Klance School AU

Chapter 4: Partners

The notebook splayed open to a page with beautiful drawings on it. Actually the same drawing that had first caught Lance's eye just the other day: the wolf. He reaches for the notebook to be helpful but the other boy is quick to whip it out of his hand and throw it in his backpack. "Don't fucking touch my shit."

Lance looks into Keith's dark eyes and realizes for the first time how tired they look. Unfortunately, the words that come out of his mouth are, "You don't gotta be an ass, I was just trying to help, man!" Both boys stand up as students stare as they pass by. Keith tries to shove by, "Be helpful by staying out of my way." Lance reaches for him but he's already making his way through the crowd. Hunk puts a hand on his shoulder to prevent him from running after him.

"Just leave it, Lance." Lance grumbles but nods and turns the other direction to walk with his best friend. "I can't believe he would just be so rude!" He exclaims. Hunk sighs, "He's just one of those guys who thinks he's better than everyone else. Don't let it get to you, bud." But it had gotten under Lance's skin and he didn't know why. 'Why should I care anyways?' He asked himself, no answer would come for a long time. But by then he would have completely forgotten about this thought.

(Time skip)

The rest of the day runs smoothly until 8th period Art Class. Lance is the first to admit he is no artist, but with getting kicked out of band he had no choice but to choose the only other welcoming elective. Unfortunately, as if the predicament couldn't be any worse, Keith was also in this class. 'No big deal', he told himself. It's not like they were sat together. Keith was notorious for never sitting with anyone unless forced to. The bright side was, Lance got to sit just one table away from Allura, the hottest girl at his school.

Everything was going fine for the moment. The lesson was an introduction into colour theory, but lance was too busy staring off into space imagining a life with his crush. The teacher wasn't paying much attention either since he was just playing a video. When the lesson ends he stands at the front of the classroom and struggles to gain the attention (and conciousness) of his students.

"For our first project," he begins, "we will be splitting off into pairs." Murmur starts around the class as students start to claim positions. "Woah there. You should know that these will be assigned, not chosen. I know you are all very excited about this but please keep an open mind. Art class is about expanding your creativity and you cannot reach your full potential by staying with those you are accustomed to."

The class groans on but Mr. Solovan pretends he does not hear. He walks over to his desk and picks up a wildly outdated top hat of poor condition. "Pairs will be chosen the traditional way via my luck top! When I call your names please move together." As he begins, Lance smooths down any fly away hairs and hopes he ends up with Allura, or at least another cute girl. The teacher calls out on and on until Lance starts listening for real. "Allura..." he draws another name, "and....Romelle."

'Lucky pairing' he thinks. It occurs to him then that not many people are left in the hat. By the time it finally reaches him he has no idea the shock he is about to be in for. "Ah, our last pairing will be... Lance and Keith!" The room goes quiet with only a few murmurs here and there. He curses his bad luck, but moves slowly towards the back of the room to join his new partner, who is objectively ignoring everything and looking out the window.

'What could he possibly be looking at?' He thinks as he sits down beside him. The window only showed the barren lot beside the school. So either Keith had a strong imagination, or he was purposely ignoring Lance. Of course, he took this as a personal strike against himself.

"Okay," Mr. Solovan starts again. "Now that everyone has their new seating arrangements for the next week, I want you and your partner to discuss some ideas for the upcoming project which will start tomorrow." He points to ink ridden board at the front of the class. "Project specifics are up here, you have the rest of the class period to come up with an idea."

With this he dismisses the class to go about their own. "So..." Lance begins. Keith sighs annoyedly and turns to meet his gaze. "Look, just because we have to work together doesn't mean we are friends." Lance rolls his eyes. "Agreed, obviously. As if I'd want to be friends with you." Keith glares at him. He clears his throat and looks away. "So what are your ideas?" With this, Keith looks up at the board and takes a moment to read it all."

"It has to be space themed?" He says really to himself. "Yeah. I was thinking we could make something that shows like galactic warfare you know?" Keith looks at him, not annoyed nor necessarily interested.

"Galactic warfare?" He asks, his right eyebrow cocked. "That's stupid." Lance dramatically acts hurt. "How is that stupid? Just because it's space themed doesn't mean it has to be boring planets and stars. We could do like-," he searches for the words. "Like robots! They could be fighting for the universe and all the hot babes in it." Keith chuckles, but he's not amused.

"What so the robots are just sentient now? Why do they have to fight anyway, seems like they are the ones putting the universe at threat."

"No of course not, they are piloted by humans and they fight against aliens who want to hurt the universe."

Keith rolls his eyes. "That's so fucking stupid. Why not it just be space ships?"

"Uh... because the robots are the spaceship that they pilot. They just are shaped like robots. Robot wolves too!"

Keith feels his eye start to twitch just listening to him, but he tries not to lash out. He masses the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. "Wolves? Why?" Lance stammers. "Um, because wolves are cool! And fierce."

Keith starts to talk, but wonders why he even is indulging in this conversation. Apart of him unfortunately, really wants his argument to come out on top, even if the situation is stupid."

"Wolves are cool, but if they are giant metal robot spaceships there is no way they could replicate the fur in the metal and still make It aerodynamic. If it was going to be anything it would be..." he pauses for a moment, "lions. Female lions. They are smooth and could easily be designed." Lance huffs. "Fine, so we go with lions!" Keith crosses his arms. "Fine!"

They sit in silence until the bell rings. They both leave either flipping the bird and sticking their tongue out at each other. As they walk away, both neither of them really knows what happened except that their art project will be a 3D robot space lion...