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Keith was awakened by the sound of footsteps in his room. They were light, but not light enough to go unnoticed by him. He sneaked a hand under the pillow and wrapped his fingers around the hilt of his knife, the other hand frozen where it was laying over his waist.
The footsteps kept getting closer, and if Keith weren't still a little dazed from sleep than he might've recognize them. But he'd barely opened his eyes, waiting for them to adjust to the dark. So his mind skipped a few steps and went straight to violence. Or self-defense as he’d later like to differ.
He stayed silent. Senses alert yet still, like a predator waiting for the right moment.
Suddenly he felt the phantom press of fingers on his shoulder. Jumping up and out of bed, he took the intruder down with him— pressing his knife against their throat as a shrike in a pitch not suitable for whatever time of the night it was came from below him. He had pinned the hand that was on his shoulder over their head. Confused to find it devoid of any weapon.
Frowning, he looked down. And oh—
Oh no
Staring up at him with eyes widened in shock was Lance. His mouth slightly agape and the unrestricted hand wrapped tightly around Keith's wrist— wrist of the hand that held a knife to his throat. Keith jerked back as soon as he broke out of his frozen state of shock, pulling both of his hands to himself.
"Lance…? What are you doing here?" He hesitantly asked, still trying to get his bearings.
Lance narrowed his eyes at him, the shadow of a smirk dancing over his lips, "Wow Mullet, cool way you greet the people coming to your room," he said motioning his head downwards. Keith followed his eyes toward the position they were in, Lance lying on the floor with Keith hunched over him, straddling his hips with legs on either side.
Keith's face flushed crimson as he crawled off Lance's lap—Lance's lap! How does he always manage to get himself into shit like that?—and sat cross-legged next to the bed. "You're the one sneaking into people's rooms in the middle of the night! How did you even open the door?" He asked incredulously.
Lance lets out an awkward cough, darting his eyes around the room, "I might or might not have asked Pidge for a spare card to your room… But that aside! I'm here for important reasons!"
"Wait why does Pidge has… and why'd they give it to you…" Keith sighs, accepting his fate and knowing better than to question the team’s evil genius, "So what are you here for?" He asked, tilting his head slightly toward Lance.
Lance perked up at that, a smile taking over his face, "Well, it's a surprise! And for that you'd have to come with me!"
Keith didn't know what was going on. Just that morning, the others had refused to even talk to him, going so far as Hunk—the nicest guy Keith had ever known—telling him to leave them alone when he’d tried to join them in the kitchen. Leaving Keith to contemplate what he'd done wrong. So wrong that they didn't even want to be in the same room as him.
And now, Lance apparently had a surprise for him. Though from what Keith knows of surprises from all the foster homes and the kids he had lived with, is that they were never a good thing.
But Lance looked so hopeful while asking Keith to follow him… and can anyone blame him for never being able to say no to that smile? When it seemed to lighten up the whole room, always so full of life that it made Keith want to do everything he could to never let it falter.
And so here he was. Following after Lance with narrowed eyes that he was sure looked anything but intimidating.
Lance walked through a few twists and turns, beyond the halls where their rooms were in. And soon they were at the emptier side of the castle. Keith looked around, trying to see if he'd been there before. But all the halls of the castle looked strangely similar, except the parts they usually used. Those were always littered with either his and Lance's clothes that should be in the laundry or Hunk and Pidge's little trinkets that made weird ticking noises sometimes.
Over that, he didn't really wander around much after dark. It was Lance and Pidge who were always up to something way into the night.
And in the rare days when he did, it'd be limited to the training deck or the kitchen. The observatory sometimes, if he was sure no one was around and when his head was filled with too many thoughts to sleep.
He'd sit and draw then— wrapped in the warmth of his blanket, and surrounded by nothing but the gentle hum of the castle’s engine.
Every time he came back to the observation deck, there would be a whole new set of constellations surrounding them. And for the first time he realized that the whole idea of constellation is just as made up as the stories circling them. That all the stars are on their own, drifting in this endless abyss and millions of light-years from one another.
But one day, a man looked up, and he saw stories on them— stories of Gods and monsters. Someone looked up and saw the stars taking shape, gaining form. And for him they came to life. The feeling was quite nerve-wracking, yet it intrigued Keith to no end.
He'd draw the simple things from earth— trees, birds, the ocean and the sky. And he'd draw the unusual creatures they'd come across out in the universe. Some with scales that'd light up in the dark, others with wings thinner than the dragonfly’s.
His eyes settled back on Lance. He was walking with long silent steps, his back facing Keith. The blue light from the ceiling made his already wide shoulders look all the more defined.
Keith felt his face heat up as his eyes traveled downwards, and he had to force himself to look back up at the walls trying to go back to his previous thoughts. But his cheeks were warmer now— his steps stiffer.
Soon Lance stopped in front of a door—saving Keith from his own embarrassment—and turned around to beam at him, "We're here!"
Keith raised his eyebrows in question, "In this empty hallway?"
"No! In this room," Lance said pointing at the door but doing nothing to open it. He wasn't looking at Keith but at the floor as he continued, "Listen umm… before we go in… I— I'm really sorry for being a jerk to you for the last few days…," There was a slight hesitation in the way he glanced up at Keith every few seconds. As though he was worried Keith would get mad at him.
And maybe he should be…
Cause yeah, it's true that he and Lance get into arguments all the time, most of them over the silliest of topics too. And that's fine. He's used to them. He has fun with the nonsensical comebacks they throw at each other. And Lance does too. Because they both know that those aren't anything serious. That if needed they'd jump in to defend the other at any given moment.
But the last three days weren't like that.
He didn't miss the way Allura, Lance, Pidge and Hunk had been acting weird around him. How some of them would be gone for hours at a time to some nearby space mall or habitable moon. But every time he tried to join them, they'd make up excuses and leave the room.
They weren't being straight up hostile, per se, but the passive aggression was killing him. Especially when no one would tell him what he'd done wrong.
When he tried to ask Shiro what was going on, he just smiled and said that Keith would find out soon enough. And that didn't help his thoughts from spiraling at the slightest.
Keith tried his best to keep the sudden worry flooding through his veins out of his voice, "So you do admit it? That you've been acting like a jerk?"
Lance pouted as a scowl made its place between his eyebrows. And how could Keith ever be mad at him when his heart yearned to smoothen the crease by putting his lips against it, a seal to never let anything harm him.
"Of course I do! It's just…" Lance took in a deep breath, seemingly getting frustrated with his inability to express himself, "Ugh… You know what? Let's just…" he pulled out another card—how many of these does Pidge has?—from his pocket and unlocked the door.
Keith's eyes widened as he took in the thousands of stars that filled his vision in a heartbeat. Right across from the door was the biggest wall of the circle-like room, made of glass and stretching on for almost half of it.
An observatory, Keith soon realized. It was smaller than the one they normally used. There were a couple of couches on one side and a… was that a mat on the other? It was glowing from flickering shadows of the countless little candles surrounding it.
The gentle tune of a foreign song filled the room. Making it feel calm and cozy. The melody was of an instrument soft like the violin yet its edges glazed with a sharpness like the pianos from earth. Altean music, maybe? Keith had never heard one before to know for sure.
He followed Lance inside. Lance's hands were behind his back and head straight forward. The usual smooth sway of his hips looked tense, either from nervousness or excitement. Keith wasn't sure which one it was…
Lance stopped in front of the… blanket. It was a blue blanket. Lance's blanket. There was a cake in the middle of it and a lot of pillows all over. The whole place was bathed in a golden glow from the swaying flames all around them.
He opened his mouth to ask what was going on, but Keith's breath got caught in his throat when Lance's hand slowly wrapped around his wrist and gave it a gentle squeeze, "Happy birthday, Keith." He said in no more than a whisper, looking at Keith so softly he felt his insides melt.
Keith's eyes widened as he stared at the boy in front of him. Lance went to sit down, tugging Keith along with him. And Keith went. Wordlessly, his eyes still locked on him.
The ember flare of the candles lightened up Lance's skin like caramel under the afternoon sun. And suddenly the world seemed to have narrowed down to just the two of them. The music picked up, sharpening all his senses to the man in front of him.
It was as if time had stopped. The moment between one breath to the next stretching on for eternity. it didn’t seem like it would ever end, not as long as Lance looked at him like that. Like he could see all of him. His past, his present and a future where he actually belonged— future that Keith had never dared to think for himself.
But Lance saw it.
Or maybe he's the one who brought it to existence, from the pieces of Keith he has picked up over the years. The pieces that he thought were lost forever.
Lost among the hundreds of times he had pointed his blade at someone. Every time he pulled the trigger of a gun foreign to his fingertips. Every time the alien inhabitant of a planet had flinched out of his way after they’d fought for hours to protect them, just cause his eyes had turned golden in the heat of it all.
Every time he saw the life fade away from the glistening eyes of people they couldn’t save, he felt a piece of himself fading away as well.
But here Lance was, looking at him as if he saw so much in him and not just— Keith. More than anything anyone has ever seen in him. As if he was something to cherish. To hold. To love…
But that just made him feel more conflicted by the sudden change, "But I thought… I thought you didn't want to talk to me… yesterday at the mall you and Hunk told me to not bother you,” his lips pressed into a thin line in order to not show any emotions, “You asked me to leave you alone…"
Lance's whole face went so red that Keith could see the color rushing all the way to his ears even in the shimmering light. Lance put his head in his hands and groaned, "Okay, I admit that was a bad way to go find the ingredients for the cake without you knowing…"
"Wait… you made it yourself…?" By the time the melodies reached a softer tune again, Keith's heart rate had already passed the number normal for humans and was bordering on Galran territory.
"I mean, yeah. Hunk helped with the ingredients and measurements a little. And the decorations a bit too…" Lance said, counting on his finger as his tune got quieter with each one. Then suddenly he spread his hands out on both sides, "Well, it's the thought that counts, right? And I tried, okay? I even burned my finger a little and it hurt!"
Despite the overwhelming amount of emotion filling his heart, Keith couldn't help the chuckle leaving him at Lance's dramatics, "Wow, the defender of the universe, the one who's gotten himself stabbed several times before, got hurt because he burned his finger a little." He felt like he'd start crying if he didn't keep talking, so he did, "And… how did you know it was… my birthday?"
"Oh, we umm… asked Shiro a while ago when we were talking about everyone's birthdays," Lance replied looking at anything but him.
That still didn't clear up Keith's confusion, "But we're using Altean calendar here…?
Lance took a deep breath, "I kinda got Pidge to figure the exact date out… since I was keeping track of the months and knew we were somewhere around October…" He then looked back at Keith, eyes shining with vulnerability, "Do you… like it?" He motioned his head slightly toward the cake.
Oh
Keith couldn’t stop the tears filling his eyes anymore...
Lance had gone through all the troubles of figuring out when Keith's birthday was… just so they could celebrate it?
Celebrate a day he hasn't considered special since he was seven. He'd even asked Shiro to not do anything for him on the occasion, even though they did end up going out for dinner with some excuse Shiro came up with every year…
But that wasn't this kind of celebration. Not with a cake.
Lance was biting his lip with a worried look on his face, and Keith realized he hadn't said anything yet. He couldn’t. Not when his throat had closed up long ago from the tears threatening to fall. So he launched himself at Lance. Tackling him to the floor and wrapping his arms around Lance's waist.
Lance let out a quiet yelp from the sudden impact, yet wrapped his arms tightly around Keith nonetheless, "What's with you throwing yourself at me tonight?" He said, smile visible in his voice— but didn’t loosen his hold on Keith the slightest.
Keith sat there, sniffling softly with his face tucked into Lance's shoulder. Fists clinging into his jacket from behind, hoping more than anything for Lance to understand just how grateful he was.
And they stayed like that for a long time. Their breathing the only sound filling the room, holding onto the other with all they had. When Keith finally pulled back, his eyes met the blue ones of the man he loved, looking as if they could hold galaxies in them, bright with the reflection of the stars outside.
"Thank you. This is…" Keith glanced at all the candles surrounding them and smiled shakily at Lance, "This is beautiful."
Lance let out a sigh, then added with the kind of childish glee that made Keith's heart soar, "Good good. I was worried you would be mad or something."
"What?" Keith laughed in disbelieve, voice still wet from before, "Lance I'd have to have gone mad to not like it. This is beautiful. I love it." He didn't have enough words to describe how much he loved it.
Lance smiled at him, his expression softening with adoration, "We actually have the real party planned for tomorrow— or it's today now, I guess. The one that all of us planned together. I kinda wanted… tonight to be just ours, I guess…"
Keith couldn’t tell who moved first, maybe they both moved at the same time, but the next thing he felt was the softness of Lance's lips over his own. He felt his eyes slowly fall shut as he gave in to the gentle rhythm of their lips moving together.
The music filled the space between them and to Keith it was perfect. Lance was perfect, and he couldn't have asked for anything more for his birthday.