Archive of Our Own ^beta

Shiro always told him that he's only human, and that humans make mistakes, but what about now? Now that he's not human, that he's never been human. What could be worse than the mistakes human Keith was making?

Well, human Keith didn't get real sleepy on missions.

"Pidge, how's the distress signal coming along?" Keith mumbled, to keep himself awake. Their lions were all but totaled, with Black and Green taking the brunt of the damage. They'd lost track of the others, but Keith could only hope they were in a better, less chilly situation than he and Pidge were.

Pidge grunted out an annoyed little sound, whacking the side of her laptop in annoyance. "Not good. We aren't getting any signal down here. We need to get somewhere higher, but I don't think our suits are gonna have enough oxygen to put up with us heaving ourselves up a mountain. In simpler terms, we're-a-fucked." Keith only nodded, pulling his knees closer to his chest. This atmosphere was the opposite of what he'd grown up with in butt-fuck-nowhere, Arizona. Survival was second nature in the blazing sun, and he could probably sniff out a small water puddle multiple miles away, but in the cold?

Well, in the cold, Keith was practically incapacitated.

The first time Keith's body put him into forced hibernation mode, it was in the back of Shiro's car. He'd come to pick him up from his current foster home, AC blasting. He'd thought Keith would be overheated, considering the lack of ventilation in that tiny house. When Shiro had stopped talking and looked back to check on him, Keith was out cold, curled up on the leather seats and clutching his jacket closer to his body. If Keith had walked into Shiro's home and got immediately swaddled in the softest quilts Adam could find in their closet, well, that was no one else's business.

In hindsight, Keith realized it's probably a Galra thing. Shiro had half-jokingly complained about wanting nothing more than a handheld fan when he was imprisoned, those ships were so damn hot, and Keith had stayed silent on his own thoughts that they were perfectly warm. 

Keith blinked, and suddenly there were big brown eyes squinting at him, small hands poking his neck and a green paladin generally being annoying. "Did you hear a word I said?" The lingering tingles on his arms told him that she'd been pestering him for a good minute. "Oh, sorry. I was zoned out. Did you find something?" Even in his own ears, Keith could tell he sounded drowsy. Luckily, Pidge only furrowed her brows before letting up and turning her laptop to him. 

"If we go to this location," She pointed to a small cliff not too far from their current location, "there should be a better connection. Don't bother asking me why, because it's lost even on me." Keith blinked slowly, nodding his head in faux-understanding. "When we get there, I'm gonna run the signal again, and pray to whatever deities there are that Allura accepts the mission's... Early completion. That's where you come in!" His head lifted even slower, and he took a second to register before his brow tweaked up. "Am I being used as a scapegoat?"

"Mmm... Something like that!" 

Keith dragged his hands over his face, willing himself to stay awake long enough to get the hell out of this glorified freezer. 

 --

It took them a little longer than it should have to reach the cliff, what with Keith stumbling every couple of minutes, but when they did, Pidge immediately forced him to sit down. She shoved a ration packet into his hands, before sighing (almost fondly, much to her dismay) and opening it for him when his own tired and numb hands wouldn't work with him. "Don't go to sleep yet. I don't know if you're hypothermic, but I'd rather not find out after it's too late." 

"'S not hypthrm'a..." He tiredly mumbled through a bite of thick food goo. This was his favorite texture of it by far, bless Hunk. "'S cause 'm galra. Makes me all... " A slow, only slightly dramatic sigh, "Makes me sleepy." He puts down the rest of his ration, exhaustion killing his appetite. Huffing, Pidge turns to her screen once more, quickly typing some code, "So, like, hibernation? That'd explain why you're always wearing that jacket," Among other reasons, Keith thought. "... Just a little mooore.... There!" With a triumphant click, the Castle's transmission line glows on the screen. 

"Paladins, why are you calling so soon? Is an extraction needed?" Allura's voice rang out, and after a moment, Pidge's laptop finally loaded the video as well. She looked less annoyed than the two strandee's had expected. "Allura! Yes, hi, we're in a tiny bit of a situation right now. All our lions are wrecked and we're on a cold ass planet and we can't reach Hunk, Lance and Shiro." She peeked back at Keith, who was slowly leaning forward and jerking himself back, almost cartoonish in his sleepiness. The princess's tone dropped to slight annoyance, "What about Keith? Is he there?" Pidge glanced over her shoulder fully this time, only to see Keith fumbling with a bandana to put over his visibly cold face. "Yeah, he's... Mostly here. I don't think he can handle the cold for much longer, though, so be quick."

"Hey, Keith, let's get the to the lions now, okay? Allura is coming to get us." Pidge stood and offered a hand to him, but he only stared sleepily. Disregarding any past hesitation, she grabbed his hands and heaved him up, pulling him to their crash point. "Come on, one foot after another, you big lazy cat." 

"'M not a cat." 

"Sure, say that again after you're not getting dragged by a 15 year old 'cause your body thought it was hibernation time."

--

The first thing Keith did when the paladins were all back on the ship was find Shiro, half-heartedly check for the others, and flop over right on top of him. "K-Keith!"

Despite being in the Castle of Lions, the cold induced exhaustion hadn't really gone away. Probably because it was still cold as a witches tit inside the damned place. He gave a sluggish wave of his hand and buried himself further into Shiro's clothes. He would never understand how the man was so warm.

After letting himself be shocked for a second (the feeling was getting rarer and rarer these days), Shiro gave an amused huffed and ran a hand through Keith's hair, feeling him relax even further. "Seems like you never really got used to the cold, huh?" A soft grumble, and a weak punch against his arm was his only response, "You could always ask Coran for a temp regulator, y'know... So you're not miserable all the time." A louder, more put-off grumble. "Yeah, alright, I'll ask him for you."

Right as Keith began to doze off, a soft hiss echoed through the room as the door opened. Pidge walked in, carrying a big blanket and her laptop under her arm and walking like a soldier with a purpose. Shiro watched silently as she tucked the blanket around him and Keith first, before climbing under the excess. He barely contained a laugh as her shin brushed Keith's freezing feet and she let out an aborted shriek. When she finished contorting herself so she was both leaning into Keith and able to hold her laptop, she finally spoke. "Galra are funny."

Shiro raised a brow, so she continued, "I was looking into it, and they don't just hibernate to preserve energy in the winter. They also hibernate as an excuse, so to speak, to cuddle with their packmates for long periods of time. 'Cause just like bears, Galra hibernation makes all of their bodily functions slow down." She reached a hand up to poke at Keith's face, giggling when he mumbled something incoherent and pushed into the touch. "So, no wonder he's so grouchy all of the time. He wants to snooze with us, but we're always too busy, or he's too damn shy to ask."

"Not sure how I didn't realize he's Galra sooner, honestly. Back on Earth, in the winter he would always come to mine and Adam's room to cuddle up and watch TV. He'd always end up falling alseep first, but still hung onto our arms if one of us tried to move. We'd have to take shifts so he wouldn't get sad and see himself out." Despite the tone growing wistful at the end, Shiro still held such a fond smile, and for a moment, Pidge felt like she was intruding on something much too personal for her ears. Then Shiro looked at her and that smile only grew. "Seems like he trusted you too, if he didn't try to hide it from you."

It wasn't like Pidge and Keith were strangers before they got into space. Shiro was friends with Matt, and by association, Keith was friends with him too. Hell, Pidge had hung out with Keith before on her own time, still as Katie, and she'd grown to trust him as someone who would protect her when bullies reared their ugly heads at her. She'd be a little disgruntled if Keith didn't trust her at all.

But still, Pidge held those words close to her heart. Keith was a good friend, more than others gave him credit for. She was proud to call him that.