When Keith awoke, it was more comfortably than he ever had in recent memory. First there was the warmth. Not just in the blankets around him and the feathery pillow under his head, but in the air. Quite unlike the sterile frigid air of the castleship, the air here bore a dense humidity and a tinge of salt that didn't quite sting, and under that the fragrant smell of fried bread. The sound of rain. Light and unintrusive, yet insistent, pattering on the rooftop somewhere above. Then there were the voices. Overlapping and unintelligible but unmistakably bright. Not near, but not too far. Just around the corner, maybe, or behind a thin wall. Under the blanket Keith stirred, trying to rid himself of the lingering dream before getting up to start the day's training.

But when he sat up and pried his heavy eyelids open, instead of his quarters on the ship he saw the McClain's living room saturated by midday light. Ah. Not a dream, then. A rush of intense emotion washed through him at the realization, capped off by a sudden dread of joining the others in the other roomㅡof seeing Lance.

Okay, that was a smidge more dread than he was used to upon waking. That meant a recap of everything that happened yesterday was necessary before he could even think about getting up. So.

You're on Earth, in Varadero, in Lance's house. Those voices belong to his family, this house is where he grew up, his sister missed him so much she pulled a Pidge, his brother named a baby after him, his mother wants to adopt you and you kind of want to let her, last night he told you he loved you like it was the simplest thing in the world, and then you made out with him like the universe was ending for five fucking minutes on the beach. Oh, and Laura saw.

Keith allowed himself a long look at these events from a carefully detached point of view, until he got to the making out on the beach part, at which point he was assaulted by the sensation of that memory and promptly shut down the mental review.

I am going to die.

He was alone in this room, for now, and apparently sometime during the morning he'd moved in his sleep from the floor back to the vacated pullout bed. Or someone moved you, the internal voice that sounded vaguely like Shiro pointed out. Ignoring it, Keith threw the blanket off his lap and slid out of bed. How long had he slept? Felt like no more than four or five hours, so that put him around 10am or 11am Cuban time.

Keith hadn't even stepped halfway into the hallway when he ran directly into Laura.

"Oh! I was just coming to check on you," she said, and if he wasn't absolute shit at reading facial cues he'd say she looked almost guilty about the conversation they'd had last night. But one blink and the look was replaced by a glare.

It occurred to him then that Laura probably hated him for the exact same reason the rest of them loved him. While Keith may have been the personification of Lance's return for most of the family, for Laura, Keith stood for Lance's eventual re-disappearance. Awesome. Good, greatㅡ

"Come on, mójol. You better hurry and eat. We saved some breakfast for you, but no food is sacred when the whole family is home." As if to punctuate the statement, Ben and Gabi chose that exact moment to race by them in the narrow hall, each with a fork in their hands. "Especially with those two garbage disposals running around," she mumbled, and Keith followed her (and the aromatic smell) all the way to the kitchen, where true to Laura's word, the entire family (minus Ben and Gabi now) was gathered. Despite the chaos and the many people, Keith's eyes instantly found Lance, who was sitting at the dining table in front of an empty plate with Little Lance standing on his lap.

Lance met his eyes and whatever story he'd been telling died on his lips. Keith noted that Lance was the only one in the kitchen who was soaking wet from head to toe. "What? It's raining," Lance defended as Keith looked him over, as if that was justification enough.

"Dude," someone shrieked, and Keith's eyes slid two feet to Lance's left, where an unintroduced new guy was now staring at Keith like he'd just done a triple backflip into the room. Tall, brunette, white. Who the hellㅡ? "You didn't say he was a babe."

"Dude," Lance hissed back mockingly, "you saw him when you walked in!"

"But he was, like, buried in blankets," the man shot back, and Keith truly did not know whether to feel flattered or infuriated by this conversation.

"Keith," Marco gestured, "this is Steven. Steven, Keith. Steven was Lance's best friend growing up, so he's basically family. Whether we like it or not."

"Pleasure," Keith mumbled, and promptly made his way past Marco and Jessica's chairs over to Sal and Jocelyn where they stood giggling by the stove near all the food. Rain turned the kitchen windows into kaleidoscope paintings of the world outside, and blanket the kitchen in soothing white noise. But it wasn't loud enough to fully mask the sound of Lance and Steven hissing at each other under their breath.

"You should have told me that 'mullet' was a term of endearment! First that badass Vogue alien-witch, and now this guy? Take me to space immediately."

"Steven, would you shut the fuck up, he's standing right there."

Sal bit his lip to hide his laughter as he passed Keith a fork from the open drawer. Jocelyn didn't bother hiding her amusement from him at all.

"Since when did thatㅡ? Ohhh."

"I swear to all that isㅡ"

"I gotchu."

"SHUT THEㅡ Oh hey, hi, so nice of you to join the land of the living, Keith." As Keith arrived with his plate in hand at the farthest available chair from Lance and Steven, Lance released his friend from a surprise headlock. Steven rubbed at his neck where Lance's arm had been and shot an annoying smirk at Keith. "It's only, what," Lance went on with feigned nonchalance, "7pm by castleship time?"

Keith sighed and dug in. Not even close. "I think that is literally the most wrong you've ever been about anything. And you're wrong a lot, so. Color me impressed."

After a beat of silence that went on long enough for Keith to wonder if he'd overdone it in front of Lance's family, Steven guffawed . Soonafter his laughter was chorused with everyone else's. "Keith," Steven chortled, "Keith, my guy, you absolute savage. Marry me. Bear my children. Bear me elevenㅡ no, twelve children."

Maybe Keith just wanted to mess with Lance. Maybe he was just in a good mood. Or maybe he could tell this guy was big on jokes and maybe he wanted to make a good impression on Lance's oldest friend. Whatever the reason, the words that fell out of Keith's mouth in response were dry and deadpan and crafted for the kill.

"Take me to dinner first and we'll talk," he said.

The effect was immediate: Lance busted up and doubled over his plate. He was now the only one laughing, but boy did he make up for that in volume. Lance's laugh was so boisterous and loud that Keith couldn't help the smile that cracked through his carefully blank expression. Steven's eyes flicked to it immediately and he broke into a maniacal smile as he connected the dots, and Keith's heart fell out his ass.

"Alright, alright," Steven said lightly. Regally. "I get it. You're progressive. Won't marry someone you just met, right? So here's a thought. Have you considered marrying," (one swooping, grandiose gesture to his right), "my boy Lance?"

"Whㅡ Steven ," Lance choked.

Lucky for Keith, he was spared having to answer right away due to the fact that he had conveniently shoved an enormous bite of bread into his mouth. He was sure he looked like a boiling kettle though, and it only got worse as Steven banged his hand on the table and cackled at Lance's obvious discomfort, until Laura came up beside him and smacked Steven upside the head.

"Oh come on!" Steven hiccuped, shoving Laura away playfully. "You guys can't tell me you don't want this one in the family, effective immediately. Everyone's thinking it! I mean, look at him. God, he looks so lost. Someone adopt him or I'm going to."

"Keith," Jessica whispered at Keith's left, "on Steven's behalf, I am so sorry."

"And mortified," Marco piped in.

"Jeez, Lance," Steven chuckled, "take a chill pill. I was just kidding."

"No," Lance said, and Keith's jaw froze mid-chew at the abrupt shift in Lance's tone. Something was wrong. It wasn't just because it was Lance that Keith caught this before everyone else; living in close quarters and battling back to back with anyone made you incredibly in tune with the sound of their voice, and the subtle micro-expressions that betrayed more information than they ever did aloud. Everyone else heard 'no,' but Keith heard, 'trouble.' Universe-scale trouble. Keith was already setting his fork down by the time Lance went on to say, "Sorry, it's not that. Someone's calling me on my comm. One of the others."

"Why do you look upset about it?" Marco asked as Lance reluctantly pulled the Altean microcomputer from his back pocket, then turned to Keith when Lance didn't answer. "What does that mean?"

Keith had left his own in the living room, but he knew it must also be buzzing. "Could mean anything," Keith said.

But it could really only mean one thing, and Lance knew it too, judging by the nausea that was evident on his face. His eyes slid up from the screen to land on Keith's, his finger poised over the 'accept incoming call' button. "It's the emergency channel."

"Should we answer it in the other room?" Keith asked quietly, even though the kitchen was dead silent and everyone would have heard the question no matter how quietly he asked it.

There was a murmuring of dissent at the suggestion, which petered out when Lance shook his head and said, "No, we'll answer it here. They deserve to know."

Nodding, Keith rose from his chair to circle around toward Lance's side of the table as Lance took a deep breath and answered the call. Allura's voice preceded her appearance on screen, cracking into the thick silence that had descended on the kitchen like a warhammer. "Lance! I am so sorry to do this to youㅡ"

"Shi-h-hit," Lance said, and he was already rising from his chair by the time Keith had circled around to see Allura peering into the camera with the guiltiest, most pitying expression, and Coran standing in the background with a frown as deep as the Grand Canyon etched onto his face.

"You know I wouldn't do this unless it were absolutelyㅡ oh, hello there," she said, her grave expression shifting into one of subdued delight. "Lance, which one is this?"

Lance glanced to his left, where Gabi had shoved herself into view to get a good look at the Altean. "Uhh… this is Gabi. And…" Lance panned the comm out in a wide sweep of the kitchen, giving Allura a brief glimpse of everyone else before turning it back toward himself and Keith. "That's everyone else," he finished sadly.

"O-oh," Allura said, and if Keith wasn't mistaken, she looked like she was two second from bursting into tears. "Hello everyone! Lance has t-told us.. so m-muchㅡ"

At this point Coran reentered the frame on Allura's left, clearing his throat and staring directly at them. "What Allura means to say, is that she's terribly sorry to cut this familial reconnection short, but something has come up."

"What has come up?" Laura said, pulling Gabi out of the way to take her place in view of Lance's comm.

"Oh dear. Lance, perhaps you and Keith shouldㅡ"

"No," Laura shouted, and slammed one hand down on the table so hard that all the plates and glasses rattled in place. "Whatever has come up, you can say it in front of us!"

"Keith? A little help?" Coran appealed, but one look into Laura's steely eyes had Keith backing down before he'd even started.

"Laura's right," Keith said instead, and placed one hand on Lance's slouching shoulder. "And besides, I think Lance wants them to know, Coran. Whatever it is. Go ahead and brief us."

"Ahhh…. Okey dokey then. Allura?"

"As you wish. The Galra have returned in full force to retake the base we last liberated," Allura said, the emotional bubble gone from her throat now, replaced by her usual regal insistence.

"What?" Lance gasped. "I thought we crippled them there! They shouldn't be back out to this sector for likeㅡ months! At least!"

"We all thought that." Allura's lips pressed into a thin, tight line. "But the distress signal from the locals came in from the base not five dobashes ago, and it's unmistakeable."

"Could it be a trick?" Keith asked.

"Even if it was, we'd still have to check it out," Lance sighed.

"Right you are, number three," Coran said. "Best to just snip this in the butt, as you paladins like to say."

"No one says that, Coran," Lance snapped in an uncharacteristically harsh tone of voice, before saying, "We'll be back at the ship in three vargas. Blue's parked a ways offshore so that's as soon as we can make it." Then he cut off the channel without giving either Coran or Allura time to respond.

"Wait, you're leaving? " Marco cried out in disbelief, and then the room broke into chaos.

Keith was jostled aside as everyone closed in on them, each family member tugging at Lance's shirt in the effort to grab the most of his attention. Keith tried to interject a few words here and there, tried to answer some of the questions, ease some of the devastation, but he'd never been good at navigating situations like this. Never been good with words. Or people. Or anything. He'd just about reached his breaking point and was about ready to bolt out of the house in a full sprint when Lance broke first.

"You don't get it!" Lance shouted. "None of you understand! I have to leave. I'm not leaving because I want to abandon you or something, okay? You think I wanted this? Any of this? When I left my barracks at the Garrison on the day I disappeared, it was so Hunk and Pidge and I could sneak out and go dancing. I didn't expect to never come home. So stop looking at me allㅡall heartbrokenㅡbecause I guarantee I am more heartbroken than any of you!"

"Lance," Keith warned, but Lance shoved his hand off his arm.

"That base Allura was talking about was the last remaining on a Galra-occupied planet in this sector. Earth's sector. And now they're coming back with full forces andㅡ god, you don't get it, we have to keep them from retaking it because they have to know that this sector is off limits!"

"Lanceㅡ"

"Do you have any idea what full force looks like in a fleet of Galra warships? Imagine the entire US air force times four hundred million, in space, coming this way, with weapons you couldn't even comprehendㅡ"

"Lance," Keith roared, both his hands covering Ben's ears now in a conscious reflection of what Marco had done with Little Lance, "would you shut the fuck up!"

Lance wheeled on him with teary-eyed fury, but it all blew out in a puff of air when he saw Keith with his hands pressed determinedly over Ben's ears. Gabi was too far or she'd have gotten the same treatment. Only when Lance faltered did Keith let go.

Ben immediately ran to Lance and threw his arms around his brother.

"I just thought I had more time," Lance said, and his furious voice finally broke into something terribly small. "I'm not ready to leave yet."

"So don't," Laura said with conviction.

Keith watched the rest of them close in around the missing link to their family, and that 'out of place' feeling reared its head again. "We have to," Keith replied on Lance's behalf, and excused himself from the emotional hurricane in the kitchen to go and gather his and Lance's things from the front room.

By the time he came back a scant minute later, the atmosphere in the kitchen had shifted in a surprising way.

"ㅡcan't believe you sailed all the way over from Cayo Mono in a boat you built from space trash." Steven was saying.

"It's not trash!"

"Regardless," Steven emphasized, we'll get back to yourㅡwhat was itㅡ?"

"Lion!" Gabi helped.

"Right. We'll get there faster in my speedboat. But we need to pick it up at my house, which meansㅡ"

"We need to leave five minutes ago," Lance finished. "Got it. Keith? You ready to go, buddy?"

"Um. Actually," Keith said, feeling a twinge of jealousy at the weird ease that Lance and Steven played off each other despite a few years separation, "if you guys are going to pick up a better boat, I'm going to split off and grab supplies."

What happened to Lance's face when Keith said this could only be described as breathtaking. He lit up so fast it was a wonder Keith didn't liquefy. "Keith, you magnificent bastard. Why didn't I think of that? I could kiss you right now."

"Please don't," he joked back, because dammit, he knew Lance was joking but Laura was standing right there and he could feel the heat of her hatred scorching him like dragonfire. "Meet you down where the old boat is moored in one hour?"

"Done. Ben, Little Lance, and Laura, you're with me and Steven on Team Speedboat. Everyone else, you're on Team Earth Food with Keith. Make sure he gets the good stuff! I swear to god if he shows up with a bag full of slim jims or somethingㅡ"

"Um, I think I'd feel better if Little Lance was on me and Jess's team," Marco laughed anxiously.

"Don't worry, Marco, Laura and I will watch him," Steven laughed back. "Come on, they're already besties."

"Exactly!" Lance triumphed. "Okay, see you all at the dock in one hour!"

With that, the kitchen was suddenly half empty, and Keith was suddenly left with the task of deciding what food to bring back from Earth in under an hour. Oh no. He didn't even have any money. Well, he had a few gacs at the bottom of his bag, but he was pretty sure they weren't interchangeable with Cuban currency. Even if they were, they'd only be enough to buy like three, maybe four slim jims.

"Wait," Sal said as the back door slammed shut behind Team Speedboat and muted the sound of the island storm. "So was Lance serious that you guys haven't had any Earth food since you left three years ago? What have you been eating?"

"You don't want to know," Keith said.

"There's no way we can send you with enough food to tide you guys over till the next time you come back to Earth," Jessica said. "We don't even know how long you'll be gone. And there's five of you humans, right?"

"Oh," Keith said, a tantalizing thought occurring to him, "actually, the quantity doesn't matter. Because whatever I get back to the ship with, I can just stick it in the replicator and save it to the database. We've been eating Altean food because that's all the replicator has to work with in its file memory. So if I were to bring back, say… the basic building blocks of the human diet, I'm sure Pidge and Hunk could work together to engineer all sorts of human foods."

"Well in that case," Jocelyn smiled, and promptly whipped a box of ziploc bags out of a drawer. "Why don't I just send you home with a small sample of everything?"

While Jocelyn set about bagging up samples of sugar and rice and flour and milk and everything under the sun, labelling each bag in sharpie as if it were one big science experiment, Marco and Jessica pulled Keith to the side for a quick word. "So what else have you guys been missing about Earth?" Marco asked.

"Oh. Uh.."

"It's not a trick question," Jessica said warmly. "We want to know if there's anything else we can send back with you. With Lance. And for the others, too. Not for survival, necessarily. Not food, per se, but soul food, if that makes any sense."

Keith blinked at them for a solid five seconds, his mind a total blank, before the answer barreled into him out of nowhere in the form of Lance's watery smile last night as Marco played guitar in the living room. "Music," he said. After food, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge spoke of almost nothing else when they devolved into those long conversations where they talked about Earth and what they missed most, skirting delicately around the subject of family. "None of us have heard an Earth song in three years, and the others… Lance never shuts up about it," he said fondly.

"That's an easy one," Jessica said immediately, and pulled an iPod out of her back pocket to dump it in Keith's surprised hands, earbuds and all. "Next?"

"Hang on, what? You can't just give this to me."

"Just did," Jessica said, and she was already pulling Marco's out of his back pocket too. "Stop pouting," she whispered at her husband, "it's for Leandro! We can get new ones. Besides, yours has completely different music on it than mine. They need both. Keith?" she said, dropping Marco's too in his hands. "Next?"

"I don't know." Could they put an ocean sunrise into a ziploc bag and label it with a sharpie? Could they bottle rain in a way that would carry the smell of desert petrichor with it across ten million light years? "That's it, I guess. Most of the things we miss aren't things we can take with us," he settled vaguely.

"Hmm," Marco said. "Oh, that's it! You're a genius, Keith."

And then Keith was being pulled upstairs to gather all the digital photographs he had time to download from the family computer onto his own computer, minus the five minutes it took to figure out how to transfer them from Earth tech to Altean tech in the first place. So they were thirty-five minutes into the allotted hour before the meetup when Keith sighed and cut off the transfer. They'd gotten a lot, and didn't have time for anything else. They needed to go.

On the way back downstairs, Keith noticed a picture on the wall he hadn't seen on the way up due to the nook it was resting in. It was a photo of young Lance in dazzling blue water, lying on his back facing up, the cameraman standing on the bow of a boat looking down. All around him the ocean sparkled with life. Three manta rays flanked him, their fins grazing his limbs, and under that the coral painted the ocean a landscape of florescent rainbow, breathing with life, with fish of all shapes and colors and size frozen in time beneath the rolling surface of the sea.

"Animals," Keith heard himself say, his boots glued to the top step. "That's the other thing we miss the most. Terran animals."

He could feel Marco and Jessica and Gabi stilling behind him at the top of the stairs. "I don't think we can help with that one," Jessica said carefully.

Keith almost jumped when he felt something soft and warm on his hand. He looked down at it in surprise, saw Gabi's hand, and looked up into her bright, smiling face. Then she was pulling him away from the stairs, back up the hallway toward a room that he hadn't been inside yet. The room was a mess of about three different themes. Pink, Elvis Presley, and space. It was weird and messy and girly yet not, and Keith stood awkwardly in the doorway as Gabi skipped into the bedroom humming, wondering why she had brought him here. Understanding washed over him when she arrived at the fish tank by the window and pulled off the lid.

"This used to be Lance's room too," she remarked as she carefully scooped a bright red fish out with a net and dunked a jar into the water to fill it. "Since I took his room, he can have my fish. His name is Rufio. You'll make sure Lance takes good care of him, right?" she added quietly to Keith as she finished throwing a few more aquatic plants in after Rufio and screwed a golden lid onto the jar. "And feeds him every day? And puts him in a warm, colorful spot?"

Not trusting himself to speak, Keith simply nodded.

. . * . .

When they got to the docks and Gabi handed over Rufio (along with a ziploc baggie of fish food labelled with as much care as Jocelyn had labelled the human food), Lance crushed Gabi in a hug so tight it was a wonder she didn't break in half. Then came everyone else's turn. It wasn't as bad as it was back in the kitchen. Everyone seemed to have come to terms with the fact Lance was leaving again, and were composed enough to say goodbye. It was hard to hear anything that was being said through all the rain, anyway, and the only person who'd bothered to bring an umbrella was Jessica, who was holding Little Lance on her waist beneath it. After hugging Big Lance one last time, Jocelyn made her way over to Keith, who was leaning self-consciously against the railing of the creaking dock, ready for this nightmare to be over.

"Keith," she called over the rain, and Keith knew right away he was done for. "It was good to meet you. We all look forward to seeing you again in the future."

"Thanks," he said, cordially. "You too. And thanks for the hospitality." As short-lived as it had turned out to be.

"You're misunderstanding me," she smiled, an act which on her was something of a full-body motion. "Whenever your team makes it back to Earth, will you please come with Lance and see us again? We'll be very sad if you don't, honey."

"Iㅡ I'm sorry, you're right. I don't understand at all," he said in genuine surprise. He didn't mean to be rude, he was just so confused by this woman. Her actions made no sense. "You don't even know me,"

"Maybe not," she said sadly. "But Lance does, and that's what matters. Familia de familia es familia, Keith." And for once, he didn't need a translation. "It means something that he brought you home with him. You know that, don't you?"

Keith grew distracted as Lance finished up his goodbyes and vaulted the railing after Steven and Laura, past Jocelyn and Keith, before shouting at Keith to get a move on. "I know," Keith said to Jocelyn, and before he could second-guess himself, gave her a quick hug before jumping into the boat after Lance.

"Finish signing the adoption papers?" Steven joked, and Lance elbowed him hard enough in the ribs to make him stumble into a dip in the flooring. Keith was pretty sure he'd turned away fast enough to prevent Lance seeing the telltale sting of moisture in his eyes, but when the motor revved and the boat left the dock, Lance clambered across the boat to sit down by Keith anyway. Keith was about to say I'm fine, god, leave me alone or something to that effect, when he heard Lance draw in a long, shuddering breath.

Right. Lance was the one who wasn't fine.

Keith looked up then from the tangled net where it swished in the pooling rain on the floorboards to see Laura sitting directly across them, glaring at a flash of fractal lightning that struck far out to sea. Once, twice, and gone. Behind her was Steven, steadfastly steering the speedboat through the choppy waves toward Cayo Mono. Toward Blue, toward the castleship, toward the stars.

When Keith's hand ghosted at Lance's trembling back, he sighed and scooted over gratefully. Gracelessly. It drew Laura's eye but Keith let it happen, let Lance's head droop onto his shoulder unquestioned, let the sorrow breathe its way out of them both to be borne away on the ocean wind. There was nothing to be said. So none of them spoke.

Until they got to shore.

Until Lance tried to say goodbye to Steven and Laura, and Laura responded with, "I'm coming with you."

"What? No you're not," Lance blanched.

"I'm coming with you," she repeated, more determined than ever. "I can help you Lance, I can help fight, I canㅡ"

"No, no," Lance reeled, "Laura, no. You don't understand what it's like out there."

"I understand just fine!" she shouted, and the water swished in Rufio's jar as Lance took a faltering step back. "It's you that doesn't understand. What I've been through these last three years looking for you, Lance. I didn'tㅡI haven't had time yet to tell you. About the Garrison. What I've done there in my search for the truth. What I've found. What I've read and seen and overheard. I know things, Lance. I've done things. I'm not a child anymore!"

"I know you're not." Lance's lip trembled with uncertainty, but his furrowed brow and icy eyes told a different tale. "If you really understand what's going on, then I need you here, Laura. Listen, take my comm." He tucked Rufio's jar under one arm to pull the Altean computer out of his back pocket. Rain pelted the screen, each drop lighting up as it flickered to life. "I was about to give it to you anyway. It's got all our intel, our battle logs, profiles of the enemy, you name itㅡ"

"I don't want your stupid computer!" Laura shouted, even as Lance tried to pull her fingers closed around the device. Her voice was going hoarse now, and Steven was there at her side trying to calm her, but she shoved him away. "I want to help. I want to do something."

"This is what you can do," Lance pleaded. "Use the knowledge in here to keep Earth safe. Please."

"If you leave me behind again, I'll never forgive you."

Lance didn't seem to hear that. "You can even send messages to me with this," he plowed on. "I'll have to get a new one obviously, and it'll take a long time to reach us once we leave the sector, but just send it to Keith and I'll see it, okay?"

"Fine," she bellowed, "fine. Then just fuck off back to space." And for a moment Keith was certain she was going to punch Lance in the face. But then she turned, shoved the comm into Steven's hands, and set off for the boat where it was moored on the sand.

"I'm sorry," Lance whispered, only loud enough for Keith to hear.

And Keith had finally had enough of Laura.

"Uh-uh," he deadpanned. "No. Nope. Laura, get your ass back here!"

She stopped dead in her tracks, converse skidding in the beach sand, long hair whipping around in fat, dripping locks as she turned back toward them. "Excuse me?"

"What is wrong with you? " Keith fumed, and all his pent up emotion from the last two days came hurtling to the surface to froth out of his mouth. "You don't even know when you'll see him again and that's how you're gonna leave this? Do you realize how much Lance has missed you, and them, and this place? He thinks of nothing else." Keith slipped in the mud in his blind march of rage, but caught himself and kept going. "Especially you. Laura this, Laura that, I miss Laura, I hope she's okay. Youㅡ you ㅡhow could you justㅡ"

"Keith, it's okay. Calm down." Normally that phrase would have worked, since it was Lance who was pulling at his shoulder and saying it, but it didn't. Not this time.

"No!" he shouted, and pointed at Laura, who looked now as though she was wishing the rain would wash her out to sea. "We're not leaving until you fucking apologize!"

"Keith," Lance said, and the softest of it was so ridiculously at odds with the tension between Keith and Laura that Keith was forced to break eye contact with her. He looked at the water instead. At the roll of a wave, at a shedded palm frond as it tried to escape the shore and was continually pushed back. Gently. Ceaselessly. "She doesn't have to apologize," Lance explained, and Keith was pretty sure he was talking to Laura more than he was talking to Keith. "I understand how she feels. Besides, she's always been a bit of a hothead, like you. But I know she loves me. And she knows I love her. No fight will ever change that, so this is... okay. We'll come back," he called out, and turned away, pulling Keith along with him. "We will." Almost like he was trying to convince himself of it more than anyone else.

"Jeez," Steven said behind them. "Go to flight school, get abducted by little green men, become a wise jedi. Check, check, and check. Aw, come on Laura," he ended on a more serious note. "Swallow your pride."

A moment later, Lance's hand was torn off Keith's arm as a body barrelled into him. Lance barely caught Rufio before dropping him into the mud. "I'm sorry," Laura was saying. "I'm still angry but I love you, and you're right, and Keith was right. I want to go with you but I can't make you take me. Just be careful, please."

"I always am," Lance shot back. "Trust me, it's Keith you need to warn about being careful. And listen, Laura, I was serious about needing you here. Look at me." He took her face in his hands and gave her his most serious face. His Leader Face. Somehow, with water cascading down it, it held all the more weight and intensity. "From the sound of it, you know more about the truth that anyone in Cuba, and now with my comm you'll know more than anyone else on Earth. This planet needs that if it's going to survive. They need you, the same way the universe needs me. That's why you can't come with me."

Awe and understanding filled Laura's eyes, followed swiftly by admiration. Then, finally, pride. "No te defraudaré, hermano."

"I know," Lance grinned.

"And you," Laura switched gears, turning to Keith, who jumped at being directly addressed again and went into fight-or-flight mode. "You be careful, Rojo . I'm starting to like you. You better still be around next time Lance comes back or I'm gonna have to kick your dead ass, okay?"

Nodding solemnly, Keith shook Laura's hand, and when he pulled away Lance was eyeing him doggedly as Steven clung onto him and hissing a string of inaudible words into his ear. "Yeah yeah," Lance hissed back. "Ifㅡ ifㅡ that ever happens we'll have it here, okay? Shut up already."

"Pfft. 'If.' And I call best mㅡ"

Lance yanked him into a headlock. "I said shut up, and you'll have to split that with Hunk. Sorry."

Steven wriggled free just as swiftly as he'd been caught ruffled Lance's hair up with affection. "What? Share you? Gee, I've never had to do that before. Now, how did the saying go? Kick ass, go to space..."

"Represent the human race." The words just sort of fell out, and Keith blinked when the other three turned to stare at him with shock and amusement written across their faces. "What?"

"On that note," Lance grinned, "we ride."

The interior of Blue's jaw was still littered with the pieces of their armor, and they took a few minutes in the warm interior just out of reach of the pelting rain to strip most of their soaking wet clothes in favor of their dry flight suits. Then they geared up. Once their paladin armor was on they may as well have been on an alien beach a hundred galaxies away with the effect it had on the atmosphere between them. As they left the entrance to head up to cockpit, bags and helmets in tow, Lance threw one last look over his shoulder at the two figures silhouetted by the sea. Even though there was no way they could see the gesture through the haze of rain that divided them, he gave one last sorrowful wave.

As they made their way up, Keith's insides squirmed uncomfortably. It wasn't any of the familiar breeds of discomfort he'd been feeling for the last two days either. It was different. He had no idea what it was, but he was missing something crucial. It felt like he'd missed a step somewhere.

It was something Keith couldn't quite put his finger on, and it had been bothering him from the very instant Lance said ' Keith' down on the shore in the rain with that agonizingly soft voice. From the instant Lance wasn't mad at Laura, when he should have been. God, he should have been. But he wasn't.

What did that mean?

Did it make Lance more mature than Keith? That he could walk away from Earth with spats left unsolved, claiming with such confidence that it didn't change his relationship with his sister? That he could just trust it to be okay?

Did it make Lance stronger than him? Did it make Keith weak?

All along Keith thought he was the strong one for resisting thisㅡthis thing between them, while Lance was the weak one for throwing his hands up and trust-falling into the abyss. But now? That notion was tipping. Capsizing. He swam after it anyway, because he didn't know what the hell else would keep him afloat if not that.

"...Keith? Buddy?"

Lance's honey-smooth voice trickled in at his peripherals from a thousand light years away. Keith realized he was standing at the back of the cockpit now with the backpack full of food samples still slung over one shoulder, and Lance was standing just behind the pilot's seat, waiting on something. Waiting on him? How long had he been zoned out, standing here, questioning his entire existence?

Clearing his throat, Lance tried once more. "I said I hate to ask, but do you think you could hold onto Rufio until we get back to the castleship?" He held the fish jar out between them like it was made of the finest, most priceless porcelain, his brows furrowing as he made his plea. "You're not supposed to shake fish too much, so I don't want to set him down. Turbulence, and all that. Would you mind?"

And Keith just stared as that 'something' clicked into place.

He stared and stared like Lance had just cut his own heart out and asked Keith to hang onto it, because that was what he had done. With stupid, foolish awe Keith raked his eyes over Lance's fingers where they gripped the jarㅡso carefullyㅡand drew in a single shuddering breath while the understanding crashed over him all at once, finally, wave after wave. He got it now. He got it; what Lance was trying to say at the beach last night as they laid together on the moonlit shore. What he was trying to say on the beach not five minutes ago. What he meant when he handed his comm to Lauraㅡhow he was really handing the family to Laura, how he was entrusting to her Earth, and home, and how when Laura demanded Keith's safety she was somehow demanding Lance's in tandem. How when Gabi handed Rufio to her brother she was really handing him herself, and how when Lance asked Keith to hold this fish, he was asking Keith to hold Gabi.

It meant something that he brought you home with him.

When Jocelyn spoke, Keith had caught onto her implication, but it was more stumbling on a shape in the dark than true understanding. Like a brushing his ankle on a fish in the deep. But now he knew. He saw what it meant. Saw how Lance hadn't brought Keith anywhere at all, or given him to anyone. He had given them to Keith; passed them over like a fish in a jar, committed them to his care. To watch, to keep, to love. Had passed his heart over too on that beach on a silver platter, no strings attached, no holds barred, because why the hell not. He'd been trying to for months. Ten months, in fact. Ever since Taulderin. Fucking Taulderin.

And Keith, like the idiot he was, thought he could just pass it back and that would be that.

'That' was never ' that' with Lance.

"Um." The jar drooped an inch as Lance's eyebrows scrunched together at him in concern. "You okay? You don't have to hold it ifㅡmph!"

Lance stumbled back as Keith plowed into him without warning, their lips nearly missing each other, catching himself with one arm on his pilot's chair, the other curling protectively around Rufio's jar, tucking it to one side as their chestplates scraped together. It was a messy, disjointed kiss with their clunky paladin armor in the way. But Keith pushed closer anyway. More lips. More breath. More armor scraping armor. It wasn't like the beach at all and he couldn't directly feel Lance's skin or hair with his gloves in the way, but that was okay, because next time. Next time. And besides, the way it felt when Lance's glove brushed at his cheek to push his wet hair away from his eyes was… just, wow. The way their noses smushed together almost killed him.

The ravenous shine to Lance's eyes as Keith pulled away could have melted steel beams; the phosphorous lights from Blue's interior shone back from the very back of Lance's retinas, changing shape as Lance tried to follow after, burning everything in his wake.

But instead of sinking back into the kiss, Keith swallowed thickly and said, "You're wrong. What you said last nightㅡor, this morning. On the beach. When we…" Keith faltered at the adorable confusion on Lance's face. The lingering shock mixed with unfiltered happiness. "I do trust you," he said with conviction, and plucked the jar from Lance's grasp. "I trust you, Lance. I've just never…"

"What?" A cocky selfsure grin came over him. "Dated anyone? Somehow, I think I can live with that."

"No," Keith huffed. "For fuck's sake, how do you do it? "

Lance blinked. The confusion was back at full capacity. "Do what?"

Do what, do what, as if he didn't know. "Wear your heart outside your body like that! How do you even function when you've got fifty different pieces of yourself scattered all over the universe, in places where you couldn't possibly protect them?" Keith knew he should stop, that it was a sore spot with them leaving Varadero six days ahead of schedule, but he couldn't. "I mean wouldn't it be easierㅡsaferㅡif you just," he was speaking in a hoarse whisper now and he should stop talking, he really should, "justdidn't?"

Keith hated the look Lance was giving him now. Hated that it looked suspiciously like pity. "Ahhh. Okay. I see the problem now."

"No you don't," Keith snapped.

"Yeah. I do. This is about Taulderin, isn't it? It always goes back to Taulderin. See, this is what happens when you go through something traumatic and then refuse to talk about it."

"We need to get back to the ship, Lance, we don't have time to talk about Taulㅡabout that." He almost jumped out of his skin when Lance seized his wrist and hauled him back across the cockpit, until their chest plates were colliding again with a soft clackthat echoed haltingly in the neon darkness. "It's crazy how opposite we are, isn't it? That you don't wanna be with me for the exact same reason that I wanna be with you. Normally that kind of dysfunction would be a dealbreaker. 'Never date a fixer-upper' my mama always warned, and I told her she wouldn't catch me dead. But heh, look at me now."

"Hey, you're the fixer-upper!" Keith yelled, his voice cracking into an embarrassing register.

"Keith. Babe. Shut up and listen to me. You really think it's gonna be easier on you if I were to die and we'd never given love a go than it would if we had?"

"Give love a go," he mocked, deftly covering his reaction to the part of that sentence that had actually gotten to him: the casually uttered babe. "Who says it like that?"

"You're stalling."

"Yes, okay? Yes. It would be way fucking easier and you can't deny that. Sue me for looking out for myself."

"Hh." Lance huffed the tiniest laugh before play-punching Keith in the chin. "Easier, sure. But since when have we ever been the sort to take Easy Street?"

"Was that a challenge?" The mischievous glint in Lance's eye gave him dead-away. Oh my god, it totally was. "Are you seriously challenging me to date you?"

"That depends," Lance snickered. "Is it working?"

To Keith's everlasting fury, it was. But that didn't mean he was going to let Lance have this. "You don't need to challenge me. Ugh. I'm the one who kissed you this time, dumbass, or did you forget already?"

"Forget? " Lance laughed, and then he was slipping out from between Keith and the chair to slide around to the front side of it. His hands flit across the controls with the ease of a long-honed skill, jumpstarting Blue to life. "Yeah right. I'll be remembering that on my deathbed. Hang on tight to my fish friend, mullet, we're goin' up."

And up they went.

Through the rain and the lightning and then the clouds, through the turbulent mesosphere, the thermosphere, the exosphere, and all too soon the Earth was curving away below them. The cradle of humanity was nothing more than one more island on the blackest, deepest sea. It struck Keith then that they weren't all that different from the sailors of old. Charting their courses with sextants and stars, roaming and roaming and sometimes, when the wind was right and the skies were clear, going home.

"Ha," Lance said, and when he pointed out the front dash Keith somehow knew the source of his amusement instantly. "Would you look at that. The castleship's off in the direction of the North Star."

Keith eyed the brightest object in their field of view; the tiny prick of white in a spiderweb of infinity. Thought about the four hundred-and-something light years between here and there, and how they'd travelled so much farther beyond here than that. Beyond anything any other human had before them. Together.

"You say that like it means something," Keith laughed.

Hands pushing the thrusters to max in his haste, Lance only shrugged. "Maybe it does."

In the direction of the star, a silver-blue speck loomed. Even as he spotted it the speck grew closer, and bigger all the while, swiftly growing into the familiar friendly shape of the Altean battleship. The castle. Keith curled his hand around the jar subconsciously, wondering whether Lance would need any help setting up the fish tank. Thinking about how beside themselves Hunk and Pidge and Shiro would be about the Earth food building blocks Lance's family had sent back with them, and how eager Allura and Coran would be to share in their culture. Considering what it would be like to kiss Lance goodbye before the incoming battle, and hello again after, and the next day good morning, and the next day, and the next. Considering that maybe the reward outweighed the risk after all.

Considering that maybe Lance was right. Maybe there was no risk.

At least, not the kind of risk that mattered.

Keith crossed his free arm on the back of Lance's chair and leaned his cheek on it fondly, watching Polaris finally vanish beyond the northern wing of the still-growing castleship. "Yeah," was all he said. But some of his love must have slipped out with the word, because Lance's grip on the thrusters slackened, and he turned toward Keith with a question on his tongue. "Maybe it does," Keith hummed.

And the way Lance smiled, then, the way it broke over him and spread like an Arizona dawn, like Sonoran wildfireㅡ

ㅡhe knew Lance heard the undertone.

Spanish-English translations:

"Familia de familia es famila." ㅡ "Family of family is family."

"No te defraudaré, hermano." ㅡ "I won't let you down, brother."