Fake Mistletoe | Plance

18, Continued (Pidge)

"We want to go to breakfast. Do you think the medics will allow Lance out to join us? If we-"

"Ugh, it's only, what, seven? Can you not just... need us later?" Ellie emerged from the medics' quarters, rubbing her eyes dramatically.

"We just wanted to-"

"Yeah, I know. 'Can Lance go to breakfast?' He can, but we'll give you a wheelchair. Anyway, I need to do routine checks, so you won't be going anywhere for the next five minutes or so,"

"That's not a problem. But- Well, I was kind of hoping I'd be able to change," Lance requested.

"I can help, if you like," I offered. Before I realised what I'd said, I received very odd looks from Matt, the medic and Lance. "Oh! Matt, you can do it. Sorry, I wasn't thinking,"

"Surprising, Pidge. Your brain stopped whirring for once?" I rolled my eyes at Matt, giving Lance a 'it's-him-not-me' look. He seemed to register it, only to allow a malicious grin widen across his cheeks.

"Truly shocking. She's always going. It's unlike you to just not think. I mean, considering... how smart you are,"

"Well, yes. You can change after I've checked that everything's okay. Seems so, though," Ellie gestured at Lance's lingering smirk. She brandished a clipboard from the foot of Lance's bed and made some hasty notes from her study of his various monitors. "Okay, it's all looking pretty good. I'll grab you that wheelchair and you can be off. Even better, you don't have to return except to bring back the chair or for painkillers if it gets too much,"

"We have... fifteen doboshes until breakfast is scheduled to start. So if Matt helps Lance, then we can all go together," Allura calculated from the clock on the wall. Allura and I waited as Matt took Lance to the bathroom to change.

When Lance and Matt had teased me for 'not thinking', it set something off in my head. I hadn't been thinking, certainly, but that didn't indicate anything bad. The previous night had been lovely, because he seemed to slow everything down for me. The usual frantic activity going on in my head almost halted, and instead of being uptight and stern, finding humour in the things I'd normally turn up my nose at. I'd found that he was a catalyst for chill.

"Come on," Matt poked his head around the door, beckoning Allura and me over. We followed him out to where he waited with Lance, who looked very relieved to be fully clothed.

"Ugh, the outside world," Lance reached out dramatically into the space in front of him. "It's been so long,"

"It's been about a quintant, Lance." Allura said seriously, before realising he had been joking. Her face lit up with a smile before she cracked into laughter. It was a rare occasion to see Allura laugh. What Lance had said hadn't even been very funny, but it had been so long since any of us had properly laughed without any cares. She spewed joy to the point where we were all almost in tears (for Lance, it was possibly from the pain it caused him). What had been said certainly hadn't been very funny, but Allura's reaction of pure, untainted elation was infectious.

By the time we'd all calmed down, Matt's watch informed us that we were going to be late.

"Always making an entrance, huh?" Lance tipped his head back to look at me. For once, I got to be taller than him. I'd definitely have to take advantage of that.

"It's Voltron's style, right?" I grinned down at him.

"Okay, come on, lovebirds. We actually do need to go, or there won't be any bacon, and I will kill you both," Matt set our course for the canteen, Lance, Allura and me in tow. We were (thankfully) not the last to breakfast. At our usual table sat Keith, Ina, Hunk, James and Nadia, while Mom was beside N-7 on a separate table. Various others sat scattered about, and I couldn't help but notice Shiro wasn't there.