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Uncharacteristically, Keith had woken up early in the morning. He was walking around his apartment doing nothing in particular but just feeling happy and excited for the wonderful day ahead of him. The raven-haired boy was happy for a couple of reasons. One, his boyfriend was finally coming back home. For the past few weeks, Lance had gone to stay at his family home which was only a 30 minutes drive from where they lived, but Keith still missed him. The second reason was that it was their anniversary. Keith had been planning this day for months, he was just mind-numbingly looking at the clock waiting for it to strike 6:00pm, which was the time when Lance had promised to come pick him up for their anniversary date night.Usually, it was Lance who went out of his way to plan events like anniversaries, birthdays, valentine’s day etc. But this year Keith insisted that he do the planning, he wanted to do this for Lance. Lance has given and done so much for Keith that he feels like he has not given anything in return. Plus, Keith had way more fun planning this than he thought he would. If Lance enjoys today maybe I will do the planning next year too. Or maybe we can do it together. Keith thinks, smiling to himself.Keith slowly walks into the bedroom, picking up a small blue box sitting on the dresser. He opens the box and happily smiles at the small tiny object inside it. This was the third reason for his excitement today; he was going to propose to Lance.A few hours later, Keith was all dressed up wearing black jeans and a red shirt with a blazer to go with it, he was waiting for Lance to arrive. Keith walks to the kitchen to get some water but stops to stare at a wall where multiple photo frames were mounted to create a beautiful photo collage, courtesy of Lance. One look and you would notice all the photos were carefully selected and placed just in the right places. There were many photo frames in the middle of the wall, but the two largest frames were set at the opposite end creating a boundary around the smaller frames. The larger frame on the right held a picture of Lance and his huge family, the left frame held a picture of Keith with his mom and dad. The rest of the photos were of Lance and Keith from their childhood to their adulthood, some of them had pictures of their closest friends with them. Looking at the photographs Keith once again realizes how Lance has always been part of his life. From that snowy winter morning when they were eight to now, he’s always been there with me. They weren’t exactly best of friends back then because Lance was constantly getting on Keith’s nerves, which he still does. But that’s just how Lance is, if Lance is not annoying, then that’s not Keith’s Lance.After drinking some water, Keith takes a peek through the window to see it heavily snowing outside, the wind was also picking up. Well, that’s an ugly weather. Keith thinks and silently thanks himself for not planning anything outside for today’s date. Keith was starting to wonder if they were going to make it to their 7:00 reservation at the restaurant when his phone starts ringing, he quickly grabs his phone and answers it.“Hey, Lance.” Keith’s excitement could be heard in his voice.“…Hey, Keith.” Lance’s hesitancy, in the beginning, went unnoticed by a very enthusiastic Keith.“I will be there in a sec,” Keith says, already grabbing his jacket. “I am surprised you were able to make it on time, the weather outside is terrible.”“Keith, wait. I am not outside.”“Huh? Wait, you are not here, yet?”“No, Keith. I am not.” Lance says slowly. “I am not coming, Keith. I can’t go with you.”“Is it the weather? Damn, I didn’t think it was that bad.” Keith looks out the window again and sighs heavily. “It’s alright. Don’t worry about it, I will call and cancel the reservation.” Keith waits for Lance to reply, but all he gets back is silence.“Lance?”“It’s not the weather, Keith. It’s not the weather.” Lance says and with Keith’s initial excitement gone, he notices the slight difference in Lance’s voice. It was slightly ragged and slow.“What are you talking about, Lance?” Total confusion takes hold of Keith. “Wait, are you alright? You sound weird.”There is a slight pause before Lance replies, he sounds like he is trying not to cry. “No… No, I am not alright, Keith.”The ragged breathing, the slow talking and a Lance who sounds like he is about to cry are enough for fear and panic to trickle into Keith’s mind. “Wait, what?! What’s wrong? Where are you? What happened?!” A very worried Keith bombards Lance with questions.On the other side of the phone, Lance lays on a hospital bed with wires attached to him that keeps him connected to the machines surrounding him. Around him stood his family and friends, all the people he loves. All the people he loves, except him. Lance just could not bring himself to tell Keith the truth and hurt him, neither did he know how to face him. So, Lance selfishly decided not to tell him anything till the very last moment. He wanted Keith’s voice to be the last thing he heard. So, now he lay there with earphones plugged in and talking to the person he loves the most in the world. Lance sadly smiles as he hears Keith’s worried voice. Worried yet so comforting. Lance thinks to himself.“I am at Altea Central Hospital…” Lance did not want to lie anymore and a part of him wanted Keith to come see him. “Keith, I am sorry. I am sorry for not tell you.”“Lance don’t worry. It’s going to be fine.” Before Keith realized it, he was already inside his car driving towards Altea Central Hospital. “I will be there in a few minutes.”“You won’t make it, Keith,” Lance says sadly. “I am dying… I can literally feel myself dying… My consciousness is slowly slipping away.” From his voice, Keith knew Lance was telling the truth, suddenly he had to face a harsh reality; the man he loves is dying, and Keith is not there beside him. Suddenly, tears spill out from Keith’s eyes and Lance hears Keith’s almost silent sobbing. “Keith, please don’t cry. Not for me.”Keith wants to reply, but he knew talking would only make this worse so, he just keeps his focus on the snowy road, speeding towards the hospital.“Keith? Keith, please talk to me.” Lance pleads. “I want to hear your voice.”Keith snivels. “I am still here Lance.” More tears fall down his face, he stops fighting it and lets it all out- his voice, his emotions, all of it. “I am sorry Lance. I am so sorry. I didn’t know, I didn’t notice. I am…” He does not try to hold back his sobs.“Keith, no. Please, don’t say it like that.” Lance's heart aches when he hears Keith’s pained voice. “You didn’t know because I didn’t want you to know… You didn’t notice because I made sure of that.”“Why didn’t you… tell me?” Keith asks while trying to keep his voice steady.There is a long pause before Lance replies. “I couldn’t… I didn’t know how to say it without hurting you.” He pauses again. “I wanted you to remember me as… As the goofball, funny, cheerful and annoying Lance that you fell in love with… Not some sick, pathetic, fragile about-to-die Lance.”“Oh, Lance…” Silent tears continue to fall down Keith’s face. “No matter how sick you are… No matter how fragile you become…  As long as you are Lance McClain… As long as you are you, I will always love you. Always.” Hearing this, tears streams down Lance’s face, he thought he had dried up all his tears from all the goodbyes he had said to everyone, he didn’t think he had any energy left in him to cry. It’s because it is Keith.“Thank you, Keith… For making me happy… For giving me so much… For making my life more colourful and for giving me so many happy memories…” Lance’s breathing had become more shallow, he was talking more slowly. “But most importantly, thank you for loving me.”It takes all the strength in Keith’s body for him to control his crying and say this, “I should be the one thanking you.” Keith snivels. “I thought I had a lifetime with you to repay all the happiness you gave me…”“…You can repay me by living… Be happy, Keith… Live for me too.” They both don’t say anything for a few minutes.“I am going to… I am going to miss you.” Lance says slowly. “I will miss your voice, your face, your hands, your smile, your lips, your warmth… And even your stupid mullet.”Keith let’s out a small laugh through his crying. “Yeah… Yeah, I will miss you too, Lance. I will miss you so much.”They stay silent for a few more minutes. “Keith?”“Yeah, I am still here, Lance.”“Happy anniversary.” Lance smiles as silent tears fall down his face. “I love you, Keith… I will always love you.”“I love you too, Lance.” Just like Lance, silent tears continue to fall on Keith’s face. “Always have and always will.” A few minutes later Lance slips into a sleep he will never wake up from.“Lance? Lance…” In Keith’s heart, he knew that he will never hear Lance’s voice again.“Keith, this is Veronica.” A short pause. “He is gone. Lance is gone.” Once again, Keith loses control over his emotion and just let it all flow out.“Okay… Okay, I will be there in a fe—” Keith hears a few things, a car honking, tires screeching and glass shattering.“Keith? Keith? Are you the—” The connection is cut off, and a few minutes later he hears sirens wailing in the distance, then all he heard was silence. Dead silence. Keith couldn’t hear anything anymore, but he sees. His eyes are closed, but he sees. In his head, he sees a tall, pretty boy with smooth tanned skin, shaggy chestnut hair and a beautiful pair of deep oceanic blue eyes. The boy smiles at Keith, a smile that reaches his eyes where it leaves tiny crinkles. Lance. My Lance. Keith reaches out to touch him, but the image slowly starts to dissolve and eventually disappearing into nothingness, leaving Keith in utter darkness all by himself.A FEW HOURS LATER ON THE NEWS.In this dangerous snowstorm, Keith Kogane, 24-year-old young man was announced dead during a car accident near Altea Central Hospital. He was on his way to visit his dying boyfriend who has also passed away. There have been other reports…A FEW DAYS LATER…On a gray cloudy day, friends and family gather around two coffins in which lay two boys. In death, both boys were wearing an engagement ring. Lance was going to propose to Keith before he had found out he was sick, they had found a small blue box on Keith right after the accident. Their friend, Shiro knew just how much the two boys had wanted to be with each and had taken it upon himself to make sure they wore the rings at least in death, he knew they would have wanted that. It was also Shiro who provided a eulogy, narrating their life.Lance’s huge family just stood there and merely stared at coffins in front of them. They had shed so many tears over the past few days, they had no energy left to cry and Keith’s death had shocked them so much their spirits were entirely shattered. Next to the huge family stood Keith’s Mom and Dad who painfully watched their only son, lying still in a coffin, about to be buried. Silent tears ran down Keith’s dad as he held Keith’s mom who was barely able to stand on her own, she was crying with a painfully heavy heart.Close to the coffin, there was a picture of two happy boys, holding each other. The taller of the two had brown hair and deep blue eyes, while the slightly shorter boy had pitch black hair and a unique pair of violet eyes. Below the picture, it was written: In The Loving Memory of Lance McClain and Keith Kogane.

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Keith’s POV
I walk into the kitchen and see Shiro blankly staring at his hand. He wore a sad, soft expression on his face.“You do realize that from my point of view that is creepy, right?”“Oh, hey Keith.” He looks up, startled by my sudden appearance. “Yeah, sorry. I was just thinking…”“About Adam?”Shiro slowly nods his head. “Yeah.”“You miss him?”“Obviously, I miss him. But its more than that. Sometimes, I feel physical pain when I think about him. It’s like something is trying to put us back together.”“Maybe that’s normal,” I say shrugging slightly. “Maybe it’s a soulmate thing.”“What do you mean?”“Well, you guys are connected by the red string of fate, right?”“Right.”“Well, the string’s purpose is to draw two people together and keep them together. But you left on the Kerberos mission, and Adam never saw you again.” As I talk, I walk around the kitchen looking for something to eat. “As far as he is concerned, you might be dead… Unfortunately, between the two of you, the one granted the power to see the string is you. If Adam were the one who was able to see the string, then he would know that your still alive, but… he can’t see it.”“What are you trying to say, Keith?”I turn around and face Shiro. “I think maybe the pain your feeling is because you haven’t seen or been with Adam for over two years and now you are literally galaxies away from him.”Shiro frowns, then stares at me for a while before saying, “When did you become an expert on all this?”“Let’s just say I have been trying to find a way on ‘how to avoid having a soulmate.”“You don’t want to find your soulmate? Why?” Shiro frowns in confusion.“Having a soulmate seems troublesome, and I don’t like trouble.”“Keith, having a soulmate is a wonderful and precious thing.”“Shiro, you just literally said that having a soulmate was giving you physical pain,” I said with a straight face.“I did not phrase it like that.”“Whatever. Plus, I am not good with people. I have a feeling my soulmate is gonna regret having me as their soulmate.”“Give yourself some credit, and whether you like it or not, one day you are going to have a soulmate.” Shiro slightly smiles.I sigh heavily. “Yeah, I know.” I walk out of the kitchen, heading in the direction of my room.I have always disliked the idea of the red string of fate or rather I have always been afraid of it. Knowing that I am destined to be with someone, I haven’t met scares the crap outta me. And I don’t even know why it scares me… Okay, that’s a lie. I know the reason for it all too well, I just hate to admit it.I am scared to love, I am scared of love. Everyone and anyone I have ever loved has left me. I have always been alone, and I am used to being alone. I am used to having that big empty hole in my heart but knowing that there is someone out there who can fill that emptiness scares me because it gives me hope. But I am afraid one day that person will leave me too, that will break me, I don’t think I will be able to recover from that.“Keith!” I snap out of my thoughts and sees Allura’s face just inches away from mine. I jump back a little startled by our close proximity.“Oh, hi. Hey… I mean, what’s up, Allura?”“Are you alright?”“Um, yeah. I was just…” I sigh.“You were what?”“I was just thinking about stuff,” I say, Allura looks at me with concern. I shake my head a little at her worried expression and smiles at her reassuringly. “Allura, I am fine. Really.”“Okay, if you say so. But if you want to talk, I am always here for you.”“Yeah, I know,” I say. “Did you want something?”“No, just saw you spacing out, and wanted to make sure you were alright.”“Oh.”Allura smiles at me and walks away, probably towards the control room. Allura is everything a princess should be, she is the definition of a warrior princess. Allura is strong, courageous, smart, and above all loving. Her personality is exactly the opposite of mine which is exactly why I admire and look up to her. I mean, I don’t want to be exactly like her, but I wish I could at least keep up a decent conversation with other people.I suddenly see a tint of red on my left side, I bring my left hand close to my face. OH. MY. GOD. Holy shit, it finally happened! I stare at the red string that was attached to my pinky finger. Oh shit, oh shit! What am I gonna do?! Wait, what am I supposed to do???“Okay, Keith. First, calm down.” I say to myself, breathing in and out.“Alright, I am calm. Now, where does the string lead?” And no, I am not going crazy talking to myself. It just helps me calm down more quickly.I look towards where the string leads, honestly, I expected it to lead into outer space. You know since we are like in the middle of nowhere it had to be someone on a planet. But the string leads deeper into the Castle. My soulmate is inside the Castle, who is it? I follow the string, it turns into a corner. Wait, didn’t Allura just go through there? Is Allura my soulmate?!I could hear two people speaking from around the corner, one of the voices definitely belonged to Allura. I let out a slow breath, turning around the corner to look at two people a few distances away from me, neither of the two notices my presence. My eyes follow the red string attached to my pinky finger, expecting it to be connected with Allura’s, but it wasn’t. Allura isn’t my soulmate, my red string of fate wasn’t connected to her fingers.My eyes once again follow the string, it was connected to the tall, slender, tanned and chestnut-haired boy’s hand. Lance. Okay, it’s official people, the universe hates me. Oh god, why Lance? I mean I don’t even like him, and I am 100% sure he hates me. Why is this happening to me? Wait, is Lance gay? No way, he is always flirting with girls. In fact, he is flirting with Allura right now. Allura doesn’t look interested in the least though. He really doesn’t know when to give up, does he?“Okay, there is no way Lance is my soulmate,” I say looking at the string. “I think you made a mistake.” I feel like an idiot. Okay, maybe I am going crazy.“You know what, it’s fine.” I am still talking to the string like an idiot. “I don’t give a shit anymore. Whatever happens, happens. But there is no way I am falling in love with him. As far as I am concerned, Lance is a total idiot.”“Hey, who are you calling an idiot?” Lance suddenly appears in front of me with a confused expression; apparently, he was done taking or rather flirting with Allura. “…And are you talking to yourself?”I stare at him like I am seeing him for the first time. “Keith? You okay?”I snap out of my trance. “N-no. I-I mean yeah. I mean No. Uh…”“Which is it?”“Yes, I am fine. No, I wasn’t talking to myself.”“Right…” Lance looked totally unconvinced.“How much of what I just said did you hear?” I ask.“So, you were talking to yourself.”“Just answer my question.” I glare at himLance stares at me for a while then says, “I heard you call me an idiot, which is not a nice thing to say about your teammate.”“That’s all you heard?” I have a feeling he heard more than that.“Yeah?” Lance says with a confused expression. “Why? Is there something more?”“No, everything is just fine. Nothing you have to worry about.” I quickly start to walk away from him when suddenly a hand grabs my arm. Lance turns me around to face him, his face was way too close to mine. His deep blue eyes stare straight into mine. “Are you sure your alright?” Wait, is he worried about me? My stomach does a little flip. I quickly pull my arm out of his grasp, pushing Lance away from me rather harshly.“Don’t touch me!” I didn’t mean to snap at him. “And I am fine.”“Dude, what the hell is wrong with you?” Without saying a word, I turn around, running towards my room. I shut the door and just sit on my bed processing what just happened. Okay, so evading this red string of fate is not as easy as I thought. The good news is, Lance hasn’t changed much except for the few seconds where he looked worried for me, but that was probably my imagination anyway. The bad news is, back there I was way too conscious of Lance, and my heart was racing too damn fast. So, things are not going according to plan. Did I even have a plan, to begin with?After a few more minutes, my mind slowly starts to calm down, I can think more clearly. Okay, now I am thinking clearly, but I still can’t come up with any bright ideas for my problem. Wait, what exactly is my problem? That my red string of fate is attached to Lance, a guy that I don’t like or is it that I am actually starting to fall for him? I sat there for a few more minutes. Then I realize this was just a waste of time. “Screw this, I am gonna go train,” I say to myself, heading toward the training room.
Lance’s POV
“Hey guys, do you know what’s going on with, Keith,” I say as I make myself comfortable in the Castle’s living room. Hunk, Pidge and Shiro were all there relaxing since it was our day off.“What do you mean, Lance?” Shiro asks.“I don’t know,” I say, scratching my head. “Just now in the hallway he was talking to himself, and when I asked him if was alright, he shoved me and ran away. I mean, he was rude as hell. Even by Keith’s standards.”“What did you do to piss him off?” Pidge asks.“Nothing!” She gives me a skeptical look. “Seriously, I did nothing. He was pissed off for no reason, and he was acting super weird.” I remember the face he made right before he ran off. I have never seen such an expression on Keith. He was clearly flustered, and his face was almost as red as his lion. He was actually kinda cute... What?! No! I DO NOT think Keith is cute. I mean, he is Keith for god’s sake! He is an emo who is super annoying, and he has a mullet which looks soft and silky, and he has smooth pale skin with beautiful violet eyes… Wait, what?! No. No Lance, don’t go there. What the hell am I thinking?“Lance, are you okay, man? Hunk snaps me out of my internal confusion, looking at me with concern. “Your face is like really red right now.”“Y-yeah, I am fine.”“You sure? You are not sick or anything, right?”“Oh, he is sick alright.” Pidge interrupts Lance before he could answer. “It’s called lovesickness.”“I do not love, Keith!” I snap at her.She smirks. “Who said anything about, Keith?” I mentally facepalm myself.“Lance, I didn’t know you liked Keith.” Shiro looks at Lance surprised, but he was smiling encouragingly.“I don’t,” I say through gritted teeth, glaring at Pidge.“Yes, you do.” Pidge and Hunk say at the same time, and Shiro looks at them questioningly.“So, back when we were in the Garrison Lance had like a huge crush on Keith.” Hunk begins, I groan, sinking deeper and deeper into the couch as Hunk continues with his story. “I mean he was almost obsessed with Keith, and it was kinda creepy, you know?” Shiro raises an eyebrow in confusion.“What he means is that, even though he liked Keith, he never admitted it,” Pidge says. “And he kept saying that the reason he was so focussed on Keith was because they were rivals. Which was obviously one-sided.”Shiro chuckles, saying, “Well, the rivalry is not one-sided anymore, that much is for sure.”“Thank you, Shiro,” I say grateful for the slight change in the topic, but unfortunately Pidge and Hunk were not done with their story.“But it was really, really obvious he liked him.” Hunk continues. “And Lance eventually admits his feeling for Keith, but that was only after he left the Garrison.”“So, by then it was already too late. He was actually really happy to see Keith again. You know, when we came to save you.” Pidge adds. “But then he successfully managed to piss Keith off and thereby lowering his chances by a lot.”I sigh sadly at my own stupidity, but I can’t help but tease him. I mean, Keith makes it way too easy.“So, why don’t you tell Keith you like him?” Shiro suggests to Lance.“Oh, hell no! Keith hates me, I am definitely the last person he would wanna date.” I sigh heavily. “Plus, it doesn’t matter, does it? One day I am going to find my soulmate, and Keith is going to find his.”“That’s true,” Shiro says, his low and sad voice makes me look up to see his face. His expression suddenly turns so sad that I unconsciously walk over to him and hugs him.Shiro is as surprised by the hug as I was. “It’s alright, Shiro. We will go back to Earth, and you will be able to see Adam again.” I say to comfort him.“Thank you, Lance.” He says softly hugging me back. Soon Hunk and Pidge rushes over and embraces us both.“Yay, group hug,” Hunk says cheerfully. “We are missing a few people though.”
Keith’s POV
“Can I join you?” I stop my training session, looking up to see Lance standing at the entrance of the training room. He was watching me with a smirk plastered to his face. I had been very successful in avoiding him for the past two days, but I knew it wouldn’t last.“Exactly how long have you been standing there?”“Does it matter?”I stare at him for a few seconds before answering. “I guess not.”“So, how about it? Can I train with you?” He walks towards me and I instinctively take a step back. This does not go unnoticed by Lance, he furrows his eyebrows in confusion but thankfully does not comment on it.No, Lance, I don’t want to train with you. I am trying my best to avoid you so, please just fucking stay as far away from me as possible. “Sure, we can train together.” Oh, fuck my life!“Really?! Alright!” He says happily. “So, I was hoping you could help me with my hand to hand combat training.” Oh, this just keeps getting better and better. He just had to pick hand to hand combat, didn’t he?“Yeah sure.” I walk up to Lance, I slowly look at my left hand’s pinky finger which had the red string of fate tied around it, I follow it to Lance’s pinky finger. Yep, it's still connected, I sigh heavily. “Alright, let’s do this.”Lance immediately holds up his two hands in a defensive position, and I do the same. I wait a few minutes before swinging my right hands towards Lance, and to my surprise, he blocks my attack. But I quickly recover, swinging my feet towards his shin, knocking him towards the ground. This routine goes on for a while, Lance was not able to land a single blow on me while I was constantly able to pin his hands behind his back or knock him to the ground.“Your reflexes are too slow, Lance.” I had him pinned to the ground.“No, your reflexes are just too fast.” He says giving up.Realizing that I was literally sitting on top of Lance, I push myself away and sits on the floor. Lance turns around and suddenly sits up, bringing his face too close to mine.“Lance, personal space?” I say moving away from him.“Oh? This bothers you?” He smirks and moves his face closer to mine. Great move Keith, you just dug your own grave.“Stop!” I could feel my face heat up. “Please?” I whisper.“Ah, sorry. I just… Um…” He suddenly gets up. “I will just leave. Thank you for the training.” He quickly walks towards the exit, I could swear that I saw a red shade slowly filling his face as he walked away from me.
Lance’s POV
Holy shit! What was that?! I just wanted to tease him, but damn his expression was so freaking cute. It caught me off guard, I didn’t know Keith was capable of making such a face. I was so close to pushing him down, if I stayed there any longer probably would have, I don’t have much trust in my self-control, not to mention it was Keith. My face heats up once again remembering Keith’s expression when I had moved closer to him in the training room, I want to see more of that expression. I think I like Keith more than I thought I did…Ever since we left Earth and got together as a team, I have been holding back all my feelings for Keith, I was doing a pretty good job. I mean I have been able to work with him as teammates without any problem, we have even become friends. Okay, we fight a lot, but that’s not the point. Everything has been normal up until the last few days. But Keith has seriously been acting weird for the past few days, I feel like he is purposely avoiding me, but that could be my imagination. I mean, he likes to spend most of his time alone but still I feel like he is distancing himself from me. Today, I half expected him to refuse training with me, but he didn’t. So, I guess maybe it is my imagination after all. But what was that at the end? Why did he suddenly make a face like that?
Keith’s POV
After training with Lance, I knew my emotions were going out of control. It was becoming harder to avoid Lance these past few days, and when I do see him, I can’t even properly look him in the eyes, and I definitely don’t trust myself to speak normally without stuttering. So, since I had no idea what to do with this situation, I decided to talk to Shiro.I walk into the Black Lion’s hanger and see Shiro sitting in front of his Lion trying to communicate with it. His eyes were closed, I could tell he was concentrating really hard. I wait for about half an hour before Shiro finally opens his eyes and notices me.“Oh hey, Keith.”“Hey, can I talk to you for a bit?” Concern suddenly fills his eyes, he walks over to sit next to me.“What’s wrong?”“It’s about the red string of fate,” I say slowly, turning to see Shiro staring at me with his eyes wide open. “What?”“Are you able to see your red string?” Shiro says with a surprised yet happy voice.I chuckle nervously. “No way. What gave you that idea?”“Keith, you are literally staring at your pinky finger.” Shiro deadpans.“Okay, fine. I can see it.” I sigh. It was no use lying to Shiro, he will see right through me.Shiro smirks. “Well, who is it?”I stare at him for a while not revealing any expression. “Shiro, we are literally in the middle of nowhere. My soulmate could be on any planet out there.”“So, it’s not anyone in the Castle?”I ignore his question and says, “Before we get to the who part of this problem, I want to know some facts.”“This is a problem to you. Why?”“Please, just answer my questions.”Shiro sighs heavily, resting his head on the wall behind him. “Alright, shoot.”“How does the whole red string of fate work,” I ask. “I mean, does it just randomly choose a partner or is it some other method.”“I thought you were an expert at this.” Shiro looks at me confused. “A few days ago, you seemed to know everything about it.”“No, those were just my speculations. I only read a few books on them, none of them prepared me for what I am experiencing now.”“And what exactly are you experiencing?” Shiro asks curiously.“Shock, trauma, disbelief, and more shock,” I say. “I want to know how the red string of fate chooses the two partners. Is it random or not?”Shiro looks at me, something about his smile tells me he knows something I don’t. “Well, I can tell you for a fact that the string does not choose the partners randomly.” Shiro starts to say. “The string’s purpose is to help people to fall in love not force people to fall in love.”“What do you mean?” I ask, confused.“Like in my case, even before we were connected by the red string of fate, I liked Adam, but I guess I was too dumb to realize it.” He laughs at his own obliviousness. “So, the string helped me realize my feelings for Adam by connecting us.”Wait, wait, WAIT! Is he saying I had feelings for Lance all along, and I was just too dumb to realize it?! No freaking way!! There is no way that is true. How could that be possible? I mean he is an idiot annoying as hell, all he does is try to get on my nerves. Why the hell would I like a guy like that? Okay, he is attractive with his tanned skin, soft chestnut hair and beautiful blue eyes… Oh god, did I actually just say that?!? Damn it!“Wait, did Adam have the same feelings as you did? I mean, did he also like you back before the string connected?”Shiro thinks for a moment. “Honestly, I don’t know. Though, he was reluctant to date me in the beginning.” I raise my eyebrows questioningly. “He didn’t believe me when I said our strings were connected. I mean, we were friends for a long time, but I guess he thought I was just messing around.” He chuckles at the memory. “But after our first kiss, he believed me.”“Huh?”“He said that he just knew I was telling the truth.” Shiro pauses for a moment. “He said when I kissed him, it just felt right.”I look at him in confusion.“Yeah, it doesn’t make any sense to me either,” Shiro admits.“Oh.”“But Keith, your soulmate can’t be just anyone out there.” Shiro looks him straight in the eye. “It must be someone you know, someone you have a strong bond to.” I could feel my face slightly start to heat up, Shiro smiles knowingly. “You already know who it is, don’t you?” I ask him with a straight faceHe shrugs. “Maybe and maybe not” He definitely knows.I sigh. “Why him?” I ask genuinely, turning to look at Shiro. He looks at me for a while, he finally lets out the laughter that he has probably been holding back for a while now. “It’s not funny.” But I was smiling too“I am sorry, Keith.” He finally stops laughing. “It’s just that you really seem to be upset by the idea of Lance being your soulmate.”“That’s because I am upset by the idea. I mean, seriously of all the people, why him?”“Why not him?” Shiro says smiling. “Do you hate him?”“Obviously, I don’t hate him.” I look at my left hand. “But he hates me. I don’t even know why.” I whisper the last part sadly.“I am sure that is not true,” Shiro says, smiling again as if he knows something I don’t.“Yeah right,” I say sarcastically. “Trust me, I am literally the last person he would wanna date.”Shiro snickers then sigh. “Wow, I wonder if me and Adam were this stupid. No, actually I think we were worse.”“Are you calling me stupid?”Shiro turns around, puts his hands on my shoulders. “Yes, Keith, you are very, very stupid. And Lance, too. You are both stupid, and oblivious idiots.” Shiro pauses. “Why am I always surrounded by idiots?”“Shiro, you are really starting to sound like Pidge. Are you alright?” I make a dramatically concerned expression.Shiro pauses for a moment. “Oh god, I do sound like Pidge.”We both look at each other before bursting out in laughter. Neither of us knew why we were laughing so hard, but we didn’t care. A few moments later, the two of us just sit there with our backs against the wall in comfortable and peaceful silence.“It’s been a while since we talked like this.” Shiro breaks the silence, there was a soft yet happy smile on his face.“Yeah.” I smile remembering all our old memories together. “I am glad to have you here, Shiro.”“Yeah, you too. I am glad you are here, Keith.”  Shiro says softly. “And Keith?”“Yeah?”“You should probably tell Lance the truth.” Shiro looks at me seriously. “I mean, you have to eventually.”“I know.” I sigh heavily. “I just need a little more time to process this.”“Okay.” After that, we go back to just sitting there in peaceful and comfortable silence, during which I think about how to confess this whole situation to my so-called soulmate. I wonder how he will react? Will he even believe me? Probably not… Oh man, this is going to be a hard thing to do.
Lance POV
Okay, Keith’s definitely been acting weird these past few days, he doesn’t look at me, doesn’t talk to me, and it is really starting to bother me. Oh god, does he hate me now? What the hell did I do to piss him off this time? I mean, I don’t remember doing or saying anything out of the ordinary… Well, except in the training room the other day, that was a little different, but it wasn’t… Oh my god, what the hell is going on?!?Yeah, I have been pondering on this issue for the past few days, but I can’t seem to find any valid reason as to why Keith would want to avoid me. This was starting to upset so much, so I decided to do something out of the ordinary. I decided to train. I couldn’t find anything else to help me take my mind off this problem, and despite my skepticism in the beginning, training was actually helping me clear my mind and focus on other things. This is good, this is very good, I am getting some training done while also avoiding worrying about Keith and his unpredictable actions.A bot appears right in front of me, I quickly kick it right in the chest which sends it flying towards the floor, I take the opportunity to shoot it right in the head, and the floor swallows up the defeated bot. I turn around to see three more bots appear behind me, running towards me at full speed. They were right in my range of shooting, I fire three shots, and within a few seconds, the bots disappear into the floor below.“End training sequence.”“Wha-?!” I turn around to see the main source of all my problems right now, standing at the entrance of the training room. I sigh heavily before turning to face him, he was looking everywhere but at me. “What do you want, Keith?”He hesitates for a few moments before finally looking up to meet my eyes. “I- I want to talk to you… About something…”I pause and study him for a while. “Does this have anything to do with why you have been avoiding me for the past few days?”“Maybe.” He mumbles.I wait for him to continue, but he doesn’t. “Um, so what is it?”Once again, he looks up at me, looking very conflicted. He looks like he is in physical pain. “Keith, what’s wrong?”“Actually, this was a bad idea.” He starts to walk away. My body moves without my permission, my right-hand latches onto his arm. Some part of me did not want to let him go, something told me not to let him walk through that door.“Keith, wait!” When I grabbed his arm, I had pulled him closer to me, I could practically see the light reflecting in his violet eyes. “Why are you avoiding me? If I did something wrong, I will apologize.”Keith’s eyes slightly widened in surprise, probably because I just said I will apologize to him, which is something I usually will never say to Keith. Did saying that hurt my pride? Yes, it did. Do I regret it? No, I don’t because honestly, Keith avoiding me hurts me more, especially when I do not know why he is doing it so, I am totally fine with this.“No, you didn’t do anything wrong.” Keith avoids looking at me again, and it hurts. “It’s not your fault.”“Keith, please stop this.” My voice is low and painful. “It hurts.” I didn’t mean to say that last part out loud.“What?” Keith looks shocked. “What did you just say?”I stay silent. Now, I was the one not looking at him, suddenly very interested in the white floor. I see Keith’s hand reaching out to touch me, so I take a step back, though I have no idea why I do that…“Lance, what did you just say?” Keith repeats more firmly.“It hurts,” I whisper so quietly I barely heard it myself.“What?”“I SAID IT HURTS!” I shout, and all hell breaks loose. “IT HURTS WHEN YOU ARE AVOIDING ME FOR NO GOOD REASON!!!! IT HURTS WHEN YOU ARE NOT TALKING TO ME!!!! IT HURTS WHEN YOU ARE NOT LOOKING AT ME!!!… I want you to look at me.” I say the last part softly, I may or may not have been on the verge of tears.Keith just stood there, his expression was varying from shock to surprise to confusion. “Wha-? Why… W-what are you trying to say?” His voice was slow and unsure, but my voice was strong and sure as I spoke the next few words.“I am saying, I love you, idiot,” I say aloud, without any hesitation. His eyes widen as my words slowly sink into his brain. “It’s fine you don’t have to say anything. I know you don’t like me, but I just wanted to get this off my chest an—”“We are soulmates!” I look up to see Keith covering his mouth with both his hands, his eyes blown wider than before if that’s even possible.“What?” I walk closer to him, probably closer than necessary, but I didn’t care anymore. “What did you just say?”He slowly lowers his hands from his mouth, looks at the ground for a few minutes and then sighs. “We are soulmates. I can… I can see the red string of fate.” He looks up, straight into my eyes, he wore a slightly guilty expression. “My string is attached to your finger… I found out a few days ago, and I didn’t know how to act around you so… I have been avoiding.”I stare at him blankly for what seemed like hours but was actually only a few minutes. “Keith, if you don’t like me, you can just reject me normally. You don’t need to go so far as to make up a lie like that.”“What?!! No! I am telling the truth!” Suddenly all the softness from before is gone, and Keith was back to acting like his hot-headed self. “And why the hell would I reject you by telling you I am your soulmate?? That doesn’t make any sense.”“I don’t know, Keith! Maybe, out of pity.” There is no way Keith is my soulmate, that is too good to be true.“Why the hell would I pity you?” Keith snaps back.“I. Don’t. Know. But there is no way the guy I had a crush on for four years is suddenly my soulmate. That’s ridiculous!” I throw both my hands up in frustration.“Wait, what? You liked me since the Garrison?” Keith’s expression was something in between surprised and… impressed?“Not the point, Keith. You are just making things up an—”I was shut up by soft lips touching mine, time froze, and everything around us stilled. My hands automatically go to wrap around Keith’s waist, pulling him closer and melting into the kiss. Keith brings both his arms to wrap around my neck, his fingers sliding into my hair. I couldn’t feel anything except the softness of his lips on mine. I notice, how perfectly his tiny waist fit into my arms.Everything feels so far away, we are not in the training room anymore, we are in our own little space, it’s just me and Keith, nothing else matters. At that moment, everything seems so perfect and just right. My emotions are overflowing, my heart feels heavy. All I feel is Keith. All I want is Keith. All I need is Keith. I can stand here forever just kissing him, and I wouldn’t complain. Our lips fit well together moving in perfect sync with each other, it is as if I was born to kiss Keith and Keith only.Unfortunately, we are humans and needs oxygen to breathe so, I reluctantly separate my lips from his, but keeps our foreheads attached“So, you are my soulmate, huh?” I ask despite knowing to be true after that kiss.“I wasn’t sure that was gonna work.” The beautiful smile on Keith’s face was doing weird things to my heart and stomach, and I think it will be the death of me, but I am surprisingly okay with that. I tightly pull him into a hug, he seems shocked by the action, but quickly returns the embrace, it was soft and genuine.“I am sorry I didn’t believe you before.”“It’s alright. I wouldn’t have believed me either.” For a while we stand there in a comfortable silence just holding each other, it feels nice and peaceful.“Lance?” His voice is quiet as if he is trying not to break the comfortable atmosphere around us.“Hmm?”“You probably already realized this, but I feel like I should say it out loud.” He pulls back from the hug to look me straight in the eye, I would have gotten lost in his violet eyes if it wasn’t for the words he said next. “I love you, Lance.”I could feel the smile creeping up on my face. “I love you too, Mullet.” Once again, our lips clash in a deep passionate kiss, stronger than the one before.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The Castle of Lions had landed on a planet called Nircard, the Nircardians had sent out a signal asking for help. Nircad was a small, peaceful planet, hidden in between large asteroids, usually no one would be able to find it unless they were really looking for it. But the Galra had managed to find it and like always, they had invaded the planet by shooting lasers down on its citizen and disrupting the peace of the planet. When Voltron arrived, they saw destruction everywhere. Houses were slowly being burnt down by fires, cries of pain could be heard now and then. The Galra roamed the planet inspecting their new Nircardian slaves.Voltron immediately faced off with the Galra forces, fighting hard to drive out the Galran army, it was a tough fight. The Galra seemed to have a limitless number of soldiers and fighter drones, so the fight seemed to drag on for what felt like forever. But eventually, Voltron was able to defeat the Galra, sending them out of Nircard.After the battle, Allura goes to speak with the leader of the planet in hopes they will join the Voltron Coalition. The Paladins had the rest of the day to themselves, most of them decides to go to rest, except Keith. Despite the hard battle he had to endure, Keith was not tired at all. So, he goes to explore the planet until it was time for them to take off again. He walks around and sees that rebuilding efforts had already begun. He notices people all around him fixing roofs, bringing water to the workers. There were stations all around him where food was being served for the citizens. Despite being a peaceful planet, these people were well prepared for war, and Keith found that impressive.Keith walks deeper into the planet; this planet was different. Well, to be fair every planet they went to was different, but this planet for some reason reminded Keith of the phrase, ‘it was all rainbows and unicorns.” Everything around him was colourful, leaves on every tree had a varying degree of bright colours, the sky above him was literally a rainbow coloured sky, and he was walking on what looked like clouds, he couldn’t even properly see his feet.As he continued to walk, more and more trees start appearing around him, he was walking through what he assumed to be a forest. Suddenly, he feels a stinging pain on his right arm, he looks down to see a small orange bug with white dots sitting on his arm, he quickly swats it away. There was a little red dot on his arm left by the bug, it hurt more than your average bug bite, but it was nothing Keith couldn’t handle. He decides that he has explored enough for one day and he walks back to the Castle suddenly very tired. Once he reached the Castle he goes straight to his room. After changing out of his armour and clothes, he slumps onto his bed, slipping into a dreamless sleep.“Keith! Keith, how long do you plan on sleeping?” Keith shifts in his bed, slowly opening his eyelids. Someone was banging very loudly on his door. “It’s already afternoon! You missed breakfast!”Keith groggily walks over to the door, opening it. “What do you want, Lance?” Keith’s voice sounded very tired.Lance was about to continue his lecture, but freezes as soon as his eyes lands on Keith. He just blankly stares at Keith before his expression turns into shock. “Ahhhhhhhh” Lance screams, scrambling back.“Wha-?!! What’s wrong?!” Keith was suddenly very awake and alert. Lance on the other hand, just continues to stare at him in shock. “Why are you looking at me like that?”“Wh-What happened t-to your hair… and eyes?” Lance raises a shaky finger pointing towards Keith.“What do you mean?” Now Keith was confused. Lance walks over to Keith, slowly poking at his hair. “Lance, what are you doing?”“Okay, come with me.” He looks at Keith, then grabs his hand pulling him towards the washroom inside the room. “Look,” Lance says pointing at the mirror in front of them, Keith obliges. The person looking back at him had pale skin, but instead of black hair he had blue hair, and his eyes had somehow gone from being violet to a bright red. Keith’s expression changes from confusion, to surprise to finally utter shock and disbelief. “AHHHHHHH!!!!” Keith screams pulling at his blue hair. “WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO ME!!? WHO DID THIS?!!”“Keith, calm down.” Lance tries unsuccessfully. “We will figure thi—”“Lance, I swear to god, if you did this.”“I didn’t do this!” Lance exclaims. “Why the quiznack would I turn your mullet blue?!! And your eyes red!!”“I don’t kno—”“Okay, what’s going on?” Shiro’s voice came from the entrance of the room.“We heard screaming.” This time it was Allura.Keith gives Lance one strong glare that sends shivers down Lance’s spine before walking out of the washroom.“Okay, whoever did this step up right now or I swear…” Keith’s anger was rising more and more by the second.Everyone in the room stops to stare at Keith, expression varying from shock to surprise to amusement. Allura and Pidge just looked amused while Shiro and Hunk looked shocked and surprised.“Keith, your hair… and eyes…” Shiro starts.“I know,” Keith says. “Now, who did this?” Everyone turns to look at the tall, tanned figure standing behind Keith.“Why do you guys just assume I did this?” Lance asks defensively.“No one else deliberately tries to get on Keith’s nerves.” Pidge deadpans.“Well, it wasn’t me.” None of them looked convinced.“I believe him,” Keith says out of nowhere.“You do?” Lance looks at Keith thoroughly surprised.“It wasn’t Lance.” Now that Keith had calmed down a little more, he was able to think more clearly. Lance’s reaction when he saw Keith was way too authentic for him to be the culprit.“Do you sleepwalk?” Hunk asks. “Maybe you did it in your sleep.”Keith sighs heavily. “Hunk, I do not sleepwalk.” Keith was suddenly feeling very tired and dizzy.“Pidge, any theories?” Shiro asks hopefully, but before she could answer Keith starts to fall, Lance rushes in and catches the small boy in his arms before he could hit the floor.“Keith, are you alright?” Lance asks with worried eyes, Keith sees the same emotion reflected in all his teammates’ eyes.“Y-yeah. I-I am fine.” Keith tries to stand up only to fall right back into Lance’s strong arms. Keith suddenly felt very weak, his eyes slowly shut close.“He is really cold,” Lance whispers holding Keith’s hands.“Bring him into my lab,” Pidge says.Lance carries Keith to Pidge’s Lab, placing him on the table. Everyone else waits around impatiently worrying about their friend while Pidge works on figuring out what was wrong with him. After a few minutes she calls them back into her lab, everyone lets out a small sigh of relief when they see Keith sitting on the table.“Pidge, did you figure out what’s wrong with Keith?” Allura asks.“I have good news and bad news,” Pidge says. “The good news is that Keith is not in any kind of imminent danger, he is not gonna die or anything. The bad news is that his body is slowly getting weaker and weaker. Eventually, he will be unable to walk and will be permanently paralyzed.” An intense silence fills the room where everyone just stares at Keith.“How did this happen?” Lance asks.“That’s just it. I know what’s wrong with him, but…” Pidge turns to look at her computer. “I don’t know what caused it.” Pidge studies Keith for a while. “So, your hair and eyes just suddenly changed colour?” She asks seriously.Keith nods in reply.“Did you wander around the last planet we were on?”“Yeah?” Keith replies.“Is there a cure?” Hunk asks.Pidge shrugs slightly. “If I knew the cause, I could probably make a cure, but the cause of this could be anything on that planet. Weird flowers, fruits, plants, maybe bugs, even the water can--”“Wait, bugs?” Keith asks.“Yeah, bugs could cause a number of illness.” She says looking at Keith.“Keith, do you remember something?” Allura asks with concern filled eyes.Keith frowns slightly. “When I was walking around the forest, a small bug bit me. I didn’t think much about it but…”“Do you remember what the bug looked like?” Keith nods his head. “Then maybe, Pidge can make you a cure?”“Of course. I mean, I can try to.” Pidge says, with the slight notion of hope the heaviness in the air dissipates. “Keith, can you describe what the bug looked like?”“Uh, it was small and orange and… it had white dots on it.” Keith explains.Pidge turns around and starts typing on her computer. “Is this the one?” She asks a few minutes later.Keith looks at the screen to see a picture pulled up. “Yeah… That’s the one.”Pidge quickly reads through the information on her screen. She seems to be very amused and surprised by the information, a smirk slowly starts creeping its way up on her face.“So, can you make the cure?” Lance asks impatiently.“Oh yeah, there is a cure.” She turns around to look Keith straight in the eye, smiling widely at him, there was a mischievous tint in her eyes.“What?” Keith asks, the look she was giving him was making him very uncomfortable.“Oh, it's just the information in there was very interesting.” She says smugly.“What does it say?” Lance asks, but Pidge just continues to look at Keith.“Pidge?” Shiro asks, Pidge turns her eyes away from Keith to look at the rest of the team.“Keith’s illness is called Leaticas, it’s pretty common among Nircardians. It’s kinda like malaria.” Pidge explains. “We can buy the cure or rather the medicine for it from the space mall. He should be back to normal after one dose.”“Okay, that’s good,” Allura says happily.“And the changes in his hair and eye colour is related to this?” Shiro asks.“Yeah, those are the symptoms of the illness,” Pidge says smirking. “It’s quite interesting actually.”“And why is that?” Allura asks curiously.“Well, the symptoms are connected to the victim’s emotions and feelings.” Pidge states. She looks directly at Keith when she says the last word, Keith’s eyes widen as realization sinks in. “Keith’s new hair colour and eye colour represents his true feelings.”“What do you mean, Pidge?” Hunk asks in confusion.“According to my computer, once the victim is bitten the colour of their eye will turn into the colour, they associate most with themselves,” Pidge explains, enjoying this situation way more than she should.“Okay, then it makes sense why it’s red,” Shiro says. “I mean, he is the Red Paladin and pilots the Red Lion.”“So, what about his hair?” Lance asks, looking at Keith’s hair that matches his own eye colour. “Why blue?”At Lance’s question, Keith’s face slowly turns into the colour of his Lion. Keith knew the reason why his hair was blue. He wasn’t an idiot, Keith knew he had strong feelings for Lance, but he was trying his best to ignore those feelings because clearly, the other boy didn’t feel the same way.“So, Keith, are you gonna tell him, or should I?” Pidge asks Keith. He just glares at her smug face.“Tell me what?” Lance looks between Keith and Pidge, slowly realizing something. “Oh, let me guess, the hair colour represents the colour you associate with the person you hate the most.”Keith doesn’t say anything, he just stares at the ground. Pidge, on the other hand, turns to look at Lance, the mischievous smirk never leaving her face.“Actually, it’s the opposite.” She says to Lance.“Opposite?” Lance asks confused, he wasn’t the only. Everyone other than Keith and Pidge was in a state of confusion.“The hair colour represents the colour he associates with someone he loves,” Pidge reveals. “Or as my computer puts it,” She makes air quotations with her finger. “the hair colour represents the colour the victim associate most with someone they hold strong feelings of affection towards.” Now, under normal circumstances, Keith would have jumped in and stopped Pidge from revealing anything, but he was too tired to move on his own.“It’s blue. So, there is the Blue Lion.” Hunk says counting blue associated things off on his fingers. “And Lance, the Blue Paladin.”“Hunk, I am pretty sure Keith is not in love with the Blue Lion,” Pidge says sarcastically.“Yeah, that would be really weird.” Hunk agrees.Suddenly all eyes were Lance, expecting him to say something or do something, but he just stood there staring at Keith who was an impossible shade of red. Lance was slowly processing this new information, he runs the conversation they just had in his mind over and over again, but no matter how many times he ran it over in his head, he always came up with the same conclusion; Keith was in love with him. This fact struck Lance like lightning, and he had no idea what to do with this new information.He turns to look at Shiro who seemed as surprised at the turn of events as he was. Allura for some reason was smiling at Lance. Hunk was nervously looking between Keith and Lance like he was expecting some fight to break out between them. Pidge was just enjoying this whole situation to her heart’s content. And Lance? Lance just doesn’t know what to do? What do people do when they suddenly find out that their teammate and rival is in love with them? So, he just looks at Keith and asks him the obvious.“Keith, you love me?”There were a few minutes of silence before Keith whispers out an answer. “Yeah.”“Thank you??”“…You are welcome.” Keith could not handle the awkward atmosphere anymore. “Hunk can you please help me get to my room? I feel really tired.”“Uh, yeah. Sure.” Hunk quickly comes over to him, he puts Keith on his back and walks out of the lab.“Okay… I am going to go to the space mall to buy Keith’s medicine.” Shiro says walking out of the room.“I am gonna see if Coran needs any help in the control room,” Allura says following right after Shiro.It was just Lance and Pidge inside the lab, after a few minutes of silence she breaks it. “Really? ‘thank you’? That’s all you could come up with.”“What else was I supposed to say?!” Lance exclaims.“I don’t know,” Pidge says turning back to her computer. “But I thought you would be better at handling a confession.”“Not when it's from my rival!”“Okay, whatever,” Pidge says. “Now, leave. I have work to do.” And to Pidge’s surprise, Lance actually leaves the lab without making a single remark.For the next few days, Lance pondered on what to do about Keith’s feelings for him. At first, he just simply tried to ignore, but that wasn’t going so well, he constantly found himself avoiding Keith (little did he know, Keith was trying to avoid him, too), and that wasn’t good for the team so, he knew he had to do something about it. At the very least, he has to give Keith a proper reply to his confession, the problem was Lance didn’t have a proper answer to give Keith. He didn’t know whether he wanted to reject his confession or accept it. Of course, in the beginning, he was all for rejecting Keith because that seemed like the obvious answer, but now that he had more time to think about it, he didn’t exactly mind Keith’s confession, maybe he even liked it a little.The whole situation was making Lance feel very conflicted, but eventually, he finally makes up his mind and decides to talk to Keith. So, here he was standing in front of Keith’s room staring at his door. He didn’t know why he was so nervous, but he was. He finally gathers up the courage to knock on the door, it slides open after a few seconds. Keith’s eyes widen in surprise as they land upon Lance’s face.“Um, can I come in?” Lance asks nervously.“…Why?”“Because I want to talk to you?” Lance was starting to think this was a bad idea.Keith studies Lance’s face for a few minutes. “Okay…” He let him in but was very, very hesitant about it.There were a few minutes of awkward silence before Lance says, “I see your hair and eyes are back to their original colours.”“Yeah, Shiro gave me the medicine.”“Good. That’s good.” This bad. This is really, bad! Lance was screaming in his head; their conversation was so awkward it was driving him nuts.“Lance, why did you come here?” When Lance doesn’t reply Keith sighs heavily. “Look, you don’t have to worry about the whole me liking you thing. You were never supposed to find that out, I was never gonna tell you. So, just forget about it.”“Keith, I don’t like you.” Lance blurts out. Ouch. Okay, that hurt Keith’s heart more than he thought it would, somewhere in his mind he was hoping Lance would return his feelings.“I know, Lance.” Keith’s face falls visibly. “I know. I am your rival, right?”“No! That’s not what meant. I mean, I don’t like you, yet.” Lance starts rambling. “I mean, yeah… You are my rival and also my teammate. So, you know, I never thought about you that way… But then you said you liked me, and I was super confused because I didn’t know rivals could like each other and I didn’t know what to do an—”“Lance, what are you trying to say?” Keith asks.“Not far from here there is a planet, it looks a lot like Earth,” Lance says. “It also has a beautiful sunset, you said you liked sunsets, right?”“Yeah?” Keith was actually surprised that Lance remembered that.“So, I wanted to go visit this planet. So… do you maybe wanna come with me?” Lance asks nervously, there was a tint of red on his face.“Lance, are you asking me out on a date?” Keith asks genuinely confused by the sudden turn of events.Lance sighs heavily, sagging his shoulders. “Yes, Keith, I am asking you out on a date.”Keith looks at Lance in disbelief, then his pale face turns so red it looked like it was on fire. “Cute,” Lance says unconsciously, immediately bringing both his hands towards his mouth. “I didn’t mean that!... I mean I did, but…”“Okay,” Keith says his beating at a rate he thought was impossible.“What?”“The date,” Keith says. “I will go with you.”“Oh, right! The date!” Lance didn’t realize he was holding his breath so, he lets out. “Okay, that’s great…”Another minute of silence passes but this time it wasn’t awkward, it was just… well, silent. Lance studies Keith, his pale face was still a bright shade of red, but it was slowly fading. Keith’s violet eyes were nervously looking at Lance, expecting him to say something. The more Lance looked at the black-haired boy, the more he realized how beautiful Keith actually was.“Do you wanna go now?” Lance asks out of nowhere.“What?! Right now?!”“Yeah. Well, I have nothing better to do.” Lance says. “But if you don’t want t—”“No, it’s fine,” Keith says quickly. “We can go now.”“Great! We will take my Lion.” Lance gives Keith a small smile. “I will meet you in the hanger in 20 minutes.”“Okay,” Keith replies as Lance walks out of the room.Exactly 20 minutes later the two excited boys arrive in the Blue Lion’s hanger, they quickly get into the Blue Lion in silence. The ride to the planet was a quiet one, but there was no sense of awkwardness between the Red Paladin and Blue Paladin. The silence inside the Blue Lion actually felt quite nice, it was calm and peaceful.They finally get to the planet, and like Lance had said, it looked a lot like earth. In fact, if Keith didn’t know any better, he would say they were back home, the forest was a lush green colour, circling it was blue water. Lance lands his Lion in an open area in the center of the planet.“Come on,” Lance says when Keith doesn’t move from his position.“Um, the last time I was on a planet, my hair literally turned blue, and my eyes turned red.” Keith hesitates. “Are you sure this planet is safe?”Lance chuckles. “It’s fine. I asked Pidge to analyze the planet, and she said we should be fine as long as we don’t eat anything from here.”“Oh.”“Now, are you coming or what?” Lance asks holding out his right hand towards him, Keith nods happily putting his hand into Lance’s open one.Together they walk around the planet for a few hours, both boys had expected their date to be very awkward, but surprisingly it was going very smoothly. As they walk, they tell each other things they didn’t know about each other before. Lance talks about his family, home country, how and why he got into the Garrison. To Lance’s surprise, Keith actually opens up to him telling about his past. He talks about how he never knew his mom, how he became an orphan after his father died in a fire trying to save him from it, and he talks about how Shiro practically dragged his ass to the Garrison forcing him to join. Keith complains a lot about Shiro, but Lance could tell from the way he talked about him, Keith was very grateful to have Shiro in his life.Probably for the first time in his entire life Lance wasn’t the one doing the talking but just listening. He continued to listen as Keith’s voice echoed through the forest as he told stories from his past. Lance wasn’t just listening though, he was also closely watching the shorter boy. He noticed the more Keith talked, the more hand gestures came into his narration, his hands sometimes went up into the air as if to display his past self’s frustration. He watched Keith’s each movement studying them, like how Keith looked towards the ground when he was talking about something sad, the way he paused to think when he forgot a particular part of the story, the scowl that appeared on his face (that Lance is all too familiar with) when he talked about something that angered or upset him, and of most importantly the smile that appeared on his face when talked about something happy. The smile that slowly crept up on his lips lighting up his whole face, adding brightness to his eyes and Lance was having a hard time controlling his heart when Keith smiled. He was starting to see a part of Keith he had never seen before, and he was loving every second of it.“Um, sorry. Am I boring you?” Keith asks a little awkwardly.“What? Oh, no way. It’s nice hearing you talk.” Lance says smiling softly. “I like it when you talk, I like hearing your voice.”Keith looked a little shocked. “Um, thanks.”Lance simply squeezes his hand in reply making Keith’s face go red. He had forgotten they were still holding hands, hell he had forgotten they were on a date. When he is with Lance, everything seems so natural, safe and normal. He feels like he can always be himself around Lance without being judged by him.“Let’s go back,” Lance says. “It’s almost time for the sunset.”They walk back together hand in hand to the Blue Lion, quickly climbing onto the top of it. They make themselves comfortable there, sitting side by side facing the sunset.“It’s beautiful,” Keith says (because you know, you have to always say the sunset is beautiful when you are watching a sunset.)“Yeah…” Lance replies. “Hey Keith, can I ask you something?”“Sure.”“Have you ever been in a relationship before?” Lance asks looking at the sunset.Keith is surprised by the question but answers honestly. “No. Not really… I have never really liked anyone before.”Lance can’t help but smile a little. “But you have been on a date before, right?”“Not really.” Keith mumbles.Now that got Lance’s attention. “Wait, what? Are you serious?”Keith nods slightly confused because why would anyone want to go out with someone as anti-social as Keith? Lance on the other was staring at the pretty boy in front of him, having a hard time believing someone as hot as Keith has never been on a first date.“But you have been to a prom or a dance with someone, right?” Lance asks.“No. I don’t really like dancing.” Keith replies looking back at the now darkening sky.“WHAT?!!” Keith jumps back a little in surprise. “Keith, don’t say that! Dancing is awesome, it’s an art Keith.”Now Keith was looking at Lance in amusement, the boy seemed genuinely upset. “Well, I can’t like dancing if I don’t know how to dance.”Lance thinks for a few minutes, he doesn’t say anything so, Keith thinks he had dropped the subject, but suddenly he gets up.“Come with me,” Lance says pulling Keith back up to his feet, together they find their way down to the ground. “Wait, here.” Lance runs back into his Lion, grabbing a music player he makes his way back to Keith.“Oh, come on.” Keith groans. “Don’t tell me…”“Yep, we are gonna dance,” Lance says happily. He scrolls through the different playlist, finally finding the one he wanted. The music starts, it was not a song just piano keys playing a sweet melody. Lance walks up to Keith, standing right in front of him.“Lance, I don’t know how to dance. I have never danced in my life before.” Keith says looking a little uncomfortable.“Don’t worry, I will help you. Just follow my lead.” Lance says sweetly in a comforting voice.Lance takes Keith’s right-hand places it on his shoulder, taking Keith’s other hand into his own right hand raising them in the air, his free hand goes to rest on Keith’s hip. Together they start to sway together, Keith has trouble in the beginning but quickly learns Lance’s pace, following his lead. Keith slowly starts to enjoy the dance, he loved the vibrant yet soft atmosphere it created. Keith was living in the moment, trying to memorize every detail of it, the sky above them dotted with stars, the music, the dance, the feel of Lance’s hand in his and the way Lance’s blue eyes looked into his violet ones. To Keith, all of what was happening seemed like a dream come true.“Hey, Keith?” His voice was quiet.“Yeah?”“How did you like, today?”Keith smiles. “I really enjoyed it, Lance.” Lance's face lights up at the answer.“Really?”“Yeah,” Keith says. “So, thank you.”“Keith, I also had a lot of fun being with you today,” Lance says. “What I mean is, I really like being with you, talking to you, and hearing your voice and… dancing with you.” Lance would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little nervous.Keith observes Lance carefully. “Me too… I also like spending time with you.”There were a few minutes of silence before Lance says softly, “Keith, I know my feelings have nowhere near caught up to yours. But I wanna try. I want to give us a shot, you and me.” After taking a deep breath, Lance looks straight into Keith’s eyes “So, Keith Kogane, will you be my boyfriend?”Keith’s heart was soaring, happiness overflowing from it. Keith smiles, a smile so big and bright it was making Lance dizzy. “I would love to,” Keith says, his voice somehow sounding playful and genuine at the same time.Lance gently crashes his lips onto Keith’s as soon as those words leave his mouth. Lance puts his arms around Keith’s waist pulling him slightly closer while Keith’s hands go around Lance’s neck. The kiss is soft and slow, their lips just getting to know each, but it is sweet all the same. Lance slowly dips their bodies to the side, he separates their mouths holding Keith’s body with one hand from falling onto the ground, he throws his other hand up in the air in a final dance pose.“Ta-dah!” Lance exclaims.Keith chuckles at his silliness, Lance brings Keith back up, smiling proudly at his own childishness.“How did I fall in love with you?” Keith asks shaking his head.“I don’t know, you tell me.” Lance pulls Keith into another kiss, a few seconds later Keith slightly pulls back to look at Lance who was smirking.“That could be one reason,” Keith says, putting his lips back on Lance’sLance thought Keith was talking about the kiss, but little did he know Keith was talking about his smirk which Keith thinks and will forever think is one of the hottest things about Lance.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The tall, tanned boy ran through the hallways of his high school, desperate to get to class. The halls were mostly empty, the classes had already started, and the students were all inside their respective classes. Panting heavily, the boy pushes open the door to his homeroom, quickly stepping inside.“Lance, you are late. Again.” His teacher scolds him.“Sorry, my alarm didn’t go off.” An obvious lie.“Lance, that’s the third time this week your “alarm didn’t go off.” She slightly shakes her head. “Go take your seat.”Lance quickly walks towards his seat, sitting next to the pale, raven-haired boy. He slumps, sighing heavily as he rests his hands and head on the desk, his heart has yet to calm down from all the running.“Do you even try to come to class on time?” The boy next to him asks.Lance turns his head slightly on the table to look up at him. “Oh, shut it, Keith. If it weren’t for your mother, you wouldn’t even come to school at all.” Lance says pointing at the short-haired women teaching in front of the class.Keith couldn’t argue back to that. It was common knowledge among their friends that Keith hated going to school, no matter how smart or good he was at studying, he just didn’t like it. Well, to be fair, Keith didn’t like any place where there was more than five people present especially if they were people he doesn’t know. So, his mom, Kroila has to practically drag his ass to class every day. If it were his dad, Keith would have either given him the puppy eyes or argued with him until he let Keith stay home. Unfortunately, the puppy eyes don’t work on his mom anymore, and he is too damn scared to argue with her.So, here he was enduring his third year of high school, trying not to think about how he has one more year left in high school, after that college. Keith will never admit it, but high school wasn’t as hellish as he thought it would be. Over this past few years, he has made some great friends and also some annoying ones, like the brunette sitting next to him. Either way, high school was more bearable to Keith because of them, even enjoying it a little.“Keith. Keith!” Someone was poking Keith from behind him, snapping Keith out of his reminiscing moment. He turns around to see a big boy with a bandana around his head looking at him worriedly.“What is it, Hunk?” Keith whispers back. Hunk directly points to the front of the classroom, Keith turns around to see his mom staring at him with a stern face, he immediately stands up.“So, Keith do you want to help your friend over there answer the question?”He looks at lance who was standing next to him with a confused look on his face. “Not really,” Keith mutters under his breath. Actually, Keith was kind of surprised Lance didn’t know the answer to whatever question his mom had asked him. Lance was smart, and Chemistry was kinda his forte.“What was that, Keith?” Kroila asks even though she clearly knew what Keith had said.“What was the question again?” Keith asks instead.Kroila looks between Keith and Lance. “Both of you would know what the question was if you were paying attention.” Kroila sighs. “The question was, what are limiting reactants?”The two boys look at each other, having a silent conversation on who should answer the question. Lance shrugs his shoulders so, Keith answers.“Um… It’s a reactant that is completely consumed during a chemical reaction, limiting the amount of product that is produced.”“But it’s not necessarily the smaller amount,” Lance adds in.“Okay, those are the right answers.” A small pause. “But Keith, Lance, please pay attention during class.”They both murmur out a sorry before taking their respective seats. After that, the two boys actually pay attention in class without dazing out. The bell soon rings for the next class, they say goodbye to Hunk before walking together to their next class. Keith and Lance have all the same classes, this has been the routine for the past few years. Ever since they started high school, the two boys have been stuck together in every class. They don’t know why or how this was happening, but they were starting to get used to it.The rest of the day go by, soon it was lunch time. They walk outside towards their usual table where most of their friends were already seated chatting among themselves. Keith goes to take his usual seat beside Shiro, Lance takes his place opposite Keith, next to Hunk.“Hello, Ladies. How are you doing today?” Lance asks the beautiful couple sitting to his side. The white-haired girl just rolls her eyes at Lance’s flirty behaviour, but a playful smile was visible on her face.“Allura and I are doing great!” The blonde girl replies cheerfully. “How has your day been, Lance?”“It’s been great, Romelle.” Lance gives her an exaggerated smile.“You really need to work on your definition of great,” Keith mumbles remembering what happened in class that morning, Lance ignores him.“So, where are the nerd twins?” Lance asks looking at Shiro.“I don’t know.” Shiro turns to look at his boyfriend sitting next to him. “Adam, do you know where Matt went?”“He was in the last class with me, but he left as soon as the bell rang.” Adam answers. “He probably just went to the lab with Pidge.”“Hopefully, trying to find a way to bomb this place,” Keith says under his breath, only Lance, Shiro and Adam hears him, resulting in a small burst of laughter from the three.“Wow, are you and Shiro really cousins?” Lance looks at Keith and Shiro in disbelief.“Seriously, these two couldn’t be more different.” Adam agrees.“Right?! Outgoing Shiro and gloomy, emo boy Keith.” Lance says earning a glare from Keith.Two figures suddenly show up behind Keith and Shiro, panting heavily.“Hey, Matt. Hey Pidge.” Hunk greets the siblings. “Where have you been?”They quickly slide into their respective seats. “So, we have been doing this experiment.” Pidge starts. “We are trying to find a way to predict who is gonna be whose soulmate, years before they actually find their soulmate.”Everyone looks at the Holt siblings in confusion and like, wtf are these two nerds up to now. Keith and Lance look at their own wrist where a clock was ticking. The clock was counting down to the time when they will first kiss their soulmate. Of course, neither of them knew who that was.“What do you mean, ‘predict’?” Allura asks curiously.“So, our research has found out that, soulmates are like magnets. The universe or whatever will always try to put them together, in order for them to be together.” Matt starts to explain. “Like, even before Allura and Romelle found out they were soulmates, they used to always meet at bookstores, coffee shops, bus stops and random places, right?”“Yeah… But we never talked.” Allura answers frowning slightly.“See, that’s what we mean,” Pidge says. “The universe was trying to get you guys to talk. It was drawing you two together.”“So… you can tell someone who their soulmate is?” Lance asks.“By studying the subject, it is possible.” Pidge answers.“So, can you predict who my soulmate is?”There was a moment of silence where Matt and Pidge seemed to have a telepathic communication. “Um, I can’t think of anyone in particular for you, Lance,” Pidge says carefully choosing her words. “I mean, it’s not something I can give an immediate answer to.”“Oh.” Lance was in more panic than most of them realized, and so was Keith.“Here, give me your wrist,” Pidge says, Lance reluctantly lets her see his soulmate timer. Pidge’s eyes widen in surprise. “Lance, your clock… It’s tomorrow.”Everyone turns to looks at Lance in surprise. “Yeah…” Lance says a little defeated. He didn’t have a girlfriend so, what the heck was gonna happen tomorrow? Was someone just gonna come and randomly kiss him?“Wait, that means Keith, too,” Shiro says. “Keith, is your timer set for tomorrow, too?”Keith sighs. “Yeah,” Keith says showing everyone his soulmate timer that was counting down to tomorrow.All their friends knew that Keith’s and Lance’s timer was set to the exact same time, but that doesn’t necessarily mean their soulmates. A lot of people have timers set to the exact same time. In fact, everyone used to think Allura and Shiro were gonna be soulmates because their timer was set to precisely the same time. It didn’t help that the two have known each other for a long time and looked like an adorable couple. But at the same time, they were both hella gay.“Oh my god, I wonder who it’s going to be?” Romelle says excitedly. It was an excitement Lance and Keith didn’t share.Sure, Lance wants to meet his soulmate, it’s something he always dreamt about, but he always thought he would know who he was going to kiss. Usually, people know who their soulmate is before they kiss them, right? Like, Hunk liked Shay as soon as he saw her for the first time, then he found out their timer was set to the same time and he kind of thought she was his soulmate. But on their first date he was sure she was his soulmate, and when they kissed, they hadn’t even realized that their timer had counted down to zero. Lance wished he and his soulmate was like that, but they weren’t. The fact that he didn’t know who his soulmate is going to be, was really bothering Lance.Keith, on the other hand, didn’t even want to meet his soulmate, it scares him that tomorrow some stranger is going to kiss him, and he is going to have to spend the rest of his life with this person. He can barely talk to a stranger so, kissing one is a big no for him. So, he has decided to do whatever it takes to elude this fate. If he had to pick one or the other, he rather has Lance as his soulmate over someone who he doesn’t even know. Plus, Lance is not all that bad, sure he is annoying as hell, but he is also smart, outgoing, handsome and just maybe Keith has a tiny teeny crush on him. Though having Lance as his soulmate is probably just wishful thinking.“Well, good luck guys,” Adam says encouragingly to Keith and Lance.“Thanks.” The two boys reply half-heartedly.Soon the school bell rings signalling the end of their lunch break. Everyone scatters to go to their respective classes, Keith and Lance leaving to the next class together. Both boys could tell that the other was not feeling too hyped about their whole soulmate situation though neither knew the exact reason why. But they found comfort in their mutual feeling of despair and the dread they felt when they thought about the next day.Eventually, the final bell for the day rang. Keith, Lance and Hunk walked together to their lockers, then to the front of the school where they said their goodbyes for the day. Hunk and Lance walked off together while Keith went to wait next to his mom’s car. A few minutes later, he hears the click of the car’s door unlocking, he gets into the passenger seat in the front of the vehicle. His mom soon arrives at the car and gets into the driver’s seat. She looks at Keith, frowning slightly after seeing the expression on his face.“So, how was your day, Keith?” Kroila asks, starting the car and driving off in the direction of their house.“It was okay, I guess.” Keith mumbles.“Really? Then why the face?”“What face?”“You look gloomy.” Kroila says. “… More than usual.”“You do realize this is a characteristic I got from you, right?” Keith deadpans.Kroils laughs lightly but doesn’t argue back. “So, what’s wrong?”“Nothing.”She turns to look at him. “Okay, fine. Don’t tell me.” Kroila says. “Just bottle everything up, but don’t come running to me when you can’t handle it anymore like you did last time.”“Oh my god, I was seven, mom!”“Whatever you say, Keith.” She says giving up, but Keith knows she won’t give up until she knows what’s up with him. His mom knows how to handle him, she was slowly breaking him, he was so close to telling her everything. But if his mom was a stubborn mother, he was an even more stubborn son. So, he just keeps quiet, staring out the window at passing cars and buildings. When Keith doesn’t say anything, Kroila sighs heavily pulling into their driveway, Keith quickly walks into their house.“Mom, I am gonna go take a nap,” Keith says, climbing up the stairs.“Don’t you have homework?” Kroila asks from the kitchen.“I will do it later,” Keith shouts back so she can hear him. After entering his room Keith decides to take a quick shower, soon after which he slumps onto his bed, within minutes he was sleeping soundly.An hour later he wakes up, he grabs his phone from the side table. He scrolls through all his social media accounts, spending more time on YouTube than he had planned. The funny thing is, he was watching romantic comedy movie trailers which is weird because he doesn’t even like romantic movies. But some of the trailers he watched actually made him want to watch the movie.Keith looks at the time, only to realize he had spent more than an hour on his phone. He quickly puts his phone away remembering all the homework he had to do. He spends the rest of the evening doing all the boring readings and writings a high school student has to do, which was a lot as far as Keith was concerned. He was just about done doing all his homework when there is a slight knock on his door.“Yeah, come in,” Keith says, still looking down at the book he was reading.“Hey.”“Hey.” Keith looks up to see his dad standing outside his room holding the door open.“Are you still studying?” His dad asks. “Because dinner’s ready.”“No, I am done.” Keith closes his book. “I will be there in a minute.”His dad doesn’t leave the room but continues to stand there looking at Keith.“Dad?” Keith raises his eyebrows questioningly. “What’s wrong?”Keith’s dad hesitates for a minute. “Are you alright?”Keith sighs. “Yeah,” Keith says, but his dad looked unconvinced. Keith throws his arms up in the air in frustration. “I am fine. Really.”“Okay, kid. If you say so.” He still didn’t look convinced, but he leaves Keith’s room.Keith sighs again, quickly putting his things away. He walks downstairs to the dining room, taking his usual seat opposite his parents. His parent was observing him very, very carefully, they knew something was definitely up with him. They ate in silence for a few minutes before the awkward silence, and his parents’ staring got to him.“What?!” Keith snaps.“What?!!” His parents say simultaneously.Keith narrows his eyes at them. “You guys are staring at me!”“What’s wrong with two parents looking at their son?” Kroila asks.“It’s weird! So, stop.”“It’s not weird!” Kroila stubbornly folds her hands across her chest.“Yes, it is!”“Okay, Keith, we get it.” Keith’s father says calmly. “Kroila, how about we just ask our son what’s bothering him like normal parents do.”Kroila sighs. “I already asked him that, David.” She says. “You know how he can be. He is always moody, and gloomy.”“I am right here. I am sitting right here.” Keith says, shaking his head and looking at his mom in disbelief.“Okay, Keith what’s going on?” David asks reasonably. “Your mom and I are just worried about you. You have a tendency to bottle everything up, but you can talk to us. You need to talk to us.”“I am sorry,” Keith says softly. “I didn’t mean to worry you guys.”“We know.”David was smiling at his son, encouraging him to open up to them. Kroila also had a small smile on her face, but her arms were still stubbornly crossed across her chest. Keith didn’t want to tell his parents about his problems because he didn’t want them to worry about him. But he never thought that not telling them could also cause them to worry about him. Of course, it would, they are his parents, it was their job to worry about him. As soon as this realization hit Keith, he suddenly felt stupid.Keith sighs softly finally giving in, he couldn’t win against both his parents and honestly, he didn’t want to. He slowly shows his wrist to his parents. At first, they seemed to be confused but soon realized Keith was showing them his soulmate timer. They looked at his timer for a while before looking up at him in surprise.“That’s tomorrow,” David says.Realization seems to hit his mother a little late. “Oh my god! Keith, you are going to know who your soulmate is tomorrow!” His mother seemed a bit too excited, it was kind of creeping Keith out because his mother rarely acts like that.“Kroila.” His dad says sternly, signalling Keith’s mom to calm down. “What’s the matter, Keith? You don’t look so excited.”“That’s because I am not.” Keith mumbles.“Why is that?”“I don’t know who it is,” Keith says sadly. “Usually, people know who they are gonna kiss. I don’t.”“Well, not really. They don’t always know. I mean, your mom and I are a good example of that.” David says. “I found out she was my soulmate when I was giving her CPR. I never even knew trying to save someone’s life by giving CPR was still considered kissing.” David laughs lightly.“But you still liked her before that. You knew her.” Keith lets out a frustrated groan. “I am not dating anyone, and there isn’t anyone I particularly like.”“Well, the last part isn’t completely true.” Kroila was smiling playfully. “I am your mother, Keith. You really think I don’t see the way you look at that boy.”Keith stares at his mother in shock. “Boy?! Well, that’s interesting.” David says, a small smirk visible on his face. “Who is this boy?”“Lance. He is a pretty smart boy, handsome, too.” Kroila says as s slight blush creeps up Keith’s face.“Mom, I- I have no idea what you are talking about. And there is no way Lance is my soulmate, that is too…”“…too good to true?” Kroila adds in helpfully.“Yeah… I mean no!” Keith says. “Life is not so good as to let people have what they want, you have to always fight your way through it.”Keith’s parents didn’t know what they were more surprised at, the words their son had just said or the pessimism behind those words. They stared at him for a while, studying him.“Keith, whether you like it or not you will meet your soulmate tomorrow.” Kroila states. “But Keith, it’s not as bad as you think it is. I used to be like you to some extent, the whole soulmate thing used to freak me out. But once I met David, everything in my life got better. I was happy.”David was looking at his wife, smiling proudly. When Keith saw his parents, he couldn’t help feeling a little happy and proud, he gave them a small smile.“Thanks, mom.” Keith gets up and grabs all the dirty dishes on the table. “I will do the dishes.”“Thank you, Keith.” His mom says.Keith was walking towards the kitchen when his dad says. “And Keith, I know you're probably worrying about your soulmate being a stranger and stuff like that,” David says. “But remember all your friends right now were strangers to you at some point. After you meet your soulmate, you will have plenty of time to get to know them.”“Yeah, maybe,” Keith mutters.After doing the dishes, he watches some space documentary with his parents. Weirdly enough, all three of them were obsessed with space and space documentaries. Keith strongly believes that his obsession with space was genetically passed down from his parents to him. After the documentary is over, Keith goes back to his room. Now, usually he would have stayed on his phone for another few hours, but for some reason, he felt drained. So, after changing into his pyjamas, he went under his blanket quickly falling asleep.MEANWHILE AT LANCE’S HOUSE…“Rachel, Veronica, what do I do?” It was after dinner. Lance was pacing around his room desperately asking his older sisters for their help though he had no idea what kind of help he was expecting from them.“I still don’t understand what he is so worried about,” Veronica says looking at Rachel. “Finding out who your soulmate is should be a good thing.” Rachel nods her head in agreement.“That’s easy for you to say. You already found your soulmate.” Lance says.“Yeah, and you will find yours tomorrow.” Veronica was totally confused by her brother’s behaviour.“But I don’t know who it is.” Lance whines. “You knew Acxa was your soulmate even before your timer hit zero, but I don’t.”“Oh.” Rachel kind of started to understand her brother’s concerns. “So, your scared who is gonna kiss you and how it’s gonna happen.”Lance pauses. “Well, something like that… I guess.”“Maybe, it’s someone you already like,” Veronica says, thoughtfully. “Lance, is there someone you like?”A certain pair of violet eyes crosses through his mind, but before the image could manifest itself fully, he quickly shoves that thought into the ‘Never Ever To Be Opened’ folder in his mind. “No. No, there isn’t anyone I like.” He says slowly, his sisters looked unconvinced.“Look, Lance, we don’t know what to say to you,” Veronica says giving up. “Tomorrow you are going to meet your soulmate, and you can’t stop it. So, just go with the flow, I guess.”“But…” Lance whines.“If it really bothers you, just don’t think about it,” Rachel says. Lance raises an eyebrow questioningly. “Starting from right now, don’t look at the timer and don’t think about anything related to soulmates. When the kiss happens, it happens.”That actually didn’t sound like a bad idea to Lance. He was quite good at running away from reality and keeping himself busy with other things. So, that’s exactly what he did for the rest of the night, and at school the next day. Lance arrived in class just as homeroom was about to begin, panting heavily.“Oh, good you made it,” Kroila says as soon as she sees Lance at the entrance of the classroom.“Of course, I wouldn’t wanna miss your class for the world, Mrs. Kogane.” Lance says confidently, Kroila raises an eyebrow in amusement.Lance walks towards his seat, Hunk quickly greets him. “Good morning, Lance.”“Good morning to you too, buddy.”Lance takes his seat next to the pale boy. “Hi, Keith,” Lance says, when he doesn’t get a reply, he turns around to see Keith staring at the window, Lance doesn’t see anything particularly interesting outside the window. “Keith? Keith!” Lance slams his hands on the table to get his attention.“What?!” Keith looked startled by the sudden sound.Lance furrows his eyebrows. “I said hi.”“Oh, hi.” Keith still looked a little dazed out. “Sorry, I wasn’t listening.”“Clearly,” Lance mutters. “Are you alright?”“Yeah. Just a little tired.” And as if to prove his point, he yawns, rubbing his eye with his right hand. It took every ounce of strength in Lance’s body to stop himself from saying the word ‘cute’ out loud. The rest of the day went by in a flash. At lunch, everyone avoided bringing up the soulmate topic. They knew two of their friends were internally freaking out about it, which really helped Lance since he was desperately trying to avoid thinking about it. Finally, the school day came to an end. After class, Lance and Hunk went down to their lockers while Keith went to the washroom. He was just leaving the washroom when his eyes travelled down to his wrist. Five minutes. Five minutes until his timer hit zero. Keith knew he had to get out there, he had to get out of school. He needed to find a place far away from the human population. By this point, Keith was officially panicking, he starts to run. He was on the second floor, he starts to run as quickly as he can to get to the exit of the school. He zooms past Shiro and Adam in the hallway who looks at him in surprise. They both call out to him, but he just continues towards the exit, worried by his strange behaviour the couple runs after him.Keith was halfway down the stairs when he trips, he starts to fall towards another figure standing at the bottom of the stairs. “Keith! What are yo—” Keith’s body collides with another’s; strong arms wrap around him protectively. The other body hits the ground, Keith falling on top him. Keith feels something soft and sweet against his lips. Keith doesn’t move his lips from that spot, afraid to see who he had kissed, afraid to see who his soulmate is. When Keith doesn’t move the other person actually starts to move his lips against Keith’s, kissing him. Shocked by this, Keith pulls back to look at the person laying below him, violet eyes meet blue ones. Keith stares intensely, feeling like he was looking into the depths of the ocean itself. He moves his eyes to look at the boy’s whole face, smooth tanned skin, chestnut hair and a lean, beautiful face.“Lance,” Keith whispers in surprise, his heart was thrumming in his chest.“Hey,” Lance whispers back, smiling softly. Lance looks at his timer which finally showed zero, it was slowly disappearing from his wrist, being replaced by Keith’s name. “Guess, it was you after all.” Keith doesn’t say anything but simply looks at his timer to see all the digits showing zero, and Lance’s name slowly appearing on his wrist.Both boys felt like a heavy weight was taken off their chest, their happiness was overflowing, neither boy realized how happy the other was. Keith once again looks into the ocean blue eyes in front of him, Lance was carefully studying Keith’s expression.“It wasn’t wishful thinking after all,” Keith whispers without thinking.“What?” Lance looked surprised.“Um… I guess, I kinda always wished it was you.” Keith says softly before he can stop himself.“Really?” Lance asks, having a hard time believing Keith’s words, but wanting so badly for it to be true.“…Yeah.” Keith was slowly starting to turn red, the same could be said for Lance.“Me too…” Lance tightens his hold around Keith. “I wanted it to be you. But I was so sure it wasn’t you because that’s too good to be true.”Keith smiles, thinking they had some similarities after all. “Yeah.”Lance looks at Keith’s eyes, then nose, then travelling all the way down to his lips. “Can I kiss you?”Keith’s face heats up, but he keeps his eyes steady on Lance. “Yeah.” He closes the gap between them, slowly moving their lips together. Neither of them ever realized that something so simple could make them so happy, butterflies were fluttering around in their stomach. Their lips moved softly against each other, expressing the affection they felt for the other.Someone clears their throat, forcing the two boys to separate their lips. “How long do you guys plan on just laying there sucking each other’s lips” It was Shiro. The two boys had forgotten they were still at school, they had forgotten they were in the hallway where they had a number of audiences. Keith quickly gets of Lance, helping the other boy up. They look up to see Shiro, Adam, and Matt beaming at them, Pidge was smirking, but there was a proud tint in her eyes, Hunk had his hands over his heart in adoring gesture, Allura and Romelle were smiling excitedly.“Rivals turned lovers, huh?” Adam says. “It’s got a nice ring to it.”“Well, are you guys happy with your new-found soulmate?” Allura asks, smirking.“Happy? This is probably like a dream come true for these dorks.” Pidge teases.“Wha-?! What do you mean Pidge?” Lance looked shocked, Keith’s brain was processing all this a little more slowly than Lance’s.“Oh, please. You really think none of us noticed what’s going between you two?” Pidge says, smugly.“What’s going between us?” Lance raises an eyebrow in confusion.“Lance, you and Keith have been pinning after each other for a while now.” Hunk explains.“Did you guys really think you were subtle about it?” Adam asks looking between Keith and Lance, surprised at their obliviousness. Shiro and the rest of their friends burst out laughing at the pair’s shocked expression, their eyes were wide, mouth slightly hanging open.This time Keith was the first one to recover. “Then, if you guys knew we liked each other why didn’t you tell us?” Keith says, looking at Pidge and Matt. “I mean, the chances of us being soulmates was high from the beginning, wasn’t it?”“Well, yeah. All our calculation led us to believe you two were soulmates.” Pidge explains. “But we knew you two liked each other so, we didn’t want to get your hopes up in case we were wrong.”“So, when I asked you who my soulmate was, you already knew?” Lance asks in disbelief. Pidge simply shrugs her shoulder.“Okay, all of that is in the past now,” Romelle says, she walks up to Keith and Lance looking at them with twinkling eyes. “I am so happy for you guys, I have always thought you two were cute together. I mean, I have always shipped you together.”“Didn’t we all?” Shiro says, smirking.“Klance for life!” Pidge shouts pumping her fist in the air, and that was the last straw for Keith.He was trying to keep it together and not lose it. All the attention from his friends was making him nervous, but he was also happy at the same time. He knew all their teasing was making his face redder by the second, but Pidge’s last few words finally got him. He covered his whole beet red face with both his hands, slightly turning away from them. Of course, this got another burst of laughter from his friends. Lance on the other hand, just stood there staring at Keith, his heart beating faster and faster by the second.“Okay, guys, that’s enough teasing for a day,” Shiro says a grin was displayed on his face. “They have hit their limit, I don’t think they can take any more of this.”Keith slowly lowers his hands, he looks at Shiro gratefully so does Lance, but something about the way he was grinning at the two told them he has more planned for them later.“Anyway, we are gonna go and…” Lance says grabbing Keith’s hand in his. “And uh… plan our future together or something.” He starts to walk away from their friends, pulling Keith with him. They got to the parking lot, Lance turns to look at Keith.“Um, I am sorry about all that,” Lance says.“Why are you apologizing? It’s not your fault.” Keith says. “They are always like that.”“Yeah…” Lance pauses for a second. “Keith, um… Just to make sure. We are boyfriends now, right?”“Do I have a choice?” Keith deadpans with a straight expression. Seeing the shocked expression on Lance’s face, Keith chuckles then smiles looking up him. “I am just kidding. Of course, I want to be your boyfriend, Lance.”Lance sighs in relief. “Don’t play with my heart like that, Keith!”Keith laughs again, it was a sound that Lance has grown to love. Suddenly, Lance wraps his hands around Keith’s waist, pulling him closer and pressing their lips together. Keith is surprised by the sudden action but quickly returns the kiss, wrapping his hands around Lance’s neck. Their lips moves strongly against each other, there was an unrestricted yearning behind their kiss this time. Lance asks for permission to enter his mouth which Keith gladly grants, he slips his tongue into Keith’s mouth exploring every corner. Lance pulls Keith closer while Keith grabs at his hair, a low moan escapes from Lance’s throat. Their kiss gets deeper by the second.Suddenly, they hear a car honking in the distance, bringing them back to reality. They had forgotten they were still in the parking. Both boys turn a deep red as they realize they were making out in the open, thankfully there wasn’t anyone around them. For a while, they just stood there in each other’s arms catching their breath, and just getting lost in each other’s eyes. “That was amazing,” Lance says smiling brightly.“Yeah.” Keith couldn’t help but smile back.Lance chuckles lightly. “I will see you tomorrow, okay?”“Okay.”The pair reluctantly separates, walking off in the opposite directions. Keith walks towards his mom’s car, quickly getting into the passenger seat.“WOW! That was intense!” Kroila says from the passenger seat, driving away from the parking lot.Keith looks at his mom in disbelief. “You saw that?!!”“Well, you were making out in an open parking lot so…”Keith continues to stare at his mom in shock. “So, Lance McClain, huh?”Keith groans. “Oh god, mom if you say I told you so, I swear…”“I am not going to say I told you so.” A few minutes of silence pass by. “But I did tell you—”“MOM!” Kroila laughs, Keith was trying to look angry, but a smile was visibly creeping up on his face.A blissful silence settles inside the car for a few minutes. “Does Lance make you happy?” Kroila suddenly asks, looking at her son.Keith smiles, his chest felt heavy but in a good way. “He does.”“Then, I am glad that boy is your soulmate.”“Me too, mom,” Keith replies.“Oh, I can’t wait to tell your dad about this.” Excitement was clearly visibly in Kroila’s eyes.Keith sighs heavily. “Yeah, can’t wait.” His voice dripped with sarcasm, but his words were honest. Keith turns to look out the window, thinking about everything that happened at school. Mostly, his thoughts surrounded Lance, his blue eyes, the barely visible freckles on his face, the warmth of Lance’s hand when he was holding Keith’s. But most importantly, he thought about how Lance’s lips felt against his, he never thought kissing someone could feel this good. Keith’s emotions were spiralling at that particular moment. Keith smiles, already looking forward to seeing Lance at school tomorrow.And just like that two months pass by since Keith and Lance started dating. The pair was at the peak of their happiness, it was a happiness they shared with everyone around them. For the most part, they were still the same as ever, their rivalry was going as strong as ever, their occasional squabbling was still something their friends had to deal with. But their teasing was more endearing now, more soft looks were exchanged between the two. Also, now they weren’t afraid to show their love for each, planting kisses on each other more often than necessary- their friends have concluded that it was a sign of possessiveness. While this kind behaviour was expected from Lance, it was Keith’s attachment to Lance that surprised everyone, but none of that mattered when everyone saw how happy the two were.Keith, Lance and Hunk were walking together to their lockers, it was Friday and the last bell for the day had just gone off. At the entrance of the school, Hunk separates from the couple, going off on his own. Keith and Lance had promised to have a movie night at Keith’s house so, Lance was hitching a ride with Keith and his mom to their home. Kroila was already waiting for them inside the car with the engine roaring, the two boys quickly got in.“Hey, Lance.”“Hi, Mrs. Kogane.”“How was your day?”“It was great! Keith “accidentally” spilled his drink on Shiro.” Lance makes finger quotation marks in the air. “Shiro was chasing him around the school during lunch break.”“And why did you “accidentally” spill your drink on Shiro?” Kroila emphasizes the word accidentally.Keith doesn’t say anything, but Lance and Kroila patiently wait for Keith to answer. “He brought up the time I literally threw my phone trying to catch a Pokémon while playing Pokémon Go.” Keith mumbles. Kroila and Lance stare at Keith before bursting out in fits of laughter. The rest of the car ride goes by Kroila and Lance teasing a mostly silent Keith, though by now Keith is used to it. When Lance is with Keith’s parents the three of them always teams up against him. But when Keith is with Lance’s family, they all team up against Lance and that thought always makes Keith feel a lot better. Plus, Lance’s family is bigger so, there are more people to tease Lance with.They finally get to Keith’s house; the pair quickly runs off into Keith’s room. Yeah, they were in a hurry, a small challenge was issued during lunch that day among all their friends. The two sat on Keith’s desk with both their laptop open in front of them. They quickly sign into the game they play with their friends.“YES!” Lance pumps both his fist in the air. “We are the first ones to arrive.”Keith opens the game to see that Lance and Keith were the only ones online, the rest of their friends have yet to come. “We won the challenge!” Keith exclaims victoriously. They wait for a few more minutes before all their friends are online. They play the game together for what only felt like minutes but was actually hours.“Keeeeiiithh,” Kroila calls from downstairs.“Yes, mom?” Keith shouts back.“We are leaving.”“Okay, coming.” Keith puts his headphones down. “I will be right back.” Lance nods looking at the scoreboards, most of their friends had left, the game had ended a while ago.When Keith got downstairs, he saw his mom in a lovely purple dress, with his dad standing next to her wearing a black suit. His dad’s company was holding a fundraising event, and they were invited to attend it.“Wow mom, you look beautiful!” Keith compliments.“Aww, thanks, sweetie.” Kroila plants a quick kiss on his head.“You look good too, dad.”“Thanks.” David smiles.“So, we will be late,” Kroila explains. “Order pizza when you are hungry, okay?”“Got it.” His mom gives him a strange look. “What is it?”“About Lance…”“What about him?”There were a few minutes silence. “Do we need to have “the talk”? David blurts out.It takes Keith a while before his dad’s words register in his mind. “Oh my god, dad no. NO!”“We know we already had this talk with you.” Kroila starts. “But back then we kind of assumed it was gonna be a girl so…”“Guys, stop. Please, stop.” Keith starts to push both his parents towards the door. “I can take care of myself. Leave. Just leave.”“But be careful when you…” The rest of his mom’s voice was muffled by Keith shutting the door close. Keith sighs heavily leaning against the door, slowly he walks up the stairs. And guess who was standing there waiting for him… Yep, Lancey Lance. Keith sighs loudly slumping his shoulders, he walks into his room, Lance following closely behind.“How much of that did you hear?”“Enough to know that both your parents think we are gonna do it tonight.” Surprisingly Lance's voice was steady and almost amusing. Keith and Lance never went all the way, but they knew sooner or later it would happen, both were hoping it would be sooner rather than later.“Sorry, my parents are a little…weird.” “Well, don’t blame your parents.” Lance chuckles. “Most people would come to the same conclusion.”A small pause. “Really?” Keith raises an eyebrow, smiling at Lance. His voice was teasing and low as he moved closer to Lance. “And did you come here today thinking the same thing?”Keith’s sudden straightforwardness took Lance by surprise, but he stood his ground as Keith wrapped his hands around his neck. “Oh honey, two can play at this game,” Lance smirks.Keith hums, face turning red at the nickname. “Yeah…And you would probably win. So, let’s skip that part.”“I can do that.” Lance gently places his hands on Keith’s hips. “But are you sure?”“Yeah.” He teases Lance by brushing his smile against Lance’s lip, turning the brunette’s smirk into a pout.Keith smiles widely at Lance’s pouting lips and furrowed brows. Lance never realized in all of his life that a simple smile from a boy could get his heart beating so fast. He could stare at that smile for eternity and not get tired of it. It was a smile that could kill him, but a smile that made him happy from the bottom of his heart. At that moment Lance decided, for as long as he lived, he will do everything in his power to make Keith smile more often.If Lance had any self-control before, that came crumbling down as soon as that smile appeared on Keith’s soft lips. He smashes their lips together in a passionate yet hungry kiss, he pushes Keith against the wall pressing their bodies together. Keith’s arms go around Lance’s neck, his hands finding their way into Lance’s soft brown hair, he gently tugs at it, earning a small groan from Lance. He takes this opportunity to slip his tongue into his boyfriend’s mouth, the two fight for dominance but eventually, Lance wins. He explores every nick and corner of the other’s mouth, no matter how hard he kissed Keith he wanted more. Lance puts his leg in between Keith’s thighs earning a satisfying moan from him. His hands find its way down to Keith’s thighs, gently picking up the smaller boy and placing him on the bed. Lance quickly takes off his shirt, Keith doing the same. The taller boy brings his lips onto the paler boy’s neck, Keith turns his head to the side to make more space for Lance to work with, while his hands searched every inch of the other boy’s tanned body. Lance places kisses all over Keith’s neck, chest, stomach slowly coming down to v- line, Keith moans. Lance smirks, quickly taking off Keith’s pants, his hard member clearly visible through his boxers, He palms Keith through the fabric just to tease him a little.“Lance….” Keith whines.Lance chuckles taking off the last piece of clothing on Keith. The paler boy gasps as his member suddenly come in contact with the cold air. Lance slowly licks the precum on the tip of his member, before taking the whole thing in. He starts sucking Keith’s member, bobbing his head and deep throating him. Lance’s tongue swirls around Keith’s member, the warmth of Lance’s mouth fills him with pleasure. Keith grabs Lance’s hair, a grunt escapes his mouth.“Lance… Oh god…” Keith moans. “Nghh… Lance… I am comin —” Keith spills into Lance’s mouth, the taller boy separates from Keith’s member swallowing his seed. Lance once again attaches their lips together in a deep kiss.“That tastes disgusting.” Keith frowns after they separate for breath.“Keith, it’s yours.” Lance kisses Keith’s head. “I didn’t think it was that bad, though.”Keith pulls Lance down for another deep kiss, both boys’ hands roam around the other’s body trying to memorize every inch. “Keith, do you have any lube?”Keith blushes at the sudden question but points to the drawer next to his bed. Lance reaches for it, he puts some of it on his fingers before slowly inserting his first finger into Keith.“Ahh…” Keith moans in pain, but soon they turn into pleasure as he slowly pulls his finger in and out of Keith. He adds another finger and then one more before scissoring them inside Keith stretching him out properly.“Is that okay?”Keith simply nods in reply.“I am gonna enter you, okay?” Lance quickly takes off all his clothes, putting some lube on his member, he lines it up next to Keith’s entrance. He slowly inserts himself all the way into Keith and waits for Keith to adjust.“Keith, does it hurt?” Keith doesn’t reply. “Tell me when I can move.” In the meantime, Lance, move on to kiss Keith’s nose, red cheeks, jawline, neck, he places marks on Keith’s neck and chest.“You can move now… Please, move…”The way Keith was practically begging him makes Lance turn a bright shade of red. “O-okay…”Lance slowly pulls out to the tip of his member before pushing all the way in, the sound of skin slapping against skin could be heard mixed with Keith’s loud moaning.“Ahhhhhh… Lance, there…. That spot….” Lance had found Keith’s sweet spot, he slams into the same spot over and over again.“Faster… Lance, go faster…” Lance was more than willing to obey, he picked up speed while also rubbing Keith’s member at the same pace as his thrusting. The pleasure was all too much for Keith, it was overwhelming, he had lost control of his body and mind. “Lance… I am coming…”“Yeah… Me too.”Keith comes first, spilling his seed onto his own stomach and his partner’s. Soon, Lance follows, coming inside Keith. Lance slowly collapses on top of Keith, both boys were panting heavily. After a few minutes, Lance goes to the washroom bringing back a towel to clean them both up. For a few minutes, they just lay there in silence, holding each other.“Keith?”“Yeah?”“I love you.”Keith smiles. “I love you, too, Lance.”Another minute of silence pass, then it was Keith’s turn to break it. “Lance?”“Hmm?”“I am hungry.”Lance chuckles. “Yeah, me too.”“I am going to order pizza.”“Yeah, okay.”A small pause. “You want to take a shower first?” Keith turns to look at Lance.“Sure,” Lance replies.After they finish showering together, Lance calls his parents to tell them he was staying over at Keith’s house. After they order a pizza, the pair realize that they have yet to watch a movie for their movie night. They decide to watch The Matrix, solely because neither of them had watched that movie in a very long time. Halfway through the movie both the boys fall asleep on the couch. When Kroila and David finally get home, they see their son fast asleep in the protective arms of his boyfriend. Little did they know, they will witness the same scene for years to come, always filling their hearts with happiness.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The crowd cheered ever more loudly as the finals of the Quidditch Cup neared its climax. The two wizards raced on their brooms, equally determined to get hold of the Snitch. The wind sharply whipped past their faces as the two Seekers clashed against each other, trying to get ahead of the other.“Oh, there it is, folks! Our school’s favourite rivals!” The commentator’s voice echoed across the speakers. “Once again, McClain and Kogane are going head to head to catch the Snitch!”“Ravenclaw! Ravenclaw! Ravenclaw!”“Gryffindor! Gryffindor! Gryffindor!”As the cheers grew louder, so did the determination of all the players, especially the two Seekers. They flew across the field with their arms outstretched towards the Snitch while avoiding the obstacles placed in front of them. Their brooms zoomed below the bleachers, making sharp turns left and right, barely avoiding crashing into something. The two Seekers surfaces to the ground, flying above the crowd. Ravenclaw’s Seeker increases his speed to get ahead of the shorter Seeker, but he fails to make a sudden sharp turn because of his high speed and is forced to come to a stop. Gryffindor’s Seeker takes advantage of this and takes the lead, quickly catching the Snitch in his pale hands.“Keith Kogane’s done it, folks! He’s caught the Snitch!” The commentator’s voice boomed above all the cheers. “And with that, Gryffindor wins the Quidditch Cup of this year!”Panting heavily, Keith slowly lands on the ground and gets off his broom. He raises his hand to show the audience the tiny fluttering Snitch in his palm, causing the audience to cheer and applause more loudly. Keith turns around to see his rival Seeker staring daggers at him while getting off his broom.“Well, congratulations, KEITH.” Ravenclaw’s Seeker spits out, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “I see you are relishing in your victory.”“And I see you are handling your defeat as pathetically as I thought you would!” Keith snaps back. “Tell me, Lance, what does it feel like to lose?”“You should know that better than anyone.” Confidence slowly seeps back into Lance’s voice. “Afterall, you have lost to me two years in a row before.”Keith glares at Lance with the most dangerous expression he could muster. Unfortunately, this has zero effect on Lance.“What? No snarky comebacks?”“Whatever, Lance. My team won this game.” Keith says. “I am not gonna let you or anyone else get under my skin today.”“Too late for that.” Keith wanted so badly to punch the smirk off Lance’s face. “Well, O Victorious One, I hope you enjoy your festivities for tonight.” Lance dramatically bows down, mocking Keith before walking away. Let’s just say, Keith did NOT enjoy any festivities that night. His mind was overflowing with anger and frustrations towards a certain blue-eyed Ravenclaw. His teammates did not know why their Seeker was emitting such a negative energy despite their magnificent win that day. They wanted to know what was wrong, but everyone was too scared to approach him. Everyone except their team captain, of course.“Keith! Did you hear about it?” Keith looks across the table to see their tall, excited captain. “Something great happened today!”“What is it, Shiro?” Keith says, sounding not the least bit interested.“You seriously didn’t hear about what happened today?” Keith furrows his eyebrows in confusion. “Keith, have you been living under a rock or something?”“That’s how I would describe my social life,” Keith mutters. “So, what happened?”“Okay. So, you might not believe this, but Gryffindor won this year’s Quidditch Cup!” Shiro exclaims exaggerated excitement was clear on his face and voice. “Our Seeker was awesome! He flew across the field…” Shiro continues to explain how their Seeker won the game for them. He kept on talking about every move their Seeker made until finally, Keith snapped.“I KNOW! I WAS THE DAMN SEEKER!”Shiro stares at Keith for a while. “Nah, that’s impossible. Our Seeker would be overjoyed at a win against Ravenclaw.” Shiro cups Keith’s face, turning it towards the rest of their teammates. “Guys, is this the face of someone happy?” All their teammates simultaneously shook their heads, saying ‘no,’ making Keith roll his eyes.“Keith, when a person is happy, they smile,” Shiro explains in a VERY serious tone. “Do you know what a smile is, Keith? It’s something like this.” Shiro stretches the corners of Keith’s lips using his index fingers.“Stop it.” Keith tries to get out of Shiro’s hold, but the older student’s grip was too firm.“Nope. Not gonna happen until you smile.”“Are you kidding me?”“Keith smile! Keith smile!” Shiro starts to chant, and slowly one by one each of their teammates follows Shiro’s lead until the whole room fills with a chorus of, “Keith smile.” Before Keith had realized it, everyone had made a circle around him, cutting off any route of escape for him.“Keith smile! Keith smile! Keith smile!” Keith was suddenly being lifted off the ground by his teammates, and they were throwing him up and down in the air.“Guys put me down! I am gonna fall!” This just makes them go faster, causing Keith to burst out laughing. “Alright, alright! I get it. Gryffindor won! Ravenclaw can suck it! Now please, put me down.”They finally lower Keith back towards the ground, happy to see their Seeker back to being his old self. Keith didn’t have any idea who was touching him. But hands were shuffling his hair, and many hands were giving him pats on his back. All around him voices were congratulating him and telling him he was really ‘cool’ or ‘awesome’ during the game. Keith just kept saying ‘thank yous’ while smiling at the people around him. Okay, so maybe Keith was having a little fun. At the very least, he was happy, and that was saying something.A few more hours go by, Keith was sitting in front of the fireplace, just staring into the flame. As weird as this might sound, Keith has always been intrigued by fire and have always loved watching it. Keith was watching the flames dance when Shiro comes to sit opposite him. Keith looks up to see an empty common room with just him and Shiro.“So, what’s the story?” Shiro asks, making himself comfortable on the couch“What story?” Keith furrows his eyebrows.“Why were you so upset before?”“…Oh, that…” Keith sighs. “It’s nothing. Doesn’t matter anymore.”“Lance again, huh?” Keith really doesn’t like the way how Shiro can see through him that easily, he pouts slightly.“He is just so annoying! Like, what the hell is his problem?!” Frustration makes its way into Keith’s voice. “We clearly won today, but he was still so full of himself even after the match. Ugh, I absolutely hate that guy!”Shiro watched Keith in silence for a while before saying, “Why are you so focused on, Lance?”“What?! I am not focussed on him!” Keith quickly defends himself.“Um, yes, you are,” Shiro says. “What I don’t understand is, avoiding and ignoring people is your specialty. So, why can’t you just do the same with Lance?”Keith lets out a defeated sigh. “I don’t know, Shiro… He just really bothers me with his attitude and everything.” Keith looks at Shiro and clenches his jaw. “I hate to admit it, but he really knows how to get under my skin.”“Clearly,” Shiro says in amusement. “Someone should give Lance an award for revealing the emotions of the ever-stoic Keith Kogane.”“That is not funny. And no one is revealing anything about me.”Shiro chuckles before saying, “You should go to bed. Tomorrow is a big day.”“What’s going on tomorrow? It’s Saturday.” Keith already started having a bad feeling about tomorrow.“Well, apparently they are gonna make some big announcement at dinner tomorrow.”“What announcement?” “Don’t know.” Shiro shrugs. “Guess, we will have to wait till tomorrow.”“Okay…” Keith yawns quietly and gets up to leave the common room. “Goodnight, Shiro. You should go to bed, too.”“Yeah. Goodnight, Keith.”The next day passes by quickly for Keith. He spent most of his day alone, just the way he likes it. Mostly, he was in the library doing homework, and before he knew it, it was time for dinner. After dropping off his study materials in his room, he makes his way to the Great Hall.No matter how many times he has been inside the Great Hall, he is always amazed by how magnificent it looked. The four long tables of the four houses were placed in the center of the room with students sitting in their respective seats. Each student had a golden plate and a golden goblet, with a variety of food deliciously displayed in front of them. Thousands of candles floated above the tables in midair, beautifully lighting up the grand room. But the most beautiful feature of the Great Hall was the velvety black ceiling dotted with silver stars, the ceiling looked so real it was hard to tell there was a ceiling there at all.While still admiring the room, Keith slowly makes his way to Gryffindor’s table on the far left. He walks towards Shiro and sees him talking to Ravenclaw’s Quidditch captain. Keith quickly takes a seat beside Shiro.“Oh, hey, Keith.” Shiro greets, turning around to look at Keith.Keith stares Shiro dead in the eyes with a serious expression. “I see you are fraternizing with the enemy again.” Both Shiro and Ravenclaw’s captain roll their eyes.“Nice to see you too.” Ravenclaw’s captain says, her face stretching into a smile. “Congratulations on your win. It really sucks to lose, but you were great yesterday, Keith.”Keith lets go of his fake serious exterior and relaxes into a small smile. “Thank you, Allura. You guys put up an excellent game.”“Of course, we did,” Allura says. “I am sorry about Lance. I heard you were upset because of him after the game.”Keith turns to look at Shiro with a look that could kill a person. “Do you tell her everything?”“…Yes???” Shiro looked a little confused by the question. “She is my girlfriend. No, secrets between us.”“What about the secrets between us?!” Keith exclaims. “We have a special bond. We are brothers!”“Since when?!” Shiro actually had the audacity to look shocked.“Since birth!”Allura chuckles at the siblings’ interaction, they stop their rambling and look at her with confused faces.“You guys are cute,” Allura says, smiling fondly. “I have to go back. I will see you guys later.” She quickly pecks Shiro’s lips before running off towards Ravenclaw’s table. Keith watches as she takes a seat next to her friends which much to Keith’s displeasure included Lance.Keith was about to continue reprimanding Shiro for his betrayal when their Headmaster’s voice echoed through the Great Hall. Everyone in the room slowly stopped talking as their attention slowly fell upon what the Headmaster had to say. The tall man stood on the raised platform, a calm and encouraging smile visible on his face.“Good evening, students.” Headmaster Alfor started. “As you all probably know, I have an announcement to make today.”The room suddenly buzzed with the voices of students speaking with each other, trying to guess what this new announcement could be about.“Yeah, I know you all are excited to know what this is about.” Alfor continued. “So, without further ado, I will get straight to the point. This year our school has decided to do an exchange program between houses.”There were whines and groans all around the room, no one was really thrilled to go to another house even if it was only for a few weeks. Personally, Keith was mortified by the idea. It took him years to fit into his current house, and that’s with Shiro’s help, even with all that he still didn’t have that many friends. So, going to another house and redoing all that is 100% impossible for Keith.“Well that being said, this year is just going to be a trial,” Alfor explains. “So, we will only be using one student to see how well he/she fares in another house. If this exchange program is successful, then we will be adding it to your regular school curriculum from next year onwards.”With that, Alfor walks towards a huge Goblet placed at the bottom of the raised platform. Blue flames were dancing above the Goblet, something told Keith those flames weren’t as hot as they looked.“The Goblet will decide who is going to be this year’s exchange student.”“Relax, Keith,” Shiro says to a fidgeting Keith. “The chances of it being you is almost zero.”“Okay.” Keith watches as Alfor reaches his hands into the blue flame and pulls out a tiny piece of paper. When Alfor calls out the name on the paper, all the colour drains from Keith’s face.“Keith Kogane!” There was applause all around the room, everyone was happy that it wasn’t their name that was picked. Keith did not miss the smirk that appeared on Lance’s face at Keith’s misery.Keith slowly stands up while staring daggers at his brother.“I did say ‘almost.’” Shiro defends himself.“Well Keith,” Alfor says. “let’s see what house the Goblet chooses for you.”Keith prayed to whatever god is out there to put him in any house but Ravenclaw. He did not want to be in the same house as Lance, anything but that.“Don’t worry, I doubt it’s going to be Ravenclaw,” Shiro whispers to Keith. “I am sure it chooses based on the personality like the Sorting Hat. You are probably gonna be put in Slytherin.” While Keith knew what Shiro said was in no way a compliment, he would gladly take being put in Slytherin over Ravenclaw.Alfor once again reaches towards the flames and pulls out a paper.“And the house Keith is being put in is…” Keith holds his breath as he waits for Alfor to continue. “Ravenclaw!”A huge part of Keith wanted to run out of the halls and to the open yards and just scream until his throat hurt. Keith never understood why shit like this always happened to him.“There is one more name I need to pull out from the Goblet,” Alfor says, Keith sags his shoulder, suddenly feeling exhausted. “Someone from Ravenclaw will be your guide and will help you adjust to your new house.” At this, Keith’s head snaps up, looking horrified. Not only is he going to the worst possible house he could go to, but now there is going to be someone to babysit him? This couldn’t get any worse for him.“Keith, it’s going to be fine.” Shiro was feeling really bad for his little brother. “Hey, maybe it’s someone handsome and cute. Or, it could be someone you already get along with.”Okay, that’s true. Now that Keith thinks about it, there are many people he knows in Ravenclaw like Pidge, Hunk, Matt and of course Allura. To be honest, he knows more people in Ravenclaw than any other house. Keith doesn’t hate Ravenclaw, it’s Lance who he doesn’t like not his house. While standing there, Keith reminds himself of that. Shiro is right, Ravenclaw is not such a bad place to be, he has friends there. Sure, Lance’s there too, but he could always just ignore him. And a guide is not a bad thing, either.Keith watches as Alfor pulls out another paper from the Goblet. “And Keith, your guide from Ravenclaw is, Lance McClain.” I am gonna go kill myself. Keith thinks to himself as soon as Lance’s name leaves Alfor’s mouth.“Well, at least the first part of what I said is true. He is handsome and cute.” Keith gives his brother a death glare, Shiro quickly gets the cue. “I’ll stop talking now.”“WHAT?!” Keith hears a sudden outburst from the table in front of them, and of course, it was Lance. He was standing up in his spot, looking at Keith and then the Headmaster with a horrified expression. There were giggles and chuckles all around the room, everyone knew about the two Seekers’ rocky relationship, everyone found this whole situation amusing.“Is there something wrong, Lance?” Alfor asks, genuinely concerned.“Yes!” Lance exclaims. “This is wrong. I don’t want to babysit HIM!” He pointed an accusing finger at Keith.Keith was too shocked and tired at the turn of the events that he didn’t even bother with a comeback, but that didn’t stop him from venomously glaring at the Cuban boy.“The Goblet’s made its decision, Lance,” Alfor says calmly. “I can’t change it.”“But—” Lance starts.“No, buts Lance.” Alfor interrupts. “This is the final decision. You will be Keith’s guide starting tomorrow and for the next two months.”Keith didn’t think Alfor could drop anymore surprises on him, but guess he was wrong. “Two months?!”“Yes, Keith. Two months.” Alfor states. “You can keep your Gryffindor robs, but starting tomorrow you are a Ravenclaw in every other sense. You can move your things into the Ravenclaw boy’s dormitory tomorrow. Lance is going to help you around.”Keith looks at Lance to see his face scrunched up, he looked like he wanted to do anything but this. The same could be said for Keith. For the first time ever, the two boys were on the same page, neither wanted tomorrow to come or the next two months for that matter.Alfor slowly walks back to his position on the raised platform. “Hopefully, all of you somewhat understand how the exchange program is going to work, if it does become successful.” Alfor stops to look at Keith. “All of this depends on how Keith performs as a Ravenclaw for the next two months.”With that he ends his announcement, slowly people start to leave the room. Keith was walking out of the Great Hall with Shiro when Alfor stops Keith. Next to him stood a very unhappy Lance.  “Keith, come with me,” Alfor says and starts to walk towards what Keith presumes to be the Headmaster’s room.“You go ahead,” Keith says to Shiro before following their Headmaster with Lance by his side. Neither boys speak a word all the way to their destination. After what feels like hours of awkward silence, they reach the spiral staircase and finally the Headmaster’s room.“So, does either of you have any questions?”“Yeah,” Lance answers quickly. “Why am I doing this again?”“Because it is a good way to create friendships with students from other houses.”“But I don’t want to be friends with him.”“The feeling is mutual,” Keith mutters under his breath.“See? Headmaster, this is a terrible idea.”“Keith. Lance. I know you boys have your differences.” Alfor says calmly. “But this is the chance for you to get along and fix those differences. Have you ever tried to be friends with each other before?”Alfor looked between Keith and Lance while they glanced at each other through the corners of their eyes. They both hung their heads down in a silent ‘no.’“Then, this is the perfect opportunity. Who knows, you might have more in common than you think.”“Doubt it.” Lance mutter under his breath.Alfor sighs heavily. “Will you at least try? Please?” Alfor looks at the boys with pleading eyes.“Okay.” Both boys mumble almost at the same time.“Great. Now, any questions?” They shake their heads. “Then, you are free to leave.”Keith and Lance quickly exit the room and together walks towards their dormitories. They weren’t walking together because they wanted to, it’s just that their dormitories were in the same directions. The awkward silence was bothering both of them, especially Lance, but it was Keith who broke it.“Just so I know where we stand…” Keith says, he does not bother to look at Lance and stares straight ahead. “Are you going to at least try to get along with me?”“Are you?” Lance asks. “Are you going to try to get along with me?”“I asked you first… No, never mind.” Keith didn’t want to start another fight. “If you are willing to try then so am I.”Lance didn’t say anything for a while so, Keith turned to look at him. The taller boy looked at Keith with a slightly amused and surprised expression. “Really? You will try to be friends with me?”“Well, I didn’t really say friends, but…” Keith says. “I will try not to start an argument every time we meet. As long as you promise to do the same.”“Okay,” Lance says. “I will try to get along with you, too.”At that point, both boys genuinely believed that they could do just that. They really thought they could survive the next two months with a moderate amount of fighting, but things are easier said than done. They thought two months is all they need to spend with each other, hoping they will be free of each other after that, but life is full of surprises.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

Lance stood inside the Ravenclaw tower, contemplating what to do with his current situation with Keith. Lance isn’t the type of person who liked to run away from his problems, but that’s exactly what he wanted to do. He really just wanted to ignore the problem until it goes away, but he knew that wouldn’t solve anything. Lance doesn’t know the exact reason why he doesn’t like Keith, but he simply doesn’t like him. To Lance, Keith seems so unsocial and moody, yet he thinks so highly of himself. Keith’s overall attitude pisses Lance off, and so, Lance always tries his best to return the favour. But none of that mattered anymore, Lance knew he had to survive the next two months with Keith one way or another, he had no other choice.The blue-eyed boy lets out a heavy sigh and slowly ascends the spiral staircase, walking towards the Ravenclaw Common Room on the fifth floor. He immediately sees Keith’s lean figure standing right next to the Common Room’s entrance. His hair was tied up in a ponytail, he was wearing black jeans and a black hoodie, nothing too flashy. And yet, it worked wonders on him, there were people (mostly girls but some guys) stopping to stare or look at him. Lance knew Keith did not like bringing attention to himself. He has constantly seen Keith trying to blend into the background as if he was trying to fool everyone into thinking he doesn’t exist. Keith probably thinks no one really notices him, but in truth, people notice Keith a lot. By just simply standing in front of the Ravenclaw Common Room, Keith has people staring and looking at him. It is hard to be invisible if you are so damn attractive without even trying to be. And yes, Lance knows that Keith Kogane is an attractive boy, no point in denying that.Lance decides to watch Keith for a while longer. The black-haired boy was clearly uncomfortable in his current environment. He had his arms crossed over his chest, it almost looked like he was being defensive. Lance could tell Keith was nervous, he was continuously tapping his fingers. Unfortunately, he could not really see Keith’s expression, he held his gaze downwards, subtly trying to avoid eye contact with everyone else. After deciding that Keith has suffered enough for a day, Lance decides to put Keith out of his misery.“Hey, Mullet.” Usually, Lance would have done something annoying or said something to piss Keith off, but today Lance wasn’t feeling it and also, they had an agreement.Keith’s head quickly shoots up to look at Lance, he sees a number of emotions run through Keith’s face. First, it was panic, then relief, then realization, to confusion, to annoyance, to frustration and it finally settled on something Lance recognized; anger.“WHAT THE HELL??!! WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? I HAVE BEEN WAITING HERE FOR SO LONG!!!” Keith starts in a panicked voice. “I CAME LOOKING FOR YOU, AND THEN I GOT LOST! I FINALLY FOUND THE COMMON ROOM, BUT THEN I COULDN’T GET IN! I DIDN’T KNOW WHO TO ASK FOR HELP AND—”“Calm down. I am only like five minutes late.” Lance tries slowly, but Keith continues his rambling. He does not even seem to have registered Lance’s voice. “Keith. Keith! KEITH!”Keith finally stops talking, realizing the situation he had created. He was yelling at the top of his lungs, people were staring at him weirdly. Lance was looking at him with slightly concerned eyes.“Have you stopped panicking?” There was no teasing tone in Lance’s voice.“I wasn’t panicking…” Lance raises a doubtful eyebrow at this. “But I am okay.”“If you say so…” Lance turns around with a huge smile on his face towards the people watching the two boys. “Okay people, nothing to see here anymore. It’s just me and Mullet Head here having our usual tantrums, but I think we are okay now, right Mullet?”“Don’t call me Mullet,” Keith mumbles but nods his head anyways.“Yep, everything is fine.”As the crowd disperses, Lance overhears people muttering about how Keith and Lance are definitely not going to get along for the next two months or how this exchange program is going to be a total failure. Lance knows that everyone at Hogwarts thought the same thing, but it still pissed him off. Why can’t people have a little faith in them, but at the end of the day, Lance thought the same thing, too. How could he possibly get along with Keith Kogane, they are polar opposites for god’s sake!Lance looks around, there wasn’t a single student in sight around the two boys anymore. Well, that’s to be expected, everyone was most likely outside enjoying themselves. Lance looks at Keith and sighs heavily.“What the hell? Don’t just look at me and sigh like that. It’s rude as hell.”“Ah, no. I didn’t mean to sigh at you.” Lance slightly sags his shoulder. It was just morning, and he was already tired. “I was just thinking about how I am supposed to get through these two months… No offense, but I really don’t like you.”“How is that not offensive? But well, the feeling is mutual.” There was no hatred or anger in Keith’s voice. It was a simple statement. It was a simple fact. “And I was thinking about the same thing… Well, think about it like this; it’s only two months, it could have been longer.”“………Since when did you become an optimist?” Lance asks, a small tired smile playing at the corner of his lips.Keith looks Lance straight in the eyes but decides to ignore the question. Then he looks at the large wooden door in front of him, it had no handle or keyhole. The only thing visible on the door was a bronze knocker in the shape of an eagle. “Are you gonna open the door or what?”“Oh, right.”Lance reaches his slender hands towards the knocker, using it to knock on the wooden door. Almost immediately, the beak of the eagle opens and a musical voice question, “Which came first, the phoenix or the flame?”Lance turns to look at Keith. “What do you think, Mullet?”Keith slightly scrunches his face in confusion. “What? I should answer that?”Lance nods his head.“Um…. Phoenix?” The door did not open at Keith’s answer, he heard a loud sigh beside him. He turns to see Lance looking at him disappointingly.“It’s a riddle, Keith. The answer is not going be so straightforward.”“What? That’s your fault. You didn’t tell me it’s a riddle!” Keith complains.“I shouldn’t have to. That much should be obvious.” Lance says.“So, it asks you a riddle and then what?”“You have to get the answer right; otherwise you cannot enter,” Lance explains.“So, what if I get it wrong?”“Then you have to wait for someone else who gets it right.” Lance looks at a slightly annoyed Keith. “So?” Lance cocks his head towards the door.Keith thinks for a moment before shaking his head. “I am not really good at riddles and stuff.”“Then you are going to have a hard time getting into the Common Room,” Lance states simply.“Well, do YOU know the answer?” Keith asks pointedly.“Let’s see, which came first the phoenix or the flame?” Lance repeats the question and thinks for a moment. “The answer is most likely; a circle has no beginning.”“Well, reasoned.” The musical voice says, immediately the door swings open.“Well, welcome to the Ravenclaw Common Room, I guess,” Lance says quietly. When Keith doesn’t say anything, Lance looks at him in confusion. “What?”  “It’s just that you are being…” Keith trails off.“What?” Keith mumbles something under his breath. “Yeah, I didn’t hear any of that.”“I said you are being nice,” Keith says, his cheeks slightly dusted red. Despite his embarrassment, he continues. “You are not being you. At least not like the Lance McClain I know. You are not being rude and mean and violent.”“You want me to be rude to you?” Lance asks, amused by Keith’s sudden change in character. “What are you a masochist or something?”At this, Keith’s whole face turns red, and he becomes a stuttering mess. “I-I Th-That’s not—”Suddenly, Lance burst out laughing, doubling over. He tried to hold back his laughter, he really did, but he couldn’t. And once he started, he couldn’t stop.“Stop laughing!” A beet-red Keith demand. “I take it all back. You are still as rude as hell!”“Sorry, sorry. It’s just your face.” Lance says as his fits of laughter slowly calm down. “I have never seen you so embarrassed. Didn’t know you were capable of making an expression like that.”“I-I wasn’t embarrassed.”“Right…” Lance says sarcastically. After a few moments of silence, he continues. “As for me being nice to you, I promised you yesterday that I won’t start any unnecessary fights with you. Plus, I hate that everyone in this damn school just assumes we can’t get along. Maybe a part of me wants to prove them wrong.”“You literally just said you hate me a few minutes ago.” Keith deadpans.“Hey, don’t twist my words!” Lance says, pointing an accusing finger at Keith. “I didn’t say I hate you. I said I don’t like you. There is a difference. I just don’t like how committed you are to being unsocial, you make it really hard to approach you as a friend.”“So, what do you want?”“I want to try being friends with you, man. I hate to admit it, but in my own weird-ass way, I respect you… You are an amazing Seeker, that’s why I made you my rival.” Lance says sheepishly. He never thought he would ever talk to Keith like this. “But I know being friends is not a one-sided thing. So… if you hate me and don’t want to be friends with me then that’s fine too… I guess.”There were a few minutes of silence where Keith was comprehending everything Lance said, during which Lance looked everywhere but at Keith.“I also didn’t say I hated you,” Keith says quietly, but the silence around them carried his voice over to Lance. “I also want to try being your friend.”As Keith’s words slowly registered inside Lance’s brain, his face lit up like the sun. Lance didn’t realize how much he had wanted to be Keith’s friend until that moment and Keith… Well, Keith didn’t know how beautiful Lance’s smile was until that moment.“Great!” Lance chuckles. “But man, that was probably one of the most embarrassing conversations I have had in my life.”“Yeah.” Keith agrees.“Well, once again Keith Kogane, welcome to Ravenclaw,” Lance says, this time more energetically, while holding out his hand towards the Ravenclaw Common Room. Keith mutters a ‘thank you’ before entering.The room that faced the two boys was wide and circular. The floor beneath their feet was covered in a midnight blue carpet which reflected onto the domed ceiling above their heads. Around the room, blue and bronze silk curtains were hung on high arched windows. There were tables, chairs and bookcases placed all around the grand room. There were only a few students in the common room, and they were mostly keeping to themselves. Keith felt a sense of calmness and peacefulness standing inside the Ravenclaw Common Room, and Keith really liked it.“Is it always so quiet here?” Keith asks.“Yeah, pretty much.” Lance answers. “Apparently, being noisy and talkative is not very Ravenclaw like.”Keith looks straight at Lance and raises both his eyebrows.“Yeah, yeah. I know, I am loud and annoying.” Lance admits, he starts walking, Keith follows closely behind. “What can I say, I just don’t like it when it’s too quiet.”When Keith doesn’t say anything, Lance continues as they climb the staircase to the boy’s dormitory. “People often tell me I don’t act or behave like a Ravenclaw.”“Yeah, same.” Keith didn’t mean to say it out loud.“What?” Lance turns to look at Keith.“Uh, it’s just people say the same thing about me,” Keith says, sadly. “I don’t act like a Gryffindor. Gryffindors are all very energetic and lively, but as you said… I am unsocial. So, I don’t exactly have an outgoing personality.”“But you are brave.” Lance’s voice sounded slightly confused, but also very sincere that it took Keith by surprise. “Isn’t bravery like the number one requisite for being a Gryffindor.”“I guess…” Keith says quietly as they reach the top of the stairs.“Remember how you fought that dragon last year. There was like fire all around you, yet you faced that huge beast head-on. I remember being super pissed at you for being so flashy and cool.” Lance slowly recalls the past. “But I also remember thinking, ‘Wow, this guy is really something else!” Lance almost looked like he had forgotten that Keith was right beside him. “To be honest, at that time, your courage and determination scared me a little. Guess that goes to show why they didn’t put me in Gryffindor, huh?” Lance turns to look at the other boy. Keith keeps a passive expression on the outside, but his mind was a total mess. Wait, did Lance just compliment me? I mean, he actually complimented me? No teasing, nothing? And he thinks I am brave? And cool? Is this some kind of prank? Wait, what the hell is going on?!!“Keith, you are a Gryffindor without a doubt. Don’t let anyone else make you doubt that.” Lance sounded so sure of his words, his lips stretched into a bright and confident smile, which pierced right through Keith’s fragile heart. “Also, we are here.”Lance opens the door to a room decorated with blue and gold colours, with arched windows just like in the Common Room. Keith was quickly able to recognize Lance’s side of the room on the right; a large bookshelf was placed in between his study table and his messy bed, on which there were parchments and a quill. Compared to that, the left side of the room had a neatly made bed and simple study table, this Keith assumed to be his side of the room. The room was divided by a double-sided couch, the couch had four seats, two of them facing Lance’s side of the room and the other two facing Keith’s side of the room.“Um, if you want more privacy, I can ask for a curtain or something,” Lance says, walking towards the couch in the middle and picking up some books he had kept on Keith’s side of the couch. “Hunk and I were okay with this arrangement so, we never bothered asking.”“Shiro told me that Hunk is rooming with Matt.”“Yeah, temporarily. He should be back when you leave after finishing your exchange program.” Lance says as he tidies up everything on his bed. “Until then, I am supposed to room with you and help you fit in. Did you get a new schedule?”“Yeah, why?”“Mind showing me?”Keith digs through his bag, finding his new schedule and showing it to Lance. The taller boy quickly looks over it and sighs. “This schedule is exactly the same as mine.”“What?! That can’t be true.” Lance takes out his own schedule from his table to show it to Keith. “Oh, come on! This is just ridiculous.”“So, basically, they want us to be stuck together 24/7,” Lance says. “Well, whatever. It’s only for two months.” “Two long months.” Keith mumbles.“Ah, I see pessimistic Keith has made a come back.” Lance chuckles lightly. “Anyway, is that the only stuff you need?” Lance points to the only luggage Keith carried, his huge backpack.“Yeah.” Keith walks towards his new bed, settling his backpack on it.“Um, do you want me to help you with anything?” Lance asks as Keith starts unpacking his things.“No.”“Okay…” There were few moments of silence, neither boys said anything, and Lance just stood there awkwardly not knowing what to do. Keith realized he was being unsocial again when he felt the awkward and tensed atmosphere in the room.“Um, Lance. If you don’t mind can you help me unpack?” Keith asks, breaking the silence. The tensed atmosphere immediately dropped, and Lance excitedly agreed to help Keith. Neither boys realized at the time, but that was the moment their relationship changed from competing rivals to something else, something new.The rest of the day went by with the two boys trying to understand each other. To both their surprise, they were easily able to talk to each other about mundane things like their family, their hobbies, their favourite subject, and so on. To say the time they spend together was 100% chummy would be a lie, insults were thrown in now and then, but it didn’t bother them now as much as it did before. They were surprisingly getting along and before either boy realized it the next day had arrived.“So… First up is potions, huh?” Keith asks.“Yeah.” Lance answer. “Ready?” Keith nods, and together they enter their potions classroom.As soon as they enter people turn their heads towards the two boys, staring at them. They had received the same treatment when they had entered the Great Hall that morning. Well, it was an unusual sight as far as everyone else was concerned. Lance McClain and Keith Kogane, Hogwarts best and worst rivals calmly entering a room side by side without bickering or throwing insults at each other was a rare sight indeed. The two wizards had received many stares and looks of surprise by their schoolmates throughout the entire day, they had quickly gotten used to it. The atmosphere around both Keith and Lance demanded that everyone should just screw off and leave them alone, so no one dared to approach them with any questions or teasing. Shiro had given Keith a look of surprise and then confusion when they had met inside the Great Hall but did not comment on it.Keith and Lance silently take a seat side by side at the very back of the class in a corner, this gave their classmates less opportunity to stare at them. Lance starts to absentmindedly flip through his potions book; he memorizes the ingredients and the steps for potions he personally found interesting. Meanwhile, Keith watches Lance in amusement as the brunette concentrates hard on memorizing.“What are you doing?” Keith asks finally.Lance looks up at Keith in confusion. “Um, studying?”“We haven’t learned that stuff yet,” Keith says, pointing to Lance’s potions textbook.“Yeah well, I guess I like to stay ahead of things.”“You sure do,” Keith says quietly looking to the front of the class.Soon their potions professor, Zarkon walks into the classroom. Keith never liked Professor Zarkon for various reasons. Firstly, he simply did not like potions class, he was not very studious, to begin with. Two, for no reason at all, Professor Zarkon liked to pick on Keith during class. And finally, Professor Zarkon reminded Keith of someone he was very much scared of. Most students, in general, are scared of Professor Zarkon, add onto that Keith’s fears, he was terrified of Zarkon and his appearance.“Alright, class.” Zarkon starts. “Today, we will learn about how to make a memory potion and next class we will make the actual potion. Any questions before we begin?”Once Zarkon makes sure no one had any questions, he starts the class. Keith as usual soon zones out, easily getting distracted by the things around him. He looks to his side and sees Lance intently listening to Zarkon and taking notes, Keith sighs more loudly than he had meant to. He wonders how people can just simply sit by and listen to one person talk for so long.“Keith!” He feels Lance nudge him.“What?”In response, Lance points his head towards the front of the class where Zarkon was glaring right at Keith. Instinctively, he stands up from his seat.“Well, Keith. Since you are paying so much attention in my class…” Zarkon says. “Would you mind telling me what the main ingredient for a memory potion?”“Jobberknoll feathers,” Lance whispers under his breath beside Keith. Keith wasn’t so sure he should go with Lance’s answer for all he knew Lance could be giving him the wrong answer. But then again, Keith didn’t know the right answer, either.“Jobberknoll feathers?” Keith’s voice sounded unsure, but as a look of surprise crossed Zarkon’s face, he knew he had gotten the answer right.“Okay, Keith. Next question, what is the final colour of a memory potion?”Even before Zarkon had finished asking the question, Lance had started tapping his bookmark with his index finger. Keith hadn’t noticed this bookmark before, but now that he saw it, the bookmark was a beautiful bright golden colour.“Golden.” This time there was no hesitation in Keith’s voice. From the corner of his eyes he saw Lance smile slightly, for a second he thought Lance had given him the wrong answer, but Zarkon’s look of surprise said otherwise.“Okay, you may sit,” Zarkon says.Keith quickly sits back down and turns to look at Lance, the blue-eyed boy quickly turns to meet Keith’s eyes. The eyes that looked back at Keith were soft, and a small smile still played at the corners of his lips.“Thank you,” Keith says softly.In response, Lance winks while his lips stretch into a wide smile, he quickly turns his attention back to the front of the class. That small exchange between him and Lance did various things to Keith’s heart. Keith was frozen in his seat, his heart beating at a rapid speed without his permission, and he could feel the heat gathering on his face.Keith realizes he was staring at Lance when the other boy turns towards Keith, raising an eyebrow at the ravenette. Keith quickly turns away from Lance, facing forward.“Are you alright?” Lance asks. “Your face is really red.”Keith didn’t trust himself to speak without stuttering so, he simply nods his head. Keith could tell by the way Lance’s eyes lingered on him that he didn’t believe him, but he didn’t ask any more questions.For the rest of the class, Keith was very aware of the boy beside him. If Keith was distracted by other things around him at the beginning of class, now he was purely distracted by Lance and his features. Keith started wondering how he had not been distracted by Lance sooner. He studied Lance’s sharp jawline, his bright blue eyes that perfectly contrasted against his tanned skin, and his lips that looked so soft. Suddenly, those lips stretched into a half-smile and half-smirk, Lance bit his lower lip then turned to look at Keith.“You are staring… at me.” Lance says slowly.“S-sorry.” Keith mentally facepalms because he didn’t even attempt to deny it and basically just admitted to staring at him.“No, need to apologize,” Lance says, smiling. Keith half expected Lance to say something self condescending, but nothing followed.After what seemed like hours to Keith, the class is finally dismissed. Keith quickly gathers his things and walks out of the class, Lance follows right behind him.“So, what’s next?” Keith asks without looking at Lance.“Oh, this one’s your favourite,” Lance says as they start walking towards their next class. “Defence Against the Dark Arts.”“Finally!”Lance chuckles. “I have always thought this, but you really are hit first ask questions later type of guy, aren’t you?”“What? You got a problem with that?” Keith asks, looking at Lance.“Nah,” Lance says. “Actually, I think it suits your personality quite well.”“That does not sound like a compliment.”“It’s not.” Keith glares at Lance in response which just makes the other boy chuckled again.“I wonder what he is going to teach us today.”“I hope its how to kill an annoying Ravenclaw.” Keith murmurs half-heartedly.Lance gasps loudly, dramatically holding his right hand to his chest. “You wouldn’t!”“Ohhhhhh, I would,” Keith says smugly.Lance looks a Keith for a while, studying his face. Then he slowly brings his mouth close to Keith’s left ear and whispers, “The face you were making in potions class said otherwise.”Lance brings his face back up to see a beet red Keith. Lance couldn’t help but laugh at Keith’s cute expression. Leaving an embarrassed Keith outside, Lance walks into their Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom.Lance starts worrying about Keith when he does not come into class after a few minutes. Lance was about to go and check up on him when Keith quickly slides into the seat beside Lance as their Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor walks in. Once everyone was settled in, Professor Antok starts the class.“Okay class, today we will be learning a simple spell.” Antok starts walking towards a chest box placed in the center of the classroom. It was vigorously shaking, almost like something was trying to get out of it. “Does anyone know what this is?”“It’s a Boggart.” Keith immediately recognizes that voice as Pidge’s, he turns and raises an eyebrow at Lance.“Oh yeah, Pidge’s in our class,” Lance says. “Hunk’s here too.” Lance points his index finger towards the big guy sitting next to Pidge.“That’s the correct answer, Holt,” Antok says. “Now, everyone come here.”All the students stand up to go and stand in front of Antok and the chest box. Hunk and Pidge go to stand beside Keith and Lance.“I didn’t believe it when Shiro and Allura said it but…. wow, you guys are actually getting along!” Leave it to Pidge to break the ice.“Yayyyy, surprise!” Keith says sarcastically, Lance slightly huffs beside him.“But it is a surprise.” Hunks says. “You guys getting along is like…. impossible. Are you guys sure you are okay?” Both Keith and Lance knew Hunk didn’t mean to be rude and that he was genuinely worried for his friends.“We are fine Hunk,” Lance says. “Keith is… Well, he is Keith. But he is not so bad, after all. Plus, I found a super cute side of him.” Lance gives his best friend a thumbs up.“Cute side?” Pidge raises an eyebrow at Keith who was desperately trying to pretend he did not hear what Lance had just said.“Does anyone know what a Boggart looks like?” Professor Antok question. Keith silently thanks Professor Antok for asking that question and distracting Pidge.“No one knows what a Boggart looks like because it keeps changing shape.” Pidge answer. “But it takes the form of one’s worst fear.” At the last part, Keith tenses.“Excellent answer, Holt,” Antok says. “Today, we will learn a spell that will help you battle a Boggart. All you have to say is ‘riddikulus’ and think about something fun or amusing. Any questions?”Once Professor Antok makes sure that no one had any questions, he continues, “First, let’s do this without your wands. Repeat after me, ‘riddikulus.’”“‘riddikulus’” The class echoes. Antok makes his class repeat this a few more times before moving on. “Alright, Holt, come here.” Pidge walks up to stand a few feet in front of the Boggart. “You ready?” Pidge nervously nods her head in confirmation, and the Professor opens the chest box releasing the Boggart inside it. Suddenly, there was a half man and half wolf-like creature in front of the tiny girl. Honestly, the werewolf looming over Pidge looks terrifying.Pidge points her wand at the werewolf and shouts, “‘riddikulus.’” Immediately the creature shrinks down, turning into a cute puppy and Pidge walks back to her friends.“Your worst fear is a werewolf?” Keith asks.“Yes and no. Last night I was reading a book based on werewolves.” Pidge explains. “So, right now, I am kind of terrified of them, but it will pass.”“Alright everyone, line up.” The students make a line in front of the Boggart and slowly, each student takes a turn to practice the new spell.Finally, it was Keith’s turn. Lance had noticed Keith getting paler and paler as his turn came closer. The shorter boy was shaking, his face was scrunched up in a terrifying look. From Keith’s expression, Lance could tell that the other boy knew exactly what the Boggart was going to change into when it was Keith’s turn.“Keith, it’s your turn,” Lance says, but seeing Keith terrified face Lance asks. “Do you want me to go before you?”Keith lets out a slightly relieved sigh. “Thank you.”Lance goes to stand in front of the Boggart; honestly, Lance had no idea what to expect. There were so many things that scared him, but nothing particular came to his mind. Suddenly, there was a giant and bloody clown hovering over him. Of course, it’s a clown, because what else could it possibly be. Lance thinks sarcastically, he points his wand at the clown, shouting out the incantation ‘riddikulus.’ The clown quickly balls up and turns into a red balloon.It was Keith’s turn; Lance smiles and gives Keith’s shoulder a reassuring grip. With hesitant legs, the ravenette moves to stand in front of the Boggart. The Boggart quickly changes shape. A tall man with dark hair and tanned skin stood in front of Keith. He had an horrendous grin on his face and piercing red eyes glared back at Keith.Lance sees Keith lifting his wand with trembling pale hands and saying, “‘riddikulus.’” The man did not disappear but simply started walking towards Keith.“‘riddikulus.’” Keith shouts more strongly, but the man continues walking towards. Keith takes a few steps back, his hands shaking more than before. Absolute fear was visible in Keith's eyes. Lance watches as Keith’s wand slip out of his hand, Keith falls to the ground and looks up at the man in front of him with terrified and tear-filled eyes. Lance’s body moves on its own accord, going to stand between Keith and the man. The Boggart quickly changes its form from the man to a clown. Lance points his want and shouts out the incantation, banishing the Boggart.“Keith, are you alright?” Lance asks kneeling down next to the distraught boy. Keith was breathing heavily, and tears had started to fall down his pale face. “Keith?” Lance tries once again, but he could say by the look on Keith’s face that he was still in shock.“Professor, I don’t think Keith’s feeling good,” Lance says. “May we be excused to go back to the dorms?”“Yeah, you two may go.” Professor Antok. “McClain, make sure he is alright.”“I will.” Lance answers.“Keith?” Lance tries to get Keith’s attention, but the other boy just continues to stare down at the ground with wide, tear-filled eyes. Lance gently places his right hand on Keith’s cheeks, the other boy flinches at the sudden touch, his eyes turning to look at Lance. The blue-eyed boy wipes a tear running down Keith’s face, but more follows. “Let’s go back, alright?” Lance's voice was just above a whisper.Keith answers with barely a nod. Lance stands up, pulling Keith up with him. He holds onto Keith’s arms, steadying him and not letting go. He places his right hand behind Keith, supporting him from the back.“Let’s go, buddy.”All the way to their room Keith was quivering uncontrollably, Lance tried his best to hide Keith from prying eyes. Once they were in their room, Lance cautiously placed the trembling boy on his bed. He sat beside Keith, gently holding him in his arms, trying to comfort him. When Lance sees that Keith wasn’t getting any better, he walks over to his desk, opening his drawer, he takes out a small bottle and walks back to Keith.“Keith,” Lance says in a soft voice. “Please drink this.” He holds up the bottle filled with blue liquid. When he is sure that Keith isn’t rejecting his offer, he slowly brings the bottle to Keith’s lips and gently tips the bottle so that the liquid slips down into Keith’s mouth. Keith without questioning it swallows the liquid, Lance was slightly shocked and happy at the fact that Keith trusted him enough to drink the potion without asking any questionsA few seconds later, Keith’s shaking slowly decreases until it comes to a full stop. At first, Keith looks relieved, soon his face twists into confusion.“How are you feeling?” Lance asks, the worry was clearly visible on his sun-kissed face.After a pause, Keith answers with another question. “Lance, why do I suddenly feel so peaceful? What was in that bottle?”“Um, it was a calming draught.” Lance answers. “It will wear off after a while, but I think it will give you enough time to gather your thoughts… or something.”“… It’s kind of freaking me out.” Keith mutters.“Huh?! You are still freaking out?” Lance asks, shocked. “I thought you said it helped you calm down.”“No, it did!” Keith says then sighs heavily. “It's just that I feel so calm it’s freaking me out. I mean not really freaking me out, but you know… I have never felt this calm before.”“Oh.” That’s all Lance says in reply.They sit in silence for a few minutes, then Keith realizes something. “Wait, why do you have calming draught in your room?”The eyes looking at Keith widens before looking away. Lance doesn’t say anything, the silence stretches, and Keith decides not to force an answer out of him. Especially because, it could backfire, forcing Keith to talk about what happened in class.But just when Keith thought Lance wasn’t going to say anything, he speaks up. “I have panic attacks.”Keith doesn’t say anything.“I am from a muggle family; I have five siblings, but I am the only one born with magic.” Lance continues, hesitantly. “For the longest time, I thought I was a freak, a monster because that’s what everyone around me said I was… I wasn’t loved by anyone, and I wasn’t needed by anyone.” Lance seemed to be lost in his own thoughts, forgetting Keith was beside him. Silent tears streamed down his face.At this point, Lance seemed to be whispering to himself. “I don’t want to be alone… I am scared of loneliness… It hurts…” Lance clutches the front of his shirt, a pained look on his face.Keith couldn’t help it anymore. He throws his arms around Lance, holding him tightly. “You are not alone. You have friends… you have me.” Keith whispers the last part. Lance’s eyes widen at the sudden contact and Keith’s words. More tears trickle down Lance’s face as he wraps his hands around Keith, returning the hug. The two boys sit there in silence, soothing each other’s painful heart, mind and soul. Neither of them knew how long they were just sitting there holding each other and frankly speaking, neither of them cared.The next few weeks were hard for Keith; he wasn’t getting enough sleep, and when he did fall asleep, he had terrible nightmares. During this time Lance always woke up in the middle of the night to the sounds of Keith sobbing or screaming. Without fail, Lance always rushed to Keith’s side, holding him in a comfortable embrace. Sometimes it got so bad that Lance had no choice but give Keith the calming draught. Other times he just simply held him saying soothing words to Keith until he calmed down or fell asleep. Each night passed, but Keith never talked about his nightmares and Lance never asked which Keith was thankful for.One particular night it got really bad; Lance woke up to Keith screaming loudly. Before he could rush over to the other boy, he saw Keith running out of their room.“Wait, Keith! Where are you going?!” Lance called out after Keith, and before he knew what he was doing, he was running after the shorter boy.Keith mindlessly ran and kept running without knowing where he was going or what he was doing. He just wanted to run away, he doesn’t exactly know from what he wanted running away from, but he just had to keep running. So, that’s exactly what he did. He ran as fast as his body would allow, unaware of another figure calling and running after him.When Keith got outside the Ravenclaw tower, he collapsed in front of it. For a while, he just sat there until his heartbeat and breathing were back to normal. He listened to the silence surrounding him, this was a mistake. The silence brought back memories of the man that terrified him the most, the same man that the Boggart changed into, the same man that caused Keith his nightmares. Soon, his heart started beating rapidly, and his breathing increased. He clawed at his chest, it hurt. His heart was going to break. No!Suddenly, there were familiar arms around him, trying to calm him down.“Hel-p” Keith manages to choke out. Keith isn’t even sure Lance could hear him. The other boy seems to be telling Keith something, but Keith is unable to hear the words. Two pairs of panicked eyes looked back at each other, desperately trying to converse.Lance was desperately telling Keith to calm down, he could tell Keith couldn’t hear him. Lance knew this situation all too well, he has been through the same thing more times than he can count. Tears pricked at the corners of Lance’s eyes as he watched Keith’s panic attack get worse and worse, he didn’t know what to do. He didn’t have any calming draught with him at the moment, he looked at Keith’s wide eyes, desperately pleading for help. A helpless Lance brought both of his hands to cup Keith’s pale cheeks, and he did the only thing he could think of at that moment. He kissed Keith. Lance brought their mouth together, moving his lips against Keith’s. Immediately, the restless boy stops clawing at his chest and then freezes. Lance keeps their lips locked together for a few more moments before pulling back to look at Keith. The indigo eyes that looked back at him were wide with surprise.“Keith, breath.”“What?” Keith huffs out.“Breath,” Lance repeats, this time more slowly.That’s when Keith realized, he had been holding his breath. Keith finally lets out a heavy breath before breathing in and out until his breathing was back to normal. Lance lets out a sigh of relief before leaning his back on the stone wall, comfortably sitting on the ground.Keith looks straight into Lance’s eyes. “Why did you do that?” His voice was curious.There was a short pause.“A read somewhere that holding one’s breath can stop a panic attack,” Lance explains. “So, when I kissed you, you held your breath.”“I did?” Keith asks dumbly.“Yeah, you did.” Lance answers.“That’s really smart,” Keith says. “Thanks.”Keith studies Lance as if he expected there to be something more, like Lance wasn’t telling him something. Lance gives in. “It’s also because I wanted to kiss you.”“Oh.” Is all Keith says. “This isn’t exactly how I imagined my first kiss, but…” The brunette mutters.“Wait, your first kiss?!” Keith looked shocked. “You are joking, right?”“Why would I joke about something like this.” Lance deadpans.“But you are always flirting with girls and stuff…”“That’s just my personality.” Lance answers. “I can’t help it.”“Seriously?” Keith looked so utterly disbelieving making Lance chuckle lightly.“Yeah, seriously,” Lance says. Keith sits there for a while deep in thought, like he had just heard the biggest revelation in his life. Lance was about to drift off into sleep when Keith speaks up again.“Did you really kiss me because you wanted to?” Keith asks cautiously as if he was scared of Lance’s answer.“Yeah.” Lance answers without missing a beat.Keith shifts closer to Lance, but he averts his eyes away from the blue orbs staring back at him. “C-can you kiss me again?” Keith asks barely above a whisper.Lance looks at Keith in surprise but happily replies. “Of course.”Once again, he cups Keith’s cheeks, gently placing his lips on Keith’s soft ones. This time their lips move together, surprisingly in sync with each. Unlike, their first kiss, they were able to savour this kiss, melting into it. Keith’s hands locked around Lance’s neck, pulling their bodies closer together. Their kiss was sweet and passionate, their hearts bloomed as their lips moved together. They slowly pull back, their foreheads still touching.“Oh yeah, I just remembered,” Keith says. “I wanted to kiss you, too.”The biggest grin spreads across Lance’s face. “Oh man, I am so damn happy to hear that.”Keith was smiling too, he was happy. Keith couldn’t believe a few minutes ago he was on the ground clutching for his dear life. Keith thinks about how Lance has literally always been by his side over the past few weeks, always giving him strength and picking up his broken pieces.“Lance, why haven’t you asked?”Lance knew what Keith was talking about. “I just thought when you are ready you would tell me.”Keith sits down next to Lance, the taller boy puts his left arm around Keith’s shoulder. Keith rests his head on Lance’s shoulder, closing his eyes.“I am ready,” Keith says.“Okay.”“Um, I don’t really know where to start.”“Who was that man?” Lance asks.“My mom’s ex-boyfriend.”Lance stays silent.Keith sighs. “You know how Shiro and I come from a muggle family, right?”“Yeah.”“Our father died when I was six,” Keith explains. “From then on, it was just me, my brother and our mom. A few years later, our mom started going out with this guy. In the beginning, everything was fine, we were happy for our mother. But then…”Keith stops talking to gather his thoughts. “Our mom wasn’t home a lot, she was always working. He… he used to hit Shiro and me. Shiro took most of it since he was always protecting me.” Tears threatened to fall out of his eyes as he remembered his past. “One day there was no one home, it was just him and me, Shiro had gone out with his friends.”There was a pause as he recollected his memories. “I was reading a book when he came into my room, he had never entered my room before. I had always thought my room was the safest place in the house, I was wrong.” Keith whispers the last part, tears running down his face.“I wanted to run out of my room, but my body wouldn’t move. I was too scared to move.” As Keith spoke, Lance squeezed his shoulder, reassuring him. “He was holding me down before I even knew what was happening. A-and I couldn’t fight him, I tried to, but he was so much stronger than me.”Keith was full-on crying, but he kept talking through it. “I don’t remember much of what happened after that, but I remember the pain and feeling nauseous. I remember screaming and calling out for help, but no one came. The next thing I remember is waking up in a hospital bed, at some point I had passed out.”Neither of them says anything for a long time, but finally, Lance asks. “Is this your nightmare? The one you have every night?” Lance's voice was pained.Keith didn’t look up from where his head rested on Lance’s shoulder. “Yeah.”“Why didn’t you tell your mom about what he did to you guys sooner?”A pause. “She had suffered a lot, and she was working so hard for us, we didn’t want to add onto her burdens.”“Where is he now?” Lance asks through clenched teeth.“Prison.”“Good.”Keith feels water droplets fall on his face, he looks up to see tears streaming down Lance’s face. “Lance?! Hold on, why are you crying?” Keith was shocked.“Sorry, I am…” Lance says as he tries to wipe away his tears. “I am an idiot. Even though I should be comforting you…”Keith smiles fondly through his tears, Lance was crying for him, and that warmed his heart. “Thank you, Lance.” Keith cups Lance’s face bringing their foreheads together, Lance’s hands go around Keith. “I love you.”Lance is slightly taken aback but doesn’t hesitate to reply. “I love you, too.”A few minutes pass and suddenly Keith starts giggling. “I can’t believe a few weeks ago I genuinely wanted to give you a bloody nose.”“Really?” Lance asks light heartedly, not surprised at all.“Yeah, right after our Quidditch match.”“Speaking of Quidditch matches…” Lance starts casually. “You know we have a practice match against Hufflepuff tomorrow, right?“Yeah.”“I signed you up as Seeker for tomorrow,” Lance says. “So, I will be watching you from the bleachers.”“WHAT?!” Keith screeches. “No way! What the hell, Lance?! You can’t just do that! What will your teammates think?”“It’s fine, they are totally cool with it,” Lance assures him. “In fact, they are looking forward to it, Allura was thrilled. You better not let her down.”“But I am not used to playing with the team yet,” Keith says worriedly.“Don’t worry, you have practiced with them. You will be fine.” Lance says. “Plus, it’s just a practice game, it’s fine even if you lose.”A small pause. “No. I will win.” Determination sets on Keith’s features. “I will definitely win.”“That’s the spirit.” Lance encourages, smiling. “That being said, we should really head back. We only have a few more hours before we have to get ready for the game.”“Yeah.”Lance gets up and holds out his hands towards Keith which he gladly takes to pull himself up. They walk back to their room in comfortable silence, holding hands. Once they were in their room, they were quick to crash onto their bed and fall asleep. And yes, they fell asleep in the same bed, cuddling each other.The next morning, as promised Keith joined the Quidditch match as Ravenclaw’s Seeker. Despite it just being a practice match, there were a lot of people who had come to watch the game, most likely because Keith was playing on Ravenclaw’s team. The news really does travel fast at Hogwarts. Basically, all his friends from Gryffindor were there to cheer for him, he warmly smiled at them for coming. Lance was sitting right in the front with all his other friends, he winked when he made eye contact with Keith. In response, Keith rolls his eyes, shaking his head and smiling.The match between Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff was nothing compared to the final match of the Inter-House Quidditch Cup they had a few weeks before, but it was still pretty heated. Keith worked surprisingly well with the Ravenclaw players, their teamwork was remarkable. The game finally came to an end with Keith catching the snitch in his hands, the crowd cheered loudly.When Keith landed on the ground, he was immediately wrapped into an embrace by familiar arms. Almost immediately, soft lips touched Keith’s own lips. At first, Keith was shocked, but as soon as he recovered his hands wrapped around Lance’s neck, and he kissed him back, happily.This was their announcement to the rest of Hogwarts, they were proving everyone wrong. People were wrong about them, they could get along. Hell, they could do more than just get along. But more than that, this was their way of announcing ownership. Keith was Lance’s and Lance was Keith’s, now everyone knew.Their lips continued to move against each other, ignoring the gasps of surprises, squealing and cheering coming from the crowd. Finally, Lance pulled back, looking into Keith’s violet eyes.“You were great!”“Yeah?” Keith was smiling, leaning forward to touch his forehead against Lance’s.“Hell yeah!” Lance exclaims, picking Keith a little off the ground.Keith laughs at Lance’s excitement, pecking him on his lips. “I love you.”“Love you more.” His voice was filled with excitement and happiness.A few weeks ago, Lance and Keith were sure this student exchange program was going to be hell for both of them. Never in Keith’s wildest dream did he think Lance McClain would be the one to save him from his hell and never in his wildest dream did Lance think one day Keith Kogane would be his most treasured treasure.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The Paladins of Voltron were on the planet Hargardin. The Hagardians had agreed to join the Voltron Coalition after Voltron had saved their planet from Galra rule. To celebrate their victory, the Hagardians had thrown a festival. The festival consisted of all kinds of entertainment that people could participate in.“Really?” The shorter boy asks, raising his sword in front of him. “You are going to fight with a sword? Against me?”“Unlike you, Keith, I am a really nice guy,” Lance firmly holds up his sword, positioning himself to defend. “Using my rifle against you feels like cheating. Plus, it will be more fun defeating you at your own game.”“You are going to lose,” Keith states confidently.“Don’t count on it,” Lance says as the whistle blows, signalling the start of their match.As Lance had guessed, Keith immediately goes for the offence. He dashes towards Lance, sharply swinging his sword towards Lance’s head. Good, he isn’t holding back. Lance thinks, smirking. He quickly defends the oncoming sword with his own, using their connected swords as leverage to push Keith back. Keith takes a few unstable steps backwards, Lance uses this opportunity to get the upper hand over Keith. He raises his sword and attacks Keith head-on, but as usual, Lance had underestimated Keith’s agility. The Red Paladin quickly crouches down, getting below Lance’s eyesight, he steps to the side and gets behind Lance. He uses the hilt of his sword to hit Lance’s neck, bringing him down to his knees. Before Lance knew it, he had a sword pointed to his neck, and Keith stood in front of him with a confident smirk plastered on his face.“My win.”“You got lucky,” Lance says.“Of course, I did,” Keith says sarcastically, rolling his eyes. “How can I possibly defeat Lance McClain without getting lucky? I mean, it’s not like I have been going through excruciating training with the Blade of Marmora or anything.”Lance simply glares back at Keith.“This win goes to the Red Paladin of Voltron.” The blue alien announces over the speakers. Cheers and applause could be heard all around their little battle stage.Once Lance and Keith had gotten off the raised platform, they meet with Allura, Shiro, Coran, Pidge and Hunk. Some of them congratulated Keith for winning the match, and others made it their top priority to spite Lance for his loss.“How stupid are you?” Pidge inquires. “Who in their right mind would pick a sword to use against Keith? Seriously, that’s like his forte.”“Yeah, that was pretty dumb.” Hunk agrees.“Hunk, not you too!” Lance exclaims. “How could you betray me like that?!”“I am just telling the truth,” Hunk says, holding up his hands. “Lance, you have never won against Keith in a sword fight.”“And he never will,” Keith says quietly, but it was loud enough for everyone to hear.“Did you say something, Mullet Head?” Lance growls out.“You heard me,” Keith says.“That’s it! I am going to wipe that smug smirk off your face.” Lance says, fisting his hands and storming towards Keith.“Alright, that’s enough, you two,” Shiro says, quickly sliding in between the two boys before a fight could break out. “That being said, this whole rivalry thing you two got going is really gaining popularity among the people of various planet.”“That’s true.” Allura agrees. “There are so many planets joining the Voltron Coalition after seeing the strength and rivalry between the Red and Blue Paladin.”“Huh. Who knew, right?” Pidge says. “That something good would come out of their stupid and annoying rivalry.”“Isn’t that great, guys?” Hunk says, looking at Keith and Lance. “You are rivalry could save the universe!”The two boys glared at each other for one whole minute, the hostile tension between them rising by the second.“Yeah, I still hate him.” Lance finally says, looking away from Keith.“Don’t worry, the feeling is mutual.”“You know, I am happy this whole rivalry thing is helping the coalition and everything.” Shiro starts. “But could you guys at least try to get along for once.”“NEVER!” Keith and Lance shout at the same time.“Geez, so much hate,” Pidge mutters.“Speaking of which, why do you two hate each other so much?” Allura asks, genuinely curious.“He is annoying,” Keith replies immediately. “And he is always pissing me off.”“I hate his guts.” Lance answers. “He thinks he is so much better than everyone else.”“I do not think that!” Keith snaps.“You do too!” Lance snaps back. “Also, I am not annoying. I am a joy to be around.”“That’s debatable.” Pidge mumbles.“Pidge,” Shiro warns. “And you two, stop fighting. It’s time for us to leave the planet.”“Already?” Lance whines“Yeah.” Shiro answers. “Apparently, we have to get to another planet.”“That’s right, the king of planet Aster has invited us to a party,” Allura informs. The group starts walking back to their ship. “Planet Aster has already joined the Voltron Coalition. So, you don’t have to attend the party if you don’t want to. But I want to show my gratitude.”“I am guessing you are sitting this one out?” Pidge asks, nudging Keith.“Obviously,” Keith replies. “I have got no time for stupid parties.”“Yeah, I thought so.”They soon get to the Castle of Lions, the huge spaceship immediately takes off from the planet Hargardin, heading towards their new destination. Everyone goes off to mind their own business, some went to rest, some went to train, and some went to eat. They got one day to relax and do whatever they wanted to do.The next day they arrive at planet Aster. Lance lazily walks into the control room to see everyone gathered there, though he didn’t see a certain grumpy raventte. His teammates were all dressed stunningly for the party.“Wow! You guys look amazing.” Lance looks at Allura flirtingly. “Especially you, Princess.”Allura rolls her eyes. “Lance, why aren’t you wearing your formal attire?”“What’s the point?” Lance sighs, dramatically holding out his hands towards Allura. “No matter what I wear, I can never attain the beauty you possess.”“Lance,” Shiro warns. “That’s enough out of you.”“Oh, is space dad jealous?” Lance raises an eyebrow and smirks at Shiro. “Wants to keep Allura all to yourself, huh?”“Lance!” Shiro and Allura shout out simultaneously, both their faces flushed red.“Okay, sorry, sorry.” Lance laughs out. “I am just kidding.”“Team, we have to leave now,” Coran says, looking at the time. “Lance, are you coming?”“Nah.” Lance answers. “I am going to sit this one out.”“Really?” Pidge asks, looking genuinely surprised.“Yeah.”“Why?” Hunk mirrored Pidge’s expression.Lance simply shrugs his shoulders. “Not really in a party mode.”“Lance, you are always in a party mode,” Shiro says, studying Lance curiously.“Guess, today is the exception.” Lance sighs. “I feel tired. So, I just thought I should get some rest.”“Okay…” Shiro says, with confused eyes. “…I guess that’s fine then.”“And what about Keith?” Allura asks.“Oh yeah, he is cooped up in his room.” Shiro answers. “He is definitely not coming.”“Typical Keith,” Lance mutters.“Lance, while we are gone don’t start any unnecessary—”“I won’t start any unnecessary fights with Keith.” Lance cuts Shiro off. “You don’t have to worry about that, Shiro.”Shiro simply stares at Lance, doubtingly.“I won’t even go near his room.” Lance gives Shiro a small smile to make his words seem more believable. “I promise.”Shiro sighs heavily. “Alright, team, let’s go.”With that everyone, except Lance walks out of the control room. For a few minutes, Lance just simply stood there watching his friends make their way out of the Castle of Lions. After he makes sure they have gone quite a few distances away from the Castle, he walks out of the control room.He slowly makes his way down the Castle hallways, with his hands lazily tucked into his pockets. He turns one corner then another, right and then left; finally, he reaches the automatic door. The door opens, and he walks into his room. A few minutes later, a knock was heard on his door. Without hesitating, Lance opens the door.“I got your message,” Keith says. “What do you want?”“Everyone left for the party,” Lance says.“What about you?”“I didn’t go,” Lance answers, looking straight into Keith’s eyes.“Well, in that case…” Keith trails off.One second, Keith was standing outside Lance’s room, and the next second he was inside, pushing Lance against the door. Almost immediately, soft lips firmly press against Lance’s. Keith’s hands automatically find its way into Lance’s hair, his lips strongly moving against Lance’s, the taller boy returns the kiss just as equally strong. Their tongues collide with each other and Lance explores every nick and corner of Keith’s mouth. They kiss each other with a mixture of lust and passion, grunts and moans echo across the room. At some point, Lance’s hands had gone down to wrap around Keith’s waist.“God, I missed you,” Lance says, in between their kisses. “Missed this.”“Yeah.” Keith answers. “Me too.”Lance flips Keith around, so the shorter boy was the one being held against the door. They continue to hungrily kiss each other. Neither boy seemed to care about breathing, they kept their lips attached until the very last second. Even when they had to separate, Lance did not move his lips away from Keith’s skin. The brunette’s lips pressed against Keith’s cheeks, jaws, neck and everywhere else it had access to, leaving a blazing trail of pleasure anywhere it touched. While working on Keith’s pale neck, Lance grabs the hem of Keith’s shirt, pulling it over his head. To Lance’s delight, he gets more area to work with. He moves down from Keith’s neck and sucks on the area just below his collar bone, visibly marking him. He smiles satisfyingly, but he craved for more.Lance grabs Keith by his thighs, hoisting him up and walking towards the bed. He gently places Keith on the bed, quickly taking off his own t-shirt.“Eager, are we?” Keith asks, smirking up at Lance.“Obviously,” Lance says, starting to mark Keith’s chest. “How long do you think it has been?”“Let me think…” Keith says while roaming his hands around Lance’s tanned body. “Two months, 45 days, 28 minutes and about 10 seconds.”Lance stops pecking against Keith’s neck to look at him with a scrunched-up face.“What?” Keith asks, both his eyebrows raised. “I get frustrated too. I also want to be held by you more often.”Lance looks at Keith in surprise, his heart surging happily.“Damn it, Keith, don’t just randomly say something so cute,” Lance says, before lovingly kissing his boyfriend.“Are you just going to kiss me today, or are we going to do something more exciting?” Keith asks impassively.“Yeah, yeah.” Lance laughs light-heartedly. “My bad.”Lance quickly takes off Keith’s pants. “Wow, you weren’t kidding about being frustrated.”“Shut it,” Keith says, looking away. “Just do it already.”“Keith, you know that’s not how this works.” Lance hovers over Keith, forcing him to look at Lance.“You are so cheesy.”“Yeah.” Lance chuckles. “But you love it.”“Whatever,” Keith mumbles, looking away from Lance.Lance bents down to gently bite and suck on Keith’s nipples, one of his hands go down to palm Keith’s clothed member.“Lance…” Keith whines, desperately.The lips pressed against Keith’s chest stretches into a satisfying smile. Lance slowly moves down his kisses, going lower and lower on Keith’s body, from his chest to his abs to his stomach and finally gets to his v-line.Lance pulls off Keith’s boxers, his hard member springs to life. A small gasp escapes from Keith when his member makes contact with the cold air around them. Lance places small kisses on the tip of Keith’s member, and he was above to take the whole thing in when Keith stops him.“No, it’s fine.” Keith breaths out. “Just put it in already.”“You sure?”“Yeah,” Keith says, softly looking up at Lance. “I want you now.”“…Okay.”Lance takes out the lube and generously applies it to his fingers before pushing two fingers into Keith. He scissors the fingers a few times before adding a third finger and repeating the action.Lance takes off all his clothes, he throws Keith’s legs over his shoulder and aligns his member with Keith’s entrance. He slowly pushes his member all the way into Keith.“Lance…?” Keith moans out.“Yeah?” Lance asks while waiting for Keith to adjust.“Why didn’t you go to the party?” Keith asks through his heavy breathing.“Why do you think?” Lance places small soothing kisses on Keith’s body.“You mean to say…” Keith says slowly while smirking contently. “You stayed back just to have sex with me?”“Yeah…” Lance mumbles against Keith’s collar bone. “You got a problem with that?”Keith pushes Lance back by his shoulder to look at his flushed face.“Then we have to make the best of it,” Keith says, pulling Lance down, pressing their lips together in a passionate but short kiss. “You can move now.”Lance pulls back until the tip of his member, before thrusting all the way back into Keith. Gradually he increases the speed, going faster and faster. Keith’s arms firmly hold onto Lance, his nails digging into Lance’s back. The shorter boy’s moans were getting louder and louder by the second.“Keith…” Lance grunts, kissing Keith. “I love you.”“Yeah… Lance…” Keith’s mind was too immersed in the physical pleasure he was receiving, to form any coherent sentence. “Lance… I am—”“Yeah, me too,” Lance says as his thrusts get sloppier. A few more thrusts and Keith climaxes, Lance soon follows.Exhausted, Lance falls next to Keith on the bed. He pulls Keith closer to him, the shorter boy automatically snuggles up to Lance’s chest. They lay there in comfortable silence for a few minutes.“Lance?”“Hmm?” Lance hums, his hands playing with Keith’s soft hair, which he secretly loved.“I love you too.”“I know.” Lance smiles down at the shorter boy. “We should probably take a bath.” “Yeah.” Keith agrees.“I will get the bath ready.”Lance grudgingly gets up from the bed and walks to the bathroom. Keith hears the sound of running water coming from the bathroom. A few minutes later, Lance returns.“Come on,” Lance says, motioning towards the bathroom.“Carry me.” Keith whines, raising his arms.“Oh wow, you are such a baby.” Lance chuckles but happily obliges.He picks Keith up bridal style, walking into the bathroom. He gently drops Keith into the bathtub filled with warm water. Lance gets into the bath and sits behind Keith with his hands around Keith’s body.“This is nice,” Keith says softly.“Yeah.” Lance agrees with his chin resting on top of Keith’s head.“So, Keith, I have been thinking…” Lance starts.“Oh, that can’t be good.”“Just shut up and listen to me.”Keith doesn’t say anything, he simply smiles in reply while playing with Lance’s hands around him.“You know how you are half Galra, right?”“Yeah…?” Keith answers slightly confused by where Lance was going with this.“And we have been to a few planets where their male inhabitants could also conceive babies.” Lance starts. “At Hagardin, I met these two dudes with their daughter, and they were so cute.”“Really?”“Yeah…” Lance says. “So, I was wondering if maybe a Galra male could have a child with another man.”“Oh god, Lance,” Keith says, rolling his eyes. “Just when I thought where you were going with this.”“Keith, you may be able to have kids,” Lance says excitedly. “We could have our own children.”“Lance, Galra males can’t get pregnant,” Keith states, looking at Lance with a soft yet sad smile.Lance pouts down at Keith. “But I want to have children.”Keith lays his head against Lance’s chest, facing forward. “You really love kids, huh?”“Yeah, obviously.” Lance answers. “Who doesn’t? They are so cute and adorable, and you just want to hug and hold them.”Keith chuckles at Lance’s excited voice.“Hey, when we get back to Earth let’s buy a small, cute house.” Lance continues speaking. “Then, we can adopt a lot of kids, and we will get a dog, too.”“Lots of kids, huh?” Keith asks. “Like a hundred?”“Umm…” Lance says. “That’s a little too much, don’t you think?”“I am kidding.” Keith laughs wholeheartedly, turning to look at Lance. “Also, didn’t you skip a few steps there.”“Don’t worry, Keith.” Lance half smirks, half smiles. “I will get to that soon.” “I will be waiting.” Keith leans up to kiss Lance.When the water gets too cold, the two boys decide to take a quick shower. Lance wraps a white towel around his waist and gets out of the shower first. Lance walks into his bedroom, closing the bathroom door behind him. He hears the sound of the running water stop and assumes Keith was done with his shower. He was about to walk to his closet to get dressed when his room’s door slides open. At the entrance stood, Shiro, Allura, Pidge and Hunk.Oh, shit! Lance thinks.“Guys!” Lance exclaims. “Why are you back so early?!”“The party was dumb,” Pidge says clearly, not having enjoyed herself.“Oh, pardon us, Lance,” Allura says politely. “We didn’t know you were in the middle of getting dressed.”“Yeah, yeah. I was getting dressed.” Lance says hurriedly, he had to get them to leave before Keith comes out of the bathroom. “So, could guys leave for now.”“Of course, Lance,” Shiro says. “Just one thing before we go, have you seen Keith? I can’t seem to find him anywhere on the ship.”“K-Keith? What Keith?” Lance panics. “No. No, I haven’t seen any Keith.”“…Okay?” Shiro says, suddenly suspicious.See, here’s the thing, no one knew about Keith and Lance’s lovey-dovey relationship. They had to hide their relationship because of the whole rivalry thing which helped with coalition efforts. If people knew about their relationship, their rivalry would be less believable, and they would be seen just as another couple, neither of them wanted that.“Lance, why are you acting weird?” Hunk asks, concerned for his best friend. “I am not acting weird.” Lance answers. “I just want you guys to leave so that I can get dressed.”Suddenly, a sound came from the bathroom. It wasn’t that loud, but Lance heard it, and he really hoped no one else did.“Is there someone in your bathroom?” Of course, Pidge heard it.“No. No one is in my bathroom.” Lance was really starting to panic now. “Why would there be anyone in my bathroom?”“I swear to god, I just heard a sound coming from your bathroom,” Pidge says, and Lance’s body automatically moves to defend the bathroom door. “Also, why are you panicking so much?”“I am not panicking,” Lance says, clearly nervous. “I am totally calm.”“No, you are not.”Everyone was getting slightly worried about Lance’s behaviour. Shiro looks around Lance’s room, trying to figure out what was going on. His eyes fall on Lance’s tousled bed, then on a half-naked Lance. Shiro’s expression changes from confusion to realization.“Guys, we should give Lance some privacy,” Shiro explains. “It’s not nice of us to intrude on him like this.”“Oh, right,” Allura says, quickly grasping the situation like Shiro. “Of course.”Pidge and Hunk soon caught up with what was happening, leaving Lance a little confused about their sudden change in behaviour. But by the way his friends were acting he figured out what was going on.Oh, they think I am hiding a girl. Lance thinks. Well, whatever. As long as they leave, it’s fine.“Uh, yeah,” Hunk says, slightly embarrassed. “We should go.”The group was just about to leave when Keith walks out of the bathroom wearing only a towel around his waist.“Babe, can you get me my—” Keith freezes mid-sentence.“Oh, god…” Lance breaths out, covering his face with his right hand.“GUYS!” Keith yelps. “W-what are you doing here?!”Shiro, Allura, Pidge and Hunk stares at the two boys with their mouths hung open. Allura and Pidge were having a hard time processing what they were seeing in front of them. Hunk and Shiro were wondering if they were dreaming. No one said anything and as the silence stretched, the atmosphere around the room thickened.“What are you doing here, Keith?” Shiro finally finds his voice.“I-I was just using Lance’s bathroom,” Keith starts. “Because…um…”“…Keith, it’s no use.” Lance says, looking at Keith and shaking his head. “Not when we are both dressed like this. Also, your chest…”Keith’s face flushes red, he had looked in the mirror. He knew the marks Lance had left on him was as clear as day on his pale skin.“Oh, man…” Hunk says. “This is… This is…”“Shocking? Unexpected? Absolutely unbelievable?” Pidge asks, looking at Keith and Lance in disbelief.“Yeah, all of that.”“Exactly how long has this been going on?” Shiro asks slowly.Lance and Keith look at each other, silently communicating with each other.“Since the beginning?” Keith answer.“The beginning?” Pidge asks, raising an eyebrow. “As in, after we formed Team Voltron?”“No,” Lance answers this time. “As in, since the Garrison.”Shiro, Hunk and Pidge’s face became even more shockingly surprised if that’s even possible.“Look, we are really sorry for hiding this from you guys.” Lance starts. “We wanted to tell you, but… the whole rivalry thing was gaining popularity with the coalition efforts, and we didn’t want to mess that up.”“Lance, Keith, you didn’t have to do that.” Allura finally speaks up. “You are the Red and Blue Paladin of Voltron. People will always love you, rivalry or no rivalry. Right, Shiro?”“Oh yeah, sure.” Shiro answers. “Of course.”“Really?” Keith looks at Shiro. “And you are fine with this?”“Why wouldn’t I be?” Shiro asks. “Plus, you guys getting along is a dream come true for me. Though, I guess you two have been getting along since the beginning.”“So, you are totally okay with…us?”“Yeah. I mean, I am a little upset you didn’t tell me sooner.” Shiro says. “But, that’s fine. I understand.”A bright smile appears on Keith’s face as he hears Shiro’s words. Shiro was like a brother to Keith and being accepted by him made Keith so happy that he couldn’t even express it properly in words.“Thanks, Shiro,” Keith says happily.“That being said, Lance…” Shiro walks up to Lance. “What are your intentions with my little brother?”Keith laughs beside them.“Seriously, we are doing the big brother talk now?” Lance asks, trying to hold back a smile.“Obviously.” Shiro tries to sound dangerous, but the smile on his face said otherwise. “You better not make my brother cry.”The uncomfortable aura disappears from the room as Shiro and Lance continue their playful exchange. Hunk pats Keith on the back, saying he was happy for Keith and Lance. Pidge excitedly asks Keith for details about their relationship among other things. Allura also looked happy for them.“Fine! You have convinced me.” Shiro says out loud. “I deem you worthy of having my brother.”Shiro grabs Keith’s hands and places it on Lance’s. “There. Now go and be happy, you have my blessings.”Everyone in the room laughs out loud at the comedic performance. Lightheartedly making fun of Shiro’s possessiveness over his brother. Lance wipes away fake tears from his face saying he was feeling sorry for himself for having to endure Shiro’s wrath. More laughter erupts in the room. In that moment, they were like one happy family.A few minutes later, Allura, Pidge, Hunk and Shiro start to leave the room. Just before exiting the room, Shiro turns around to look at Lance.“Lance?” Shiro calls.“Yeah?”“Take care of him,” Shiro says, smiling.“I will,” Lance answers, smiling back at Shiro.Shiro leaves, the automatic door closing behind him.“Well, that was…” Keith says.“Embarrassing?” Lance asks, helpfully.“Yeah, kind of,” Keith answers, sheepishly. “But I am kind of glad they found out.”“Yeah, same,” Lance says, taking out some clothes and putting them on. He felt weirdly happy for finally having some clothes on. “They took that really well.”“Yeah…” Keith says, grinning.“And you seem really happy,” Lance observes, giving Keith some new clothes to wear. He swiftly puts them on.Keith simply smiles widely at Lance in reply, wrapping his hands around the taller boy’s neck.“Shiro?” Lance asks, softly looking into the violet orbs in front of him.“Yeah.” Keith answer. “I never thought he would reject me or anything, but hearing him say all that made me really happy.”“I am sure,” Lance says, he softly presses his lips against Keith’s. “I love you.”Keith cheekily smiles at Lance. “You’re okay, I guess.”Lance would have said something back, but his boyfriend was too damn cute. So, instead, he placed one more loving kiss on Keith’s soft lips. If you couldn’t tell, Lance really loved kissing Keith.