keith agrees. “But Kraft wants a walk.” At the mention of her name, Keith’s lovable pup (read: interdimensional, teleporting cosmic wolf) wags her tail.
“Well then,” Lance says. That settles that.
They fall into an easy pace, watching as Kraft bounds ahead, sometimes shimmering into nothing, reappearing elsewhere, but always trotting back to Keith, enthusiastic with her adventure. He scritches at the fur between her ears, gives her a nice little head pat, and then she’ll run away again.
Lance’s sweatpants don’t have any pockets, so he shoves his fingers under the waistband as he walks, hands on his hips, shoulders loose. He has the thought that he’d be content to walk like this forever, listening to Keith’s little huffs of amusement, the alien city slowly unfolding around them in the dark.
“You cold?” Keith asks him suddenly, his voice sounding low, the light rasp standing out against the night.
Lance shakes his head, it’s chilly, but his tee shirt is fine, honestly. Keith maybe doesn’t see his response because, without any further prompting, he tugs off his hoodie. He pulls it over his head from the shoulders, in the way that almost takes his shirt off with it, revealing for a moment the creamy pale skin of the small of his back. There’s enough light from the street lamps that Lance spots a freckle there, almost just where the skin dimples on the left, before his shirt slides back down.
Lance swallows.
“I run hot, anyways,” Keith explains, holding it out. His face is flushed like he might, indeed, run hot.
Lance nods, pulling it over his head. It’s warm, toasty warm, and smells, maddenly enough, like a crush that has existed since his Garrison days. Like everything he’s ever wanted. “Keith--” he starts.
“Hmm?” Keith turns and looks at him, dark eyes wide and deep in the low light.
‘Do you like me?’ is the question that was on the tip of his tongue. It doesn’t feel right to ask it, though. It feels juvenile---they’ve all been through too much for a question like that. They’ve fought a war together. Keith’s come back to him, older than he was, but more than that---it’s like he’s whole. Not that Keith wasn’t before, but there was something so restless in the way that he used to be, and it’s just not there anymore. It shows in the way that he carries himself, in the way that he’s opening, piece-by-piece, each one of them fitting together like a puzzle he wants Lance to solve.
But isn’t liking someone---isn’t love supposed to be about big confession scenes, and dancing even though there’s no music, and kissing ardently in the pouring rain?
Lance steps forward toward Keith, ‘til they’re toe to toe and Keith’s hand settles on his hip as if it’s been there a million times before.
Shouldn’t love be something more dramatic, something besides this comfortable rhythm that they’ve fallen into? This easy push and pull that he’s helpless to resist?
Lance watches as Keith’s eyes flutter shut, dark eyelashes over his cheeks. Lance tips forward, nose touching Keith’s. They both inhale at the contact. Lance’s mouth parts.
Is love supposed to be something more than sharing anecdotes and laughs and knowing when the other person needs to hear your voice? Is love more than the comfort that comes from sharing warm breaths on a cold street?
Maybe it’s not.
Lance catches Keith’s mouth, simple as that.
Keith complies, one hand sliding along Lance’s jaw to cup his cheek. He tilts his head just so, moving closer, achingly slow, but then it’s not slow. It’s sudden and heady, Keith’s mouth on his. Soft and hot against his lips. Lance moves closer, kissing opened mouthed, pressing into Keith’s chest. His hand drops down to Keith’s shoulder, grounding himself because everything else is gone: There’s just the taste of Keith’s tongue and the weighty feel of Keith’s hands and the low, needy noise that Keith makes with every pause.
When Keith pulls away, Lance’s eyes follow his lips, bitten red and glistening. From me , he thinks in a daze.
‘You never even told me you liked me!’ Lance will accuse at some point.
‘Was it not obvious?!’ Keith might shoot back, with a good-natured scowl.
Not tonight.
For now, Lance fusses over his hair, smoothing it back into place from where Keith’s hoodie and Keith’s hands have displaced it. Keith lets him, lips slightly pursed like he wants to say something but has decided against it. He leans against Lance when Lance is done, soaking in as much heat as possible by slinging an arm around his waist.
“Run hot, my ass,” Lance mutters, rubbing at Keith’s goosebumped arms as they start walking back to the ships.
“What about it,” Keith asks, his hand dipping down,
“Keith!” Lance says, half mock-scandalized, half actually flushed. “Take me out to dinner first, man!”
Keith nods, absolutely serious. “Tomorrow,” he says, pulling Lance close again. “Or the next day. We have time.”
Lance hums, considering this.
Emergency stops at space diners notwithstanding, they should have about forty-eight more quintants before they make it back to Earth. That does seem like plenty of time. And after that, all the time in the world. Lance lets out a satisfied sigh.
*
In the morning, when Lance sees Keith, his eyes bug out of his head. “Keith!!” he sputters.
“Yeah?” Keith asks, chilling on top of one of the yellow lion’s paws. The team is eating breakfast before they resume their roadtrip. Keith has his legs crossed, one ankle on his knee, balancing a bowl of alien cheerios in his hand. He shoves a spoonful of them in his mouth, crunching as he gives Lance a once over. “G’morning, Lance.” he says, mouth still full.
“Holy crow, dude, please, I’m suffering.” Lance makes a big show of handing Keith back his sweatshirt, keeping his eyes averted, so that he has to view the blue and white tie-dyed abomination that is Keith’s tee shirt for as little time as possible.
“I got it at the last truck stop!” Keith protests, swallowing. He pulls out the bottom so that the design---three wolves howling at a big full moon---is perfectly visible. “It’s nice!!”
“I might be sick----Hunk, I’m gonna hurl---get me the---”
Pidge passes them, carrying a coffee as big as her head. “It’s too early for this, boys.”
Keith glowers into his cereal, mouthing ‘it is nice,’ once again under his breath. He scoots over so there’s plenty of room for Lance to sit beside him.
***