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autisticlancemcclain · 3 months

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“This your place?” Keith asked, panting.

His host raised his eyebrow, pushing open the door.

“No,” he deadpanned, “this is my annoying neighbour’s house. He’s on holidays. I’m staying here and using all his things to take revenge for hours of small talk.”

“Oh,” Keith replied, impressed. “Cool.” He’ll have to do that next time Lance is on a solo mission.

“No, I’m – I’m kidding, Paladin.”

“Oh,” Keith repeated, disappointed. “Less cool.”

“Just – get in the house.”

Keith didn’t argue. He followed his host into the small building, nodded as he was pointed to a guest room, and passed out the second his head hit the straw-stuffed pillow.

— — —

When Keith woke, it was dark outside. A scarred face was looming over his, and he bit back a scream, hand flying for his knife on reflex.

“Peace, Paladin,” said Ares, holding up a hand. “I startled you. I did not mean to. It’s time for the feast.

Keith slumped. His heart slowed from its jackrabbit pace. “Yeah. Yeah, man, thanks. I’ll be right out.”

His host nodded and left, closing the door behind him. Keith took one minute to calm himself, closing his eyes and counting his breaths. Once sixty seconds passed, he stood, glancing down at his armour.

That was…fine, right?

They always wore their armour to diplomacy missions. Well, mostly because Keith threw a massive hissy fit the second Coran attempted to force him into the worst, most restrictive suit he’d ever seen. His armour was battered, unpolished, and honestly kind of rank, but it wasn’t like he had many other options. He held out his helmet, inspecting himself in the reflection of his visor.

Shiro would tell him to brush his hair.

Too bad he didn’t have a hairbrush.

He walked out of his room, shrugging. His host was waiting for him by the small hearth in the middle of the house, standing as Keith approached.

“Shall we make our leave?”

“Sure.”

He followed his host back out of the little house. They walk in silence. Keith’s feet begin to hurt by the five minute mark – he has no idea how long he slept, but it was not long enough, and exhaustion still pulled at his frame.

Dryope had mentioned food, though. And something like a party, but one lucky thing about Ares – he doesn’t seem to be much of a partier, either, so hopefully Keith could ditch that bright and early and go right back to sleep.

They walked along the same hills Keith’s host had led them down earlier, only this time they were going up, so it was worse. Thankfully, though, the walk was just barely shorter – they weren’t walking back to the beach, but to the hearth, the big fire pit Keith noticed walking in. All the houses they passed were empty, not even a light by the window.

“Is everyone at the – party, thing, whatever?” Keith panted.

Ares eyed him briefly, not pausing his stride. “Look for yourself.”

They crested the top of the hill, and Keith’s jaw dropped.

The hearth was blazing. The flame burned so brightly and hugely that Keith was half-convinced it was out of control. Surrounding it in hundreds of chattering groups was every single Aegian, tall and wide and small, smiling and laughing. As he watched, an Aegian called something in a language Keith couldn’t understand, and immediately dozens of the tree-warriors rushed up to join hands in a big ring around the fire, twirling and dancing as the watching Aegians chanted and sang.

Keith’s first thought was, Aren’t these guys made of wood?

His second thought was, This looks like a hippie commune. Time to ditch.

Unfortunately Ares caught him before he could go right back the way they can, spinning him around and shoving him down the hill.

“Real hospitable,” Keith grumbled.

His host seemed, as much as such a scary person could look, amused. “On you go, Paladin.”

Keith stomped on. He probably could take Ares in a fight, at least normally, but he was exhausted and injured and weak. Plus, if he was the reason behind yet another failed diplomatic mission, Lance would gleefully hold it over his head for weeks, and Shiro would be disappointed if Keith finally killed him. Plus, Allura would be upset with him, and having Allura upset with you kind of feels like taking a kitten that loves and trusts you and drop kicking it into the sun. Very quickly, you realise that you are the scum of the Earth and the worst person alive. It’s generally just something you should avoid.

As he trudged down the hill, he quickly recognised three familiar suits of armour. They were kind of hard to miss – even as scuffed as they were, they glinted in the light of the massive fire, shining like a bunch of precious stones. Pidge, sulking somewhere near a table of desserts; Hunk, chatting with his host; and Shiro, speaking with the Aegian leader like the tryhard little teacher’s pet he was. Coran stuck out, too, in his bright blue Altean uniform that was somehow pristine even though Keith watched him get flung at a wall and shocked by a bare wire from the broken control centre back on the dead castle.

All the Aegians wore some kind of bedsheet, or their Tinkerbell clothes. Interestingly, the dryads were not the only Aegians present – there were others who looked a little more human, although they had plenty of strange features that reminded Keith they were not. A group of laughing girls looked like they were made from the bottom of a pool in the sunlight, skin shifting with dappled light. Several guys walked around with half a donkey hanging out of their drawers. Keith spotted some honest-to-God centaurs. One girl appeared to be made out of blowing, spinning wind.

Hundreds of eyes seemed to follow Keith as he joined the crowd, glancing at him and then back at their friends, whispering to themselves. Keith shrunk into himself, letting his hair fall in front of his eyes – no one looked mad, or angry, or cruel, but no one looked exactly welcoming, either. Ares had disappeared at some point, not that he was what Keith would consider a friendly face.

Keith needed to find someone he knew, stat.

His first instinct was Pidge – the two of them usually slunked in some corner together whenever they were forced (often at gunpoint, thanks, Lance) to some stupid party. They had a running game called How Many People Can We Convince That Barking Is A Polite Human Greeting Before Shiro Finds Out. So far their score was 135-149, Pidge in the lead. (Keith very much intended to catch up.) But before he could make it over to where she was hiding, a group of water-girls descended upon her like a pack of piranhas, giggling and shouting something about braiding and eye makeup. Keith decided he would rather chew off his right hand than put himself anywhere near that, and did an abrupt 180 in search of Hunk.

Unfortunately, the big guy was still preoccupied. His host – Elijah (or something, Keith would be reminded of his real name eventually) – was showing him some kind of metal box that opened to a bunch of intricately placed gears and bobbles and wires. Hunk was staring at it like the Holy Grail. Not even Keith’s best pleading eyes and sad orphan story would convince him to babysit Keith and glare at anyone who attempted to socialise. Another dead end.

Keith sighed. That really only left –

“Hey, squirt!”

Keith went bright red, cringing with his whole entire body. He loved his brother, he really, truly did, but Shiro was as out of depth as he was at stuff like this and tended to overcompensate by being affectionate. Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, except he had a bad case of Foot In Mouth Disease and knew Keith at his most embarrassing early teenage emo.

So.

“Hey, Shiro,” he said stiffly, trying not to die inside as the man pressed a smacking kiss right in the centre of his forehead.

A tall, handsome guy somewhere to their left raised his eyebrows, smiling with amusement. Keith thought he could die. Sometimes, he thought his brother was secretly a forty-six year old suburban mom of three.

“We missed you!” cried his embarrassing brother. He was so genuine about it, it was hard not to smile back at him. “You took so long getting here!”

“My host’s place is at the farthest corner of the city,” Keith explained. “Had to hike here. Thought I was gonna bite it by mile six.”

Shiro snorted. “Drama queen.”

“Yeah, yeah. You try hiking after getting shaken around like a bobblehead. I bet your place is, like, twenty feet away from here.”

“Pretty much,” Shiro agreed, smile turning into more of a smirk. He attempted to dig his knuckles into Keith’s skull, but Keith was well used to his brand of crap and squirmed away at the last second. “Akeso’s sorta the main healer around here – at least I think? They’re not much of a talker – so they live in this building that’s attached to the infirmary. One of the big buildings in the inner circle.”

He pointed to one of the more rectangular buildings Keith had seen on the way in, with a much smaller, rounder building attached to it like one of those suction fish on a shark. It was hard to make out many details in the dark, fire’s light only able to stretch so far, but it looked pretty infirmary-ish.

“Hunk’s staying near the forges. He loves it, you should talk to him about it. He’s all cute and excited, you know that look he gets. Elatreus is impressed with him, practically made him an assistant.”

Elatreus! That’s the host’s name. And Keith absolutely knew what look Shiro’s talking about – the wide brown eyes, clasped hands, talking a mile a minute. He smiled softly. Nothing better for the soul like watching an ecstatic Hunk.

“That’s good. Glad he’s happy.”

“Yep. And Pidge is in a regular house like you, little more in-city. Next to some kind of trap shop? I don’t totally get it. Apparently Dysnomia needs a lot of supplies. Pidge was being all sketch about it.”

“That’s not super reassuring.”

“It is not!” Shiro agreed. He led Keith to one of the many tables laid out, absolutely covered in food. Keith realised he was ravenous, piling up a plate at least a foot high with meats and breads and foods he couldn’t even identify, but that smelt positively godly. At Shiro’s raised eyebrow, he rolled his eyes and selected a single vegetable.

“Make sure you toss some in the fire,” Shiro advised.

Keith squinted at him. “I’m…not gonna do that, thanks.”

“No, no, you have to.”

He pointed to the edge of the fire, where, sure enough, some Aegians were scraping the edge of their plates into the flames.

Keith wrinkled his nose. “The hell are they burning their food for? What a waste!”

Shiro shrugged, stepping into the line. “Akeso said it’s an old tradition, something that their ancestors felt protected them and gave them good will and peace. No one really wants to mess with that mojo, so. Portion of the food is sacrificed.”

Keith would be less pressed about it if the food didn’t look and smell so good. Scraping perfectly good food into fire felt like spending hours polishing a sword only to scratch it three seconds later – effort for no reason. When it was their turn, though, Keith did as the custom dictated. He’d learned enough about questioning weird traditions.

He held eye contact with Shiro and flicked his one vegetable into the flames. Delightfully, his brother’s eye twitched, like he was considering shoving Keith into them. Suddenly, this custom was Keith’s favourite he’d ever been forced to partake in.

By the time they finally sat somewhere to eat, Keith was so hungry he was ready to eat his fingers along with the food. He inhaled his food for a good five or six minutes, ignoring Shiro’s attempts first at conversation, then at slowing him down.

“Christ, kid,” he said, voice tinged with either horror or awe. Maybe both. “Eating like I never fed you in your life.”

“You haven’t,” Keith replied around a rib of some kind. “Adam fed me. You made ash of everything you touched.”

Shiro’s expression soured. He poked sullenly at some kind of leaf. (Serves him right for trying to be some kinda health freak now that he’s in charge. Keith once watched him eat an entire Costco sheet cake at three in the morning, and that had been his first and only meal of the day. Keith enjoyed bringing it up every time Shiro preached about the benefits of salad and watching him just start screeching to drown Keith out. Good times.)

“I didn’t turn everything to ash, you ungrateful brat. I made muffins that one time!”

You microwaved an already cooked muffin, Keith thought, wisely choosing to eat some kind of rice dish instead of bringing it up. And it tasted like erasers afterr. So.

“Sure, Shiro.”

Shiro nodded, satisfied. He picked up the leaf, sprinkled with some…orange thing, maybe, Keith couldn’t tell exactly, and took a delicate bite. He looked less satisfied.

“So,” he said, setting down his plate like he was looking for an excuse not to eat it. He looked at Keith expectantly. “You must want an update on Allura.”

Keith blinked. “Oh, shoot, yeah. I didn’t see her. She good?”

“Yeah, from what we can tell. When we got to the infirmary, Akeso stitched up my knee, then we –”

“You had a knee injury?” Keith interrupted. “You should have said something!”

Shiro smiled gently. “I got it treated, dork.” He bumped their shoulders together, trying to ease Keith’s upset expression. “I’m fine, okay? If Akeso didn’t bring it up, I would have. Promise. It wasn’t too bad, anyway, I swear.”

Keith frowned harder. He had noticed Shiro shifting slightly when they were first confronted by Dryope and her army, but Shiro had walked away without limping, so he’d allowed himself to stop worrying. A stupid mistake, and one he should know better than making. He knows his stupidly self-sacrificial brother.

“Keith, seriously,” Shiro assured. He leaned down, unlatching his thigh and knee braces, then pulled back the rip in his undersuit. Keith wasn’t comforted by the size of the rip – nor the placement of it – but the wound didn’t look too bad, and was stitched neatly. Some kind of salve was spread all over it, under the clear wound dressing. As he watched, the wound seemed to contract, shrinking ever so slightly.

“Healing magic,” Shiro explained, putting his armour back. He patted Keith’s shoulder. “Akeso is super practiced at it. They stitched me up but warned that overdoing magic healing is as bad as cheating death, so it’ll still take a couple weeks to heal fully. Just won’t hurt so bad and might heal a little faster than with just stitches.”

“That why Allura is still out?” Keith clarified, finally letting go of the tension in his shoulders. Shiro looked relieved. “No speedy magic?”

Shiro nodded. “Exactly. After Akeso stitched me up we went to go visit Rhea, check on Allura. She’s tucked in this massive bed-nest thing, snoring away. She’s fine. Just super drained and needs all the rest she can. She’s in good hands.”

Relief punches out of Keith like a physical force. It’s one thing if his friends are injured, a whole other if they’re unconscious – but with Shiro’s assurance as well as Coran’s confidence earlier, he can relax. The two of them can read people like no one else on the ship – except maybe Lance. She’ll be fine.

“Speaking of Lance,” Keith said.

“No one brought up Lance except your own brain,” Shiro responded patiently. That infernal smirk twitched at the corner of his mouth.

Keith went red, barrelling right on. “Where is he? This stuff is right up his alley, I figured he’d be out twirling until he passes out in the punch or something.”

Shiro frowned, looking at him funny. “He is? He’s been over –”

Just then, the music that had been playing in the background changed – there was a collective inhale, then all the instruments played something at once. Keith didn’t know much about music, but the something felt intentional, deeply so. A song was beginning, rather than endless background music.

Excited murmuring moved in waves throughout the gathered Aegians. People started shifting. High above everything else, loud and excited, rang a disbelieving laugh – a very familiar laugh.

Keith whipped his head up, roll dropping from his hand and bouncing into the dirt. At the edge of the crowd, lit softly by the orange golden flames, was Lance – but it was no wonder Keith had missed him before. He wasn’t wearing his armour.

He was wearing a dress!

Well, not really a dress. One of those ancient Greek toga things, that looks like a droopy bedsheet. Keith had noticed it on several – almost all, in fact – of the Aegians; a draped, white garment, cinched in the waist, pinned at the shoulders. It hadn’t looked anything special on them.

Lance, though, wore it like it had been made for him. Maybe it had. Most Aegians wore the toga-thing pinned at both shoulders, but Lance’s was only gathered at one, the rest of it falling artfully on his chest, looking dangerously like it was about to fall off. The cinched golden rope acting as a belt made his waist look downright tiny, like someone could pick him up around his middle and throw him, or something. It wasn’t crazy short, or anything, but Lance surely didn’t wear it down to his toes, like some others did. A pair of simple brown sandals wrapped all the way up his calves.

There were actual freaking laurels in his hair, along with what Keith could only assume were gold threads, wrapped around a few tiny, careful braids. A golden bracelet wrapped around his bicep, contrasting with his many Earth-made bracelets and anklets, and his plastic blue Moana watch that he never took off.

“He looks ridiculous!” Keith cried.

Shiro tried poorly not to laugh. “I think he looks nice!”

“He looks like a freaking Roman statue!”

The music started to swell, and Lance reached out to grab an offered hand, and suddenly Keith’s blood went cold.

“What is he doing all over Lance,” he hissed.

Shiro raised his eyebrows. “His…host?”

“Hosting immoral thoughts, maybe!” Keith protested. Shiro choked on his drink. “Look at his damn hand! Gripping Lance’s waist like there’s a magnet involved! What’s he want, to pick Lance up like a prize and show him around, or something? What a creep!”

But Lance wasn’t scowling, or even using his polite I-hate-you-and-can’t-wait-to-talk-crap-about-you-to-my-friends smile. He was just smiling, and concentrating hard on his feet, wrapping his own hands all over Mr. Creep. As the music got more complicated, they started dancing.

“What’s your deal with Peithos?” Shiro questioned. “What’s he –”

Keith ignored him. “And they have some kinda dance prepared? He’s supposed to be helping Lance recover, not teaching him a dance! How long have we been here for?”

Shiro finally sighed, giving up on his questioning. He watched the dancing duo, although with significantly less (zero) animosity than Keith.

“‘Bout ten hours? Give or take.”

“Ten ho – ten hours,” Keith said, stumbling over his words. He tore his eyes away and stared at his brother, alarmed. “We’ve been here ten whole hours? I thought it was, like, three!”

Shiro nodded, taking a long sip out of his cup. “Yep. Surprised the heck outta me, too. Went for a nap after checking on Allura, and boom, sun’s down, Akeso’s waking me up, and my leg hardly hurts anymore. Exhausted sleep is sleep, man, I feel you. Pidge, Hunk, and Coran knocked out, too. Only Lance stayed up. That’s why he’s not in armour. And why he knows this dance, apparently.” He nudged Keith’s shoulder, expression suddenly much more solemn. “You know how he is with sleep.”

Keith softened. He turned back to the blue paladin with a sigh, watching the half-Aegian twirl him around. The music got faster and faster and the man grabbed Lance around the waist and lifted him, twirling them both like it was easy as pie. Lance threw his head back and laughed, cheeks flushed and nose squinted like it does when he’s really laughing.

“Yeah, I know. Still, though. I don’t trust that guy. Too friendly. And Lance is too comfortable.”

“That’s fair.” Shiro was staring at him, too. “I don’t really trust many people here, actually. I think Rhea is trustworthy. And Elatreus. The other people, I can’t say yet. But Dryope…”

He turned to glance at the leader, who watched the festivities over the rim of an ornate glass. She sat on a carved rock, her father next to her. The rock-seat to her right was left empty. Keith could guess who it was for.

“There’s something they’re not telling us,” Keith finished, nodding. “Agreed.”

He turned back to look at Lance and Peithos. The song had ended, but they were still standing close to the fire, bent close. Lance was gesturing like crazy, smile lighting up his face. Peithos was intently watching his every move.

“We’ll keep an eye on them,” Shiro promised. His smile was small and reassuring. Keith glanced at the half-Aegian, then back at his brother, nodding slowly.

“Yeah. Yeah, I think we should.”

After the weird dance, the party started to die down. People slowly started to head out, first in singles, then in couples, then in large swathes. Pidge was one of the first to make her getaway. Keith looked around for his host, but couldn’t manage to land his eyes on him. He hoped he hadn’t already left – he had no clue how to get back to his guest room in the dark, and wasn’t super pumped about sleeping on the ground if it came to that.

“You know where the house is?” Keith overheard Peithos murmur, so close to Lance there wasn’t a place they weren’t touching.

Lance grinned up at him. “Yep! I’ll meet you there, don’t worry about me. Go do what you need to do.”

The half-Aegian smiled gratefully at him, then rushed off.

Some host, Keith thought bitterly.

His glare was apparently pretty pungent, because now that Lance’s distraction was gone, he looked over quickly. He brightened, jogging over.

“Keith! Hey! I haven’t seen you all night.”

“Yeah, wonder why,” muttered Keith sullenly.

“I hope you –” Lance frowned. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What’s that supposed to mean,” Keith repeated, mocking. He rolled his eyes. Unfortunately he still managed to notice the expression on Lance’s face – wounded, not mad. He faltered.

That wasn’t how their arguments were supposed to go. “You know what it means,” he insisted, but it sounded unconfident even to his own ears.

“I really, really don’t. I looked for you earlier, I couldn’t find you when everyone else –”

“You looked?” Keith asked incredulously. “I couldn’t’ve pried your eyes away from Tall, Dark, and Handsome if I plucked them out of your head!”

Lance’s already-present flush exploded out of control, so bright Keith could see it even in the dying embers of the hearth. “I wasn’t – he’s not – you’re not – what are you talking about!” he finally managed, tripping over his words in a way he usually didn’t. “Peithos and I were just – were just – we were only dancing! He taught me the Spring Dance, earlier, when he was showing – showing – me the wildflower fields, and –”

Keith narrowed his eyes. He realised for the first time that Lance was swaying, slightly, and even as he talked himself out of his embarrassment, the red didn’t totally fade from his face, staying high on his cheeks.

“– I don’t know what your problem is, I swear, every time I have fun you live to ruin it. Gods, can’t I even have – have – have one thing, I just –”

He kept tripping over his words, like his tongue wasn’t working with him. Keith frowned harder.

“Lance, are you – drunk?”

“What? No!”

That Lance said clearly. He whirled on Keith with a new layer of clarity in his eyes, dark like pits and absolutely flashing in fury.

“You think,” he seethed, stepping forward, “that I am so freaking irresponsible, so absolutely stupid and idiotic, that I would get intoxi – intoxish – intoxicat –”

He couldn’t even say the words. Keith stared at him in alarm, because he raised a good point – Lance liked to pretend, but he really wasn’t irresponsible like that. Keith had never heard him swear. He went to bed at the same time every night. As far as he knew, he’d never actually touched a drop of alcohol in his life – it would be out of character for him to get wasted at a diplomatic mission, late at night, when they were separated and wary.

Something was not right.

“Lance, I think you should maybe –”

“Gods, you ruin – you ruin everything.” Lance blinked, hard, then glared at Keith, shoving off the steadying hand Keith had placed on his elbow and stumbling backwards. He held his gaze for several moments, absolutely glowering, and then – to Keith’s great horror – his brown eyes watered. Tears built up faster than he could wipe them away, tracing a line down his cheek. Keith staggered backwards.

“I hate you sometimes,” he said, and ran off.

Keith watched him go, aftertaste of the delicious food turning sour in his mouth.

— — —

all art by @jiveyuncle!!

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