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Shiro snored.
Of all the people in the world that Pidge expected to snore, Shiro was not one of them. But there he was, head tilted back over his pillow, mouth hanging open, and snoring. In the loudest, most obnoxious rip-snorting way.
The beds of the other three paladins were silent, but Pidge could see the eerie light of Keith’s tablet lighting his bunk, and Hunk was rolling over every time Shiro made a noise. Lance, she guessed, was probably asleep, with his mufflers and blinders, because he was the smartest out of all of them and assumed the whole world was out to wake him up at an unfortunate hour.
Hunk sat up. “Okay,” he said, in a loud whisper. “Am I the only person who can’t sleep like this? Because I can’t sleep like this.”
Shiro snored. Pidge sighed, and sat up in her bunk. “I’m awake,” she admitted. She looked over at Keith’s bed, which made Hunk look too, and they both stared at his tablet light for a long, wordless moment before the light flipped off and Keith’s head appeared over his bunk.
“It’s not like there’s anything we can do about it,” he said with the kind of peevish look that said he was tired of thinking of things that they could do about it.
“Well I’m gonna go get a drink of water or something. There’s got to be a water barrel or … whatever,” Hunk said, getting to his feet.
“Me too,” Pidge said, because laying here in the dark listening to Shiro snore wasn’t doing her any good. She crawled to the bunk ladder.
“Whatever,” said Keith, but he lightly threw himself over the bunk railing and landed on his toes. Show-off, Pidge thought, not because he was one, but because she was jealous she couldn’t do that without making any noise.
The creak of the inn door opening actually stopped Shiro’s snoring; he went still, then rolled onto his side, and cracked his eyes open. “Keith? … guys, what’s …”
Although Shiro’s bed was the bottom bunk closest to the door, it still wasn’t fair that he could somehow hear a door creak over all the racket he was making. Pidge pinched the bridge of her nose.
But Keith bent down, reached out and put his hand on Shiro’s shoulder. “Go back to sleep, Shiro.”
Shiro looked doubtfully at Keith with a bleary gaze before transferring it to each of them in turn, but at length said, “If you need me--”
“We’ll wake you up, we promise,” Pidge said hastily. She placed her hands on Hunk’s back and pushed him from the room. “Come on, Hunk, midnight snack.”
“If only,” Hunk grumbled, but then they were in the hall. Keith closed the door behind them, and they all stood there, contemplating the situation.
“Maybe he won’t start snoring again,” Hunk suggested.
“He’ll start snoring again,” Keith said, his brows knitted together. “Were you serious about the water thing?”
“Yeah.”
“Then let’s go.” Keith pushed past Hunk and Pidge in the narrow hall and started for the stairwell; Hunk and Pidge looked at each other, shrugged, and followed.
**
In all honesty, the town they were staying in looked like something out of a high fantasy RPG. Pidge hardly knew what to make of the four-room ‘inn’ structured like a hostel, with bunk beds and all; there was no running water and no electricity. The town smelled of animals and animal dung and the locals - green-skinned, bipedal aliens with voices that sounded like croaking - apparently ate nothing but meat, mildly supplemented by fungus.
More importantly, their town was sitting on top of some ore that Coran could refine for improving the lifespan of Pidge’s cloaking technology, which Pidge was still struggling to wrap her mind around. The crystal technology was fascinating, but she had a lot to learn. But the town was completely surrounded by a dense wood, so there was no place to park the Lions or the ship nearby. They were therefore about half a day’s ride by transport from the ship, and it made more sense to just spend the night locally instead of flying back.
Hence: sharing a room with the other paladins for the night, and also hence: finding out that Shiro snored like a buzzsaw. Pidge now regretted not taking up Allura’s offer to share the second room with her, trading spaces with Coran - but she still thought the idea that she needed a separate sleeping space just because she was a girl was antiquated and dumb.
The inn was dead quiet; they were the only out-of-towners, and it seemed that even the inn’s proprietor had left for the night. The only light in the common room downstairs came from the planet’s moon, which was orange-hued. The effect was, if Pidge was being honest, pretty creepy.
“Where do you think they’d keep fresh water around?” Hunk asked, no longer whispering now that they were out of the room.
“I dunno. The well?” Keith shrugged.
“There’s no way they haul water every single time they want a drink. Let’s check the kitchen,” Hunk proposed. Keith looked at Pidge; Pidge shrugged too, so they all started for the back door of the common room.
The water expedition finally found success by the stove; a half-barrel was full of water, a ladle provided, and Pidge took a drink. The water was sweet, but as it was room temperature it wasn’t very refreshing. She wiped her lips with her knuckles. “If Shiro keeps snoring like that, nothing is going to get me to sleep. It’s ridiculous.”
Hunk finished drinking from the ladle and drew the back of his hand across his mouth. “Yeah, me neither.” He offered the ladle to Keith, who shook his head, so Hunk replaced it where it was balanced over the barrel edge. “I- I didn’t really expect him to be a snorer. Seems kind of like the opposite of everything else about him.”
“All I want to know is how my brother and dad slept through that during the mission to Kerberos,” Pidge said. Human space transports were nothing like the sophisticated space-faring fortress that the Castle of Lions was; her father, Matt, and Shiro would all have shared a single room for sleeping, where they would have to strap themselves in to keep from floating out of bed. “I would have murdered him somewhere been Mars and Jupiter.”
Keith listened with his arms crossed over his chest. “He didn’t snore back then.”
Pidge’s eyebrows tried to climb directly into her hairline. She and Hunk shared a look, then turned their gazes on Keith almost simultaneously. “And how do you know that? ” Pidge asked.
Keith glowered at her, but Hunk took up her cause. “Dude, come on, you can’t drop a hint like that and not explain it.”
“What difference does it make?” Keith demanded, but Pidge thought she could see him turning pink. It was hard to tell in the orangey light.
“Look, it’s obvious you and Shiro know each other from before the mission to Kerberos.”
“Yeah, man, we’re just curious.”
Keith scowled. “Stop making it sound like we have some weird conspiracy going on. It’s not that involved. I just--”
“Wait, wait wait wait,” Hunk interrupted. He pushed Keith towards the kitchen door. “Let’s go back to the common room.”
“What? Why?”
“Less hanging meat for one thing,” Hunk pointed out. “But also it’s a better place for a good story.”
“There isn’t a story!” Keith protested, but Pidge was also happy to get away from the hooks with cured meat hanging from them, so she assisted Hunk in getting Keith back out to the common room. Hunk settled himself onto one of the floor cushions that surrounded the low tables; Pidge decided to follow suit after a moment, arranging a pile of the cushions so she could lean back on them. Keith heaved a put-upon sigh, but sat cross-legged on a cushion himself so they sat in a loose equilateral triangle.
“So how do you know about Shiro’s snoring habits?” Pidge asked. Hunk sat eagerly forward.
Keith was quiet for a long moment, looking down at his lap. When he looked up, he said, “I was Shiro’s wingman in the synchronized flight class.”
“Oooh,” Hunk said, nodding. “... Wait, what does that mean?”
Pidge knew; it meant that Keith was a really, really good pilot cadet. She whistled. “Nice.”
“What did I miss?” Hunk protested.
“Synchronized flight is what the Air Force One fighter pilots do over the White House during ceremonies,” Pidge explained. “It’s one of the most difficult flying exercises.”
“Oh! Oh, yeah, I remember Lance talking about it. Hey, man, that’s cool, you got to fly with Shiro?”
“In simulators.” Keith’s normally-flat expression gave way to a little smile. “Trust me, flying the Lions is way cooler.” A short pause followed while they all thought about the thrill of flying in Voltron. Keith cleared his throat. “They made us go on a camping trip as a trust-building thing. We spent three days getting bit by mosquitos and getting drizzled on.”
That sounded just like the Garrison to Pidge; full of pointless exercises meant to make cadets miserable. “Sucks,” she said sympathetically.
Keith shrugged. “So that’s how I know Shiro doesn’t - didn’t - snore.”
“;Cause you had to share a tent?” Hunk asked. At Keith’s nod, Hunk scratched his chin. “I see. Yeah, you’re right, it’s not much of a story.”
“I told you.”
“But it’s still cool you got to spend that much time with him. Man, Lance would be so jealous,” Hunk continued. “I’m kind of glad he’s not awake to hear this.”
Keith crossed his arms. “That’s stupid. We all sync fly with each other now.” He closed his eyes. “He’s not missing out on anything.”
“So,” Pidge interrupted, not interested in a debate about Lance’s ongoing ‘rivalry’ with Keith, “Why does he snore now?” Even as she asked it, she realized that there was no reason any of them should have the answer. It also didn’t matter: knowing why Shiro snored wouldn’t get them any more sleep. But before she could change her question to a more pertinent one, Keith met her eyes.
“Because his nose healed wrong.” Keith pointed to the bridge of his own nose. “Somebody cut it open and when it healed his nostrils got screwed up. He can’t breathe right.”
Pidge digested this information like a stone sinking into the bottom of her stomach. She had never really thought about the scar across Shiro’s nose, but Keith was right: the only way a scar like that could have been left was if something had cut through his nose so deeply it scored into his cheeks. And the most likely place for that to have happened was in the arena - the only part of his captivity Shiro had described with any detail.
Hunk had picked up where Pidge left off. “I didn’t even think of that,” he said in a subdued voice. “Do you think he remembers it?”
Keith gave a slight shrug. “Dunno.” He turned his attention back to Pidge, who had bowed her head without noticing. “Hey. You okay?”
Thinking about Shiro as a Galra captive naturally brought on a flood of anxiety for Matt and her dad. A lump rose in her throat, but she swallowed it down with determination. They were going to find her family. She refused to accept any other outcome.
Pidge took a deep breath and looked up. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Keith looked concerned; Hunk, doubtful, so she added, “Well, we can’t exactly fix his nose. What’s the solution?”
“Next time we have to share a room: bring earplugs,” Hunk grumbled. Pidge half-smiled at that. “Okay, but seriously? My stepdad is a big snorer, and Mom says she just elbows him and then he rolls over and stops. But they’re married. It feels like that would be weird to do to Shiro. And …” Hunk made a gesture with both hands that somehow communicated helplessness. “What if he just wakes up?”
Considering how easily he had woken up at the door creaking, Pidge thought Hunk had a point, and said so. “You know how Shiro is always ready to go before any of us every time Princess Allura makes us drill?” she added. “I just thought maybe he just never slept, but now I think he just wakes up the fastest. And sleeps in his armor.”
“You thought he never slept?” Hunk gave Pidge a skeptical look.
Pidge frowned. “I said maybe he never slept. Obviously I was wrong, but - sometimes he looks tired but he’s never, like, nodding off and he’s always ready to go. I thought maybe the Galra did something to him so he didn’t have to sleep or … I dunno,” she trailed off at the looks Hunk and Keith were giving her. “Look, it was a valid theory! We didn’t have any evidence he sleeps!”
“Except that he’s human ,” Keith said, incredulous.
“Okay, Keith? I might have kinda wondered a couple times too,” Hunk admitted after a short pause. “I just didn’t think about it as hard as Pidge.”
Keith sighed, but he changed the subject. “Look, the only way we’re going to get any rest is if we just get tired enough to sleep through it.”
“Wait it out, huh?” Hunk looked exhausted at the thought. “You know, we could sleep down here. These pillows are pretty comfortable.”
“We could take some of the pillows upstairs and use them as mufflers,” Pidge suggested, as she much preferred the idea of sleeping in a bed. Keith’s disgruntled look faded into one of mild appreciation at that.
“We could make Shiro sleep down here,” Hunk said, but waved his hands in front of him even before Keith and Pidge turned a glare on him. “I’m joking, I’m joking.”
They fell silent, contemplating their options, when the sound of a door creaking, followed by footsteps, came from upstairs. Pidge had a weird moment, feeling like she’d been caught sneaking out of her room by her mom, but she shook it off and whispered dramatically, “Everybody act natural.”
Hunk snort-giggled at that, but Keith said, “What?” in a tone of complete confusion. Pidge internally bemoaned that Keith wasn’t Lance.
“It’s a meme,” Hunk started to explain, but Pidge held out a hand to tell him to be quiet. The footsteps came down the stairs.
It was Shiro; he looked completely awake, put together, and pretty much exactly like he always did whenever Pidge saw him on the Castle of Lions. “So you are down here.” He came towards them. “What's up, guys? Couldn’t sleep?”
Pidge, Hunk, and Keith all exchanged a glance. “No,” Keith said.
Shiro looked at them each in turn, a small frown creasing his brow. “Is something wrong?”
Pidge could see Hunk’s mind turning over and knew he was about to start making irrelevant excuses for why none of them were asleep. The absurdity of it struck her as funny, and she twisted her mouth to keep from grinning. Before Hunk could speak, she said, “You snore.”
“Oh.” Shiro blinked at this. He lifted one hand as high as his neck, as if reaching for his face, but ended up just scratching the back of his head. “I guess that’s not a total surprise. Did I keep you up?”
Hunk looked guilty; he hooked his hands together and fiddled with his thumbs. “Yeah, kinda.”
Shiro let out a little breath; his brows quirked up as his expression fell somewhere between apologetic and amused. “You can make me roll over next time.”
“Okay,” Hunk said, but considering what they’d all discussed, Pidge doubted he meant it.
“Did we wake you up?” Keith asked.
“I … no, I don’t think so. I just woke up and noticed you weren’t in bed.” Shiro looked around the common room. “You should try to get some rest before morning. With any luck we’ll be able to core tomorrow and roll back out.”
“What about you?” Pidge asked.
Shiro smiled. “I’m good.”
“Shiro,” Keith said. Pidge couldn’t read his voice, but Shiro looked at him with a straight face. “You sure?”
“I’m sure.” Somehow, Shiro’s tone was more reassuring the second time; he seemed somehow less patronizing towards Keith. Pidge felt a buzz of irritation, making her scowl.
“Well, if you’re sure, I’m turning in,” Hunk said. “G’night, Shiro.”
“Night, Hunk.”
Hunk stood up, stretching by putting his hands on his backside and leaning backwards. “You guys coming?”
“In a second,” Pidge said. “Night, guys.”
Hunk looked taken off-guard, but Keith, though he frowned speculatively, seemed to catch on to something and got up too. “Night.” He started for the stairs, and Hunk followed with a shrug.
There was a pause in their steps at the top of the stairs, but they resumed shortly afterwards, a little faster than before. Pidge waited until she heard the door to their room close again.
Without preamble she met Shiro’s eyes and said, “I know you’re our leader. And you’re good at it, and I’m grateful. I like that you listen to all of us. But you know, we’re listening too. And if you’re worried you’re going to keep us all up trying to sleep, there are other solutions.”
Shiro blinked, but even though he looked surprised, he smiled genuinely. “Thank you, Pidge. I promise I’m not just staying up to spare you from listening to me snore.” He hesitated. “I usually sleep about four hours a night, so I feel rested.” He bent down to settle cross-legged on the cushion Keith had abandoned.
And didn’t that bode well. Pidge could guess why he slept so little, so instead of asking, she cut straight to the chase. “Do you ever have nightmares?”
Shiro stopped smiling. “Sometimes,” he said, very seriously.
“Do … do you think any of them are memories? That you forgot?” Pidge forced herself to keep her eyes on Shiro’s face.
Shiro met her gaze and held it. “I try to not think about it. What’s this about?”
Pidge couldn’t face Shiro and keep talking; she looked away. “I just. I was wondering if there was anything else you could tell me about my family.” It cost her to say it; her throat threatened to close up. “I can’t tell if you never talk about it because it hurts or because you don’t remember. But it’s my family . I don’t want you to hide anything about it from me.”
Shiro didn’t answer right away, and Pidge took slow, deep breaths to help herself calm down. When he did talk, it was in gentle tones. “I really don’t remember much,” he said. “From what I can recall, we didn’t spend very long together after we were abducted. Your father was sent off to a work camp, and I don’t think it was much after that I attacked Matt so he would get sent to one, too. I hope they ended up together. From what you’ve gotten from Galra records, it sounds like they probably did.
“But I do remember that even though we were all terrified, Commander Holt …” Shiro trailed off. Pidge looked at Shiro; he rubbed his flesh hand down his face. “Commander Holt kept insisting on looking on the bright side. I have a clear memory of us in a metal cell, and your father just … he wouldn’t stop talking about convergent evolution. He couldn’t believe that we were surrounded by bipedal aliens and that the air on the Galra ship was breathable for humans. I’m sorry, Pidge, but I really wanted to punch him.” Shiro gave a choked laugh. “He talked about our captivity like he was making the greatest scientific discovery of our time. And I guess he was.
“He talked about everything like we would be home in a matter of weeks to tell the tale.” Shiro breathed in like he was going to continue, but he didn’t.
Pidge could imagine it; she remembered the cell they’d emptied on the Galra ship. She could see her father and brother and Shiro sitting in that pitch-black space as her father talked about biology because it was better than talking about anything else. “Sounds like Dad,” she said, her voice wavering.
Shiro leaned over and put his arm around Pidge’s shoulders. “If anyone is going to hang in there, it’s Commander Holt,” he said. “Your family is so strong. All of you.”
Pidge squeezed her eyes shut, forcing the unshed tears in her eyes to wash out, and brushed them away harshly. “You’re right,” she said, looking up. Shiro’s cheek was wet, but Pidge pretended to not notice; she wasn’t ready to see him cry, or for him to see her do much crying either. “Thanks, Shiro.”
“Anytime.” Shiro squeezed her shoulder. “You going to try to sleep now?”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Pidge said, with a little smile. She got to her feet. “See you in the morning.”
“See you then.” Shiro knuckled his own cheek discreetly and waved her off.
Back in the room, Hunk and Keith had managed to drift off; Lance had rolled onto his side. She climbed into her bunk and layed her head down. The silence of the room was more deafening than Shiro’s snores; there was no metallic hum of a ship, no patrols outside her Garrison room, and only the quietest echoes of animals outside the walls - none of which she could identify. The animals sounded nothing like the ones on Earth.
She counted Lance’s even, untroubled breaths and thought of her dad’s smile until she was lulled to sleep.
fin