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Takashi Shirogane is having a perfectly ordinary day.
The Garrison-issue hoverbike hums underneath him as he flies out over the sand, exhilarating as always. He’s brought his lunch with him on this fine Sunday, so that he doesn’t have to stick close to the Garrison all day. He’s got his phone mounted to the handlebars so he can see where he’s not explored yet.
All in all, it’s a perfectly good morning.
Unfortunately, that perfectly good, perfectly ordinary morning goes askew very quickly.
Hardly nine miles out, he spots a house a few hundred meters in front of him. Even from a distance, it’s clearly old, dilapidated. Shiro can’t imagine anyone living in it.
Which, all the better for him. He’s out here to explore, after all. What could be better than an abandoned house?
He pulls closer, slowing more and more as he nears the house. It’s more shack or shed than house, really, with the remnants of something bigger hardly intact a few meters away. Usually, he’d be talking to himself, pretending he had a friend out here with him.
(It’s childish, maybe, especially when you factor in that Shiro is twenty years old. But he’s out in the desert, miles from the nearest person. He’ll talk to himself as much as he wants, thank you very much.)
But no, Shiro is quiet now. There’s a heavy notion of something solemn hanging over the area, and the closer he draws to the little house, the more he feels like something is going on here that shouldn’t be. This is technically Garrison property after all – anything within ten miles of the base is. And yet, here stands this shack, a far cry from the sleek metal and shiny greys that the Garrison prefers.
Just about the last thing Shiro expects is to see a young face peering out from one of the windows.
And so, of course, that’s exactly what Shiro finds.
At first, he thinks he imagines it, and he blinks hard, rubbing his eyes almost cartoonishly. But those striking eyes stare at him unwaveringly when he looks back up. Shiro stares right back.
He waves.
The face disappears.
"Wait, come back!" Shiro cries, ripping the keys from the ignition of his hoverbike and nearly falling flat on his face in his haste to get to that window. There's no way this house (truly, calling it a house is too generous for this structure, but Shiro doesn't want to insult the dwelling) is suited for a child to be living there. He doesn't know what the situation here is, but he'll be damned if he doesn't try and make it better.
" Hellooooo ," he calls, tapping at the window. "I'm- I'm not here to hurt you. I'm with the Garrison, see?" He tugs on his shirt, pressing the logo to the glass of the window.
"I just want to make sure you're okay."
The door opens.
Shiro whirls towards the sound.
There's a kid, the same one from before, standing in the doorway with one hand still on the handle. He’s skinny, almost unhealthily so, and his tangled, long hair falls messily over his shoulders. He’s wearing a shirt that's several sizes too big, stained in several places, presumably from existence out here in the desert.
Despite the kid's haggard appearance, his eyes are striking. Shiro can't help but tear his gaze away – it feels intense, somehow, to allow their eyes to meet.
The silence between them is long, tense. Shiro looks the kid over while he stares unwaveringly back.
"What are you doing out here?" Shiro finally asks. The kid shrugs.
"Living."
It’s an answer as simple as it is strange. Living, the kid says, not surviving, not staying. Living, as if his existence here is just another part of existence overall. And, well, Shiro supposes it is, at least for him.
He’s clearly been out here, or at least in similar environments, for a while. His clothes and hair are sandy (silently, Shiro wonders whether or not there’s running water out here, but that’s not a now problem) and his skin is darkened by the sun, freckles and spots dotting along his arms and face from the exposure. Should Shiro be worrying about possible skin damage right now?
“Well?” the kid demands impatiently, cutting Shiro’s train of thought short. “What are you doing out here?” He glares at the Garrison logo on Shiro’s jacket, as if the thing has personally offended him. Shiro tries to formulate a response. Talking to this kid feels like running an exam simulation – one wrong more, and it’s done for good.
“I was out riding,” he finally begins. “Came across your… house. I can leave if you want me to.” And maybe call child protective services on the ride back, he doesn’t say.
“I don’t care,” the kid shrugs. “It’s not my desert. Just my house.” The door swings ever-so-slightly wider, and Shiro’s able to get a glimpse of the inside. It’s cluttered, unorganized, like a child’s attempt at cleaning only half-finished. “As long as you stay on the sand and not on my porch– Hey!” Shiro’s head snaps up, eyes wide.
“Are you even listening to me?”
“Oh, um, yeah,” he says absentmindedly, shifting to try and get a better look at the inside of the house. “Say, where are your parents?” The kid (Shiro’s really gotta get his name, he can’t just keep calling him “the kid”) rolls his eyes, as if that’s a stupid question.
“I dunno,” he says. Shiro frowns.
“How long have they been gone?”
“I dunno.” Shiro’s frown grows deeper.
“Guess,” he suggests. “Five days? A week?”
“Longer.”
“A month?”
“Longer.”
Longer than a month. Stars above, Shiro is in way over his head. This kid, probably no older than eleven or twelve from the looks of things, has been alone for over a month in the harsh desert. This is way above what he’s equipped to handle, and honestly, he wants nothing more than to grab this kid by the scruff and take him back to the Garrison, maybe get him a hot shower and a good meal before he contacts the social workers with the school there.
But the way he’s glaring tells Shiro that if he’s to make one wrong move, he just might disappear into the sand. If there’s one thing Shiro likes less than the idea of a kid out in this house all alone, it’s a kid out in the desert all alone for god knows how long.
And he still doesn’t know the kid’s name.
“I’m Shiro,” he says. “Do you have a way to contact your parents?” The kid shakes his head.
“I’m Keith,” he replies. “I don’t have a phone.”
Oh, well if that’s the issue here…
Shiro pats around his pockets until he finds the one his cell phone is in. He fishes it out, holding it out towards the boy – Keith .
“Do you know your mom or dad’s number?” he asks. Keith rocks his head side to side in an odd sort of gesture.
“Mom’s up there,” he says, taking the phone with one hand and pointing at the sky with the other. Oh. “Dad’s been at work for a while; he might not answer.” Still, Keith punches in a series of numbers. “He’s been there for a while, but it’s fine. His job is really important.”
Shiro wants to ask just what could be so important that a man would leave his child out in the desert for over a month, but Keith's already pressing the phone to his ear.
“Hello?” he says. “Can you check if my dad’s there? He said if I call this number I can talk to where he works.”
There’s a bit of a laugh, muffled, from the other side of the line. Shiro still can’t tell, for the life of him, what this workplace might be.
“Sure thing, kid,” says the person coming through the phone. “What’s your dad’s name?” Keith scrunches his face.
“Austin.”
There’s a long silence. Shiro worries at the inside of his cheek.
“Austin,” the person repeats. “Austin… Kogane?”
“Mm-hm.”
A heavy sigh crackles through the speaker.
“Hey, bud, Austin’s–” Another sigh. “He’s been gone a while. You okay there?”
“I’m fine,” Keith says, as if the situation he finds himself in is completely normal. “Do you know my dad?” The person on the other end speaks again, voice halting and hesitant.
“Uh, yep, I know your dad, I– hang on just a moment, bud.” The muffled voice goes even quieter, as if whoever has been speaking has pulled the receiver away from his mouth.
“Yeah, Kogane, you remember him?” A pause, presumably someone else speaking that the phone doesn’t pick up. “It’s his kid. Askin’ for ‘im. What do I…?” There’s a bit of shuffling, a few words here and there that don’t make any sense out of context.
“All right kid,” the person finally says, voice coming through loud and clear once more. “Is there an adult with you?” Keith looks at Shiro. He puts a small hand over the receiver.
“Are you an adult?” he whispers. Shiro blinks.
“I’m twenty.” Keith nods, satisfied, and takes his hand off of the receiver.
“He’s twenty,” he reports back.
"Okay. Why don't you talk to him about your dad, all right, bud?" Keith shrugs.
"M'kay. Bye." Before the other person can respond, Keith's already hit the end call button and is shoving the phone back at Shiro, turning those sharp eyes back onto him. “He said to talk to you about my dad.”
Fine. This is fine. Shiro is just gonna have to put together this mystery all on his own, he supposes. He feels terribly out of his depth but what choice does he have?
All right. Deep breath, Takashi. It’s just a kid. A strange, half-feral looking wilderness kid with fuckin’ purple eyes, but a kid nonetheless.
“What can you tell me about him?” Shiro asks. Maybe he can get out some info, build some trust before he heads down to the Garrison and marches himself down to the social services office. It’s a long shot, but something deep inside his chest hopes that they’ll get contact with Keith’s dad, that this whole thing will be one big misunderstanding.
But what kind of misunderstanding can it be? How can a father leave a young kid alone in the desert for over a month? There’s no way there’s not a CPS case here, as hesitant as Shiro is to admit it.
But he can’t think about that right now. Right now, he needs to talk to the boy in front of him and figure out as much as he can about this situation.
“My dad’s a fireman,” Keith says, eyes fixed downwards, then to Shiro’s right, then above his head. The behavior isn't skittish like Shiro would expect from an abused or abandoned kid. Rather, his eyes just drift, over Shiro's uniform, over the sand, over the lizard that darts across the porch they're standing on.
"He used to work all day and all night and then come back," he continues, dashing Shiro’s hopes and solidifying that yes, there was definitely a child neglect case here at the least. "But now I think he just stays there. I don't know. I couldn't call him." Then, after a pause, Keith says with a finality that Shiro feels powerless to argue against “Let’s go inside. The sun’s in my eyes.”
Shiro catches the rickety door as it swings shut behind Keith, who slips in like he’s something between a little snake and pure flowing water. He steps across the threshold with trepidation burning in his throat. But no, he needs to do this. Even if this is all some front to lure him in, even if it’s some weird test from the Garrison. He’s not going to let this kid be alone in the desert any longer than he has to be.
Keith sighs heavily as he goes boneless, toppling into a couch with such a childlike motion that Shiro can’t help but smile. Those piercing eyes glint even in the low light of the house.
“I’m not supposed to talk to strangers, you know,” Keith announces. Shiro blinks at the unprompted confession.
“Why are you talking to me then?”
There’s a long moment of silence in which Keith wrings his small hands, deciding on a response.
“I really wanted to talk to— to somebody, ” is what he settles on. “I like quiet but sometimes… sometimes it’s too quiet out here and I wish there was some noise or a neighbor or something. Plus,” he continues, smiling almost eerily, “you feel solid, and big, and that’s good. You feel like when I look at the stars. I like it.”
Shiro, still hovering near the door, feels tension creep into his shoulders. What is that supposed to mean? Why is this kid being so cryptic? He manages a nod, looking around the room.
It’s a mess. There’s not really another word for it, but he can hardly blame a kid of ten or eleven for not picking up after himself. Old-looking cans sit on many of the flat surfaces, jagged around the edges as if they’d been pried open with a knife rather than a proper tool. Papers are scattered everywhere, and everything on the shelves is covered in a thick layer of dust. A calendar hangs precariously from one corner, threatening to fall at any moment.
Wait.
A calendar.
Oh, god, Shiro can practically feel his blood turning to ice in his veins. It’s suddenly hard to draw breath. Staying upright is a conscious effort.
The open page dates back to four years ago.
This is so much worse than he could have ever imagined.
🌩
Shiro doesn’t sleep that night. He lays awake, staring at the ceiling. Four years. Four years. There’s a kid in the desert and no one knows he’s there and he’s been surviving on his own for four goddamn years.
He sits up. The clacking of a keyboard from the other side of the room halts abruptly.
“You okay?” asks Matt, glasses shining from the light of his computer screen. “Sorry, was I typing too loud?” Shiro shakes his head, hardly looking at his roommate and best friend as he reaches over to grab his phone.
“You’re fine,” he mutters, inputting his password. He clicks the search bar at the top of his homepage. On the keyboard, he taps out a name.
Austin Kogane.
The last name is one he knows because of the conversation on the phone. Whoever it was on the other line, presumably someone at a local fire station, had said it, and Shiro had silently filed the information away for later. The results take a moment to load — for all its funding the Garrison can’t seem to upgrade the shitty wifi in the dorms. When they finally do, Shiro heaves a long and measured breath. It’s not unexpected, not really, but it still hits.
An obituary for a rugged yet incredibly kind-looking man is dated back to the exact month and year the calendar in the little house was turned to. Austin Kogane, it reads, a local firefighter, dead at thirty-nine. Shiro reads on, biting at the inside of his cheek. He has no spouse or children, the obituary reads.
No children.
What the hell?
Shiro’s mind runs a mile a minute. Was Keith kidnapped by this man? A foster kid who got lost in the system in the worst way possible? How is it that Keith ended up in the care of Austin Kogane? Before he knows what he’s doing, he’s tossing off his covers and taking the few steps needed to get from his bed to Matt’s.
“Can you look up someone for me real quick?” Matt looks up at him, surprised. He turns back to his computer with a shrug, pulling up a search window.
“Didn’t take you for the stalkerish ex boyfriend type,” he quips. Shiro rolls his eyes.
“It’s not about an ex,” he grumbles, flicking Matt in the back of the neck as he eases down to sit on the mattress. Predictably, Matt lets out a high-pitched yelp. “Just someone I used to know.” Matt raises a skeptical eyebrow, but Shiro knows when to pull out the big guns.
“I’ll make sushi tomorrow,” he promises, and Matt pumps his arm in victory.
“Now we’re talkin’, man,” he says, cracking his knuckles. “I will find you that mystery person ASAP.” And with that, Shiro’s giving Keith’s name and Matt is typing away once more. But, after a moment…
“Huh.” Matt raises a hand to sweep his bangs back. Shiro frowns.
“What? What’s wrong?” Matt looks up at him with an odd expression.
“Are you sure you have the name right?”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” Shiro confirms. “One hundred percent. Why?” Matt clicks around a bit more, reloads a couple pages.
“Shiro,” he finally says, “the person you’re looking for doesn’t exist.”
His body suddenly taut like a bowstring, Shiro shoots to his feet.
"That's impossible," he protests. "I just– I spoke to them not long ago. They're not dead or– or anything!"
"If they were dead I'd be seeing at least an obituary," Matt says. "There's just no info at all. Nothing anywhere, unless this mystery person has lived their entire life under some sort of– of– of…" he trails off, trying to find the right words. Finally, he settles on, "Like if FBI 24/7 surveillance and witness protection cranked to eleven had a baby. Like that . In which case, I will not be attempting to find this person." Matt rakes his bangs back again, giving a sweet little smile and a flutter of his eyelashes. "I'm too pretty for federal prison."
Shiro gives him a long, hard stare.
"I think you'd fit right in, actually." Matt gasps dramatically, falling backwards with a hand against his forehead. He makes offended noises before fanning himself.
"Someone bring me my smelling salts," he says in the worst British accent Shiro’s ever heard. "I fear I may faint from the sting of such a horrible betrayal."
Shiro manages to keep it together for approximately three seconds before he's shoving his face into the nearest pillow to stifle his laughter.
"I don't know if I can take it any more," Matt, who's adopted a nasally falsetto somewhere along the way, continues. He's more committed to his impromptu role than most people are to their spouses at this point. Matt lives and dies for the bit, and once he's started there is no stopping him. "Oh! Reginald! Fetch me a quill so I may write down my final will and testament. I fear I am fading fast… My poor heart…"
"Oh. my god, Matt ," Shiro wheezes.
"I fear that–" Matt cuts himself off with a grating, rattling breath, "my time on this Earth is fleeting. Shorter, truly, than I could have ever imagined. And to be cut down to my death by the likes of you! " Matt flails a floppy hand in Shiro’s direction, the other sweeping across his own face. "I cannot fathom it, even as I take my final breaths."
"Are you crying right now?" Shiro manages between gasps for breath.
"TRULY!" Matt exclaims, raising a dramatic finger. "If you felt the pain that sears through my very bones at this moment you would be moved to tears as well! Goodbye, cruel world! I ascend unto the spirits above. I see my late father smile at me. Oh, happy day!"
And with that, Matt goes utterly limp, like a puppet cut from its strings. Shiro can hardly even see him breathe. Speaking of breathing, Shiro is having a rather hard time doing so, as he's long choked on his own saliva and is now coughing terribly in a desperate bid for air.
Matt pops back up as Shiro finally manages a breath, grinning. He bows from his seated position on the mattress, reaching out and waving as if to throngs of adoring fans. "Thank you, good sir," he says when he finally turns to Shiro, "for such a spectacular and moving reaction to my performance."
"You dick ," Shiro swears vehemently. "I couldn't breathe!"
"Breathtaking, yes I know I am," Matt says smugly. "But it is rather late and uh, maybe you'd like more than four hours of sleep for the test tomorrow?" Swearing under his breath, Shiro stands and scrambles back to his own bunk. His phone is carelessly tossed back onto the nightstand, his search forgotten amidst all of Matt's drama.
"You're right," he mutters, getting back under the covers.
"I usually am," is Matt's reply.
And then, faster than he knew was possible, Shiro's out, dead asleep. The mystery kid in the desert can wait just a little bit, right? He needs tomorrow to go well first.
One step at a time.
🌩
It’s a bad idea, probably. Shiro has homework due and tests to study for and projects to plan. But he can’t get Keith out of his mind, and so as soon as classes are over, he checks out a bike and goes flying across the sand once more.
It doesn’t take him long to find the shack, standing all by its lonesome on a bit of a hill. He kills the engine much more readily this time, swinging a leg over and pulling his backpack up from where it’s been slipping steadily down his shoulders. There’s not much in it, but hopefully what little there is can be of use.
Inside are a few sandwiches that Shiro smuggled from the cafeteria. The lady behind the counter had looked at him a bit oddly when he piled four sandwiches onto his plate, but didn’t say anything. The Garrison mess hall is all-you-can-eat, after all. Beside the sandwiches he’s tucked two bottles of water and one bottle of orange juice, figuring the kid deserves at least something sweet. Besides, none of this cost him anything extra, so he’s more than happy to pass it on to Keith.
Speaking of Keith, Shiro finally looks up to find that same little face peering out of the window at him again. He gives a smile and a wave, tucking the bike keys into his pocket and making his way over to the front door.
“You came back,” Keith says, throwing the door open before Shiro can even step onto the porch. Pulling his bag to his front, Shiro smiles.
“Yup,” he replies, “and I brought you some stuff.” Keith’s face scrunches, but he moves aside anyway, letting Shiro step through the door. Just like the day before, he flops into the same couch, looking almost as if he’s being absorbed into the worn fabric.
“What did you bring?” Keith demands. Shiro almost laughs at the kid’s tone. Abandoned desert orphan or not, he’s got fire in him.
He sets his bag down on the table in the room, which, like many things in the house, is incredibly makeshift. It looks to be a slab of plywood placed atop a few vertical cinder blocks, but hey, it does its job. Quickly, Shiro begins unpacking his bag. He pulls the bottles out first, not missing the way Keith’s eyes widen at the juice. Silently, he files away that tidbit for later.
Impossibly, Keith’s eyes go even wider when he pulls out the sandwiches, blinking hard each time Shiro sets down another one. He reaches out as if to pick one up, but draws his hand back at the last moment. Shyly, Keith peers at Shiro through his overgrown bangs.
“For me?” he breathes. “All four?” Shiro smiles, nudging the food a bit closer to the kid.
“All four, bud,” he says.
“Do they have peppers?” Keith asks. Then, with a sour expression, “Are you giving me these so I’ll come with you and people can take me away from my house?” Shiro’s breath catches. Yeah, he kinda had been, but he can’t exactly tell that to Keith, now can he?
“No and no,” he forces himself to say. Keith nods, satisfied, and reaches for a sandwich once more, struggling with the cling wrap for a moment before finally getting it open.
“Good,” he mumbles around a mouthful of sandwich. “Because I don’t like peppers, and if someone tried to take me away from my house, I’d stick ‘em with my knife like that,” he says, driving one hand forward in a sharp motion, “and then I’d run off and I’d go to the caves and never come back.”
It’s not a threat, not really. More like childlike fantasizing of how well he’d protect himself and his turf and whatnot. Still, the matter-of-fact tone to Keith’s voice and the glint in his eye makes Shiro take pause.
Keith’s been out here for four years. That means he knows every nook and cranny, every creature, every canyon and crevice within however many miles of his home. He likely knows the desert better than any police officer, search team, or ranger.
If Keith doesn’t want to be found, then no one will find him.
For all accounts and purposes, it’s safer at the moment to leave Keith be. That scares him a bit, knowing that the safety of this kid is, at least partly and temporarily, in his inexperienced hands.
Shiro takes a measured breath and lowers himself onto the two-seater to Keith’s right. The kid is still happily munching away at his sandwich, pausing every now and then to pick food from his teeth with a jagged fingernail. It’s a little gross, the way Keith hardly hesitates before sticking half his hand in his mouth, but Shiro supposes it could be worse, so he doesn’t comment on it. Once he’s done with the sandwich, he moves on to the juice, drinking a few sips before setting it down. Shiro wrings his hands.
“Do you know anyone?” he blurts out. Keith blinks up at him, one eyebrow raised. “Like, a family friend? Someone that would take care of you?” Keith’s nose scrunches minutely.
“My dad didn't have friends,” he says, “and neither do I.” Shiro frowns. It’s on par with last night’s discovery of Keith basically being nonexistent, legally speaking, but it’s still troubling,
“So nobody knows who you are? Nobody knows you’re out here?”
“Just my dad,” Keith says nonchalantly. “Can you bring more juice next time?” Shiro swallows hard and takes a measured breath. Stars above, this situation just keeps getting more worrying. He tries for a smile as he looks up at Keith.
“Of course,” he says. “What kind do you want?”
🌩
What happens if a person’s birth isn’t recorded? is what Shiro types into the search bar that evening.
It's the only thing that makes sense. There's no information to be found on Keith, likely because no such information exists. If Keith’s demeanor is anything to go by, who's to say that his father and the further mystery that is Keith’s mother didn't pop a baby out in the middle of the desert and decide to raise him like the wild thing he is?
If a child’s birth is not registered, the answer from Google reads, there will be no permanent legal record under the child’s name. The article he's clicked goes on into the specifics of registering various kinds of births as well as the penalties for not doing so, but Shiro doesn't care. No permanent legal record can mean no legal record at all . God, Keith was never recorded in any kind of system, was he? No hospital, no doctors' visits, not even a school.
He's just been out there, in the desert, alone or with his dad. For all his life.
Shiro pulls at his hair, the thin strands threatening to tear from their follicles. He is in so fucking deep, deeper than he should be by all accounts. He's a college student with nothing but his associate's. He doesn't know how to introduce a wild desert kid into everyday society, he's just recently stopped being a teenager!
But he has to, doesn't he? Because he's got some kind of trust slowly building with Keith. Trust that he knows he can't violate. Because he knows that Keith will bolt if someone other than him shows up to his little desert house.
So he has to do this. He has to keep this kid alive, has to teach him what he can, has to care because no one else in the world does.
Shiro has to figure this out. Keith hangs in the balance, and something about the kid tells Shiro that it's important not to let him go.
🌩
It’s been about two months since Shiro happened across Keith’s house, and they’ve settled into a routine.
Shiro comes by every few days, brings food and drink and at one point toiletries and soaps, because apparently one of the desert caves has moving water that Keith’s been washing in. Keith stares and asks strange questions and remains characteristically cryptic. Through, Shiro’s beginning to think less that he’s trying on purpose to be a bit strange and more that it’s a byproduct of the way he grew up.
“I feel bad,” Keith says one day as Shiro’s helping him tidy. To be completely honest, it’s mostly Shiro doing the cleaning but Keith’s putting in visible effort despite getting distracted every few minutes, so Shiro doesn’t mind. But the statement gives him pause, and he sets down the trash bag he’s holding.
“Are you sick?” he asks. Keith shakes his head, hair flying around his face at the movement.
“Not that kind of bad,” he says. “Bad like… because you do a lot.” Keith frowns, squeezing the can he’s picked up until it’s more oval than circular. “And I don’t, because I can’t really do much. But I still feel bad.” At this point, he’s not looking at Shiro, opting to stare at the floor at his feet instead.
And, well, Shiro obviously can’t let this stand. He moves to sit down on the couch in the room, tugging Keith gently to sit next to him. Carefully, Shiro tilts his face by the chin so that Keith’s actually looking at him. He gives the kid a soft smile.
“Keith,” he says quietly. “I’m not doing this because I want to be repaid. You never have to do anything in return, you got it? I’m doing this because I want to.” He squeezes Keith’s shoulder lightly.
Ever so slightly, Keith’s bottom lip begins to quiver. Before Shiro can even complete his thought of Holy shit I just made a kid cry oh no , Keith’s launching himself at him. It’s so quick that Shiro barely catches him before they both go over the edge of the couch, but he laughs anyway, hugging Keith tightly. He thinks for a moment that maybe he’s holding him too tight, but Keith squeezes impossibly closer and Shiro smiles so hard that he feels tears flood his own eyes.
Takashi Shirogane is the only person in the world who knows this kid exists. The intense and instinctual protectiveness that follows stresses him out a bit, sure. But stars above, he’d do this a hundred more times as long as it meant that Keith was fed and even marginally safer than he was all alone.
“Sometimes,” Keith mutters into Shiro’s shoulder, so quiet he hardly hears, “it sucks being all by myself out here. I h–” his breath hitches, shoulders shaking minutely in Shiro’s grasp. “I hate it, and even though it’s been a long time I’m scared and I– I know my dad’s not coming back.”
With the last statement, Keith’s voice breaks and he sobs . Shiro can tell, his own heart wrenching, that this is the first time Keith has admitted that out loud. It’s the first time he’s allowed himself to acknowledge that he’s no longer waiting for his dad. He’s just existing here, with no one.
Well, almost no one. Shiro’s determined to stick with this kid even if it kills him. He’s not leaving anytime soon, that’s for sure.
It's a while before Keith's breaths even out, and longer still before he's leaning out of Shiro’s embrace. He looks up, eyes rimmed red, to meet Shiro’s gaze.
"I still wanna give you something," Keith insists. Mentally, Shiro braces himself. Who the hell knows what strange thing Keith’s got tucked away in this place? He has half a mind to refuse, to protest again that he doesn't need or want anything from him. But the look on Keith’s face gives him pause. It’s the same look he sees on little kids' faces when they hand over a leaf or rock or some other inconsequential thing that's clearly meant to be a sort of impromptu gift. It's a look that says the little kid (or, not so little, in Keith’s case) is going to be very upset if the recipient declines.
So, in the interest of not wanting Keith to be upset, Shiro finally nods.
"As long as you know that you don't have to give me anything," he relents. Keith brightens like a sunbeam peering out of a cloud. He scrambles up, disappearing through a doorway before popping back out and waving Shiro over. Easily, Shiro goes, crossing the small room in just a few strides. Across the room, Keith's already shifting things around on a desk.
Keith tugs open a drawer, and Shiro’s eyes go wide. There’s just… wads of cash shoved into it, as if someone had gone to the bank and asked for as much cash as they could get then and there. He grabs a bill less than carefully and holds it up, as if handling something foreign to him.
"Is fifty dollars a lot?" he asks. Shiro blinks, puts a hand in a pocket, and rocks back and forth on his heels a bit.
"I– Uh. Yeah," he manages. "Fifty is a lot, Keith. Why haven't you been using this money?" Keith shrugs, taking the liberty of sticking the bill in Shiro’s jacket pocket for him. He shuts the drawer none too gently.
"Where would I use it?" he says. "I don't go to the store."
"You could have!" Shiro nearly shouts. Stars, he really doesn't mean to, but honestly! Keith's been hunting out in the desert in order to eat, only supplemented by the occasional canned food, for so long! "Keith, you could have been eating good food, not just enough to get by!" Keith returns his gaze to the floor, drawing into himself at the raised tone. Ah, shit. Shiro takes a deep breath collecting himself.
"I'm sorry, Keith," he says, tone even and measured. "I shouldn't raise my voice at you."
"It's fine," Keith mumbles, body language practically screaming that it is absolutely not fine. Shiro sighs to himself, fidgeting with his zipper.
"It's not," he says. "I just… I worry about you, a lot. But that's not an excuse. I shouldn't have raised my voice at you. I'm sorry." Keith’s posture opens marginally, but it's good enough for Shiro.
"I forgive you," Keith says easily. To Shiro, the words feel like a shot to the heart. It's not in any way he can explain. Maybe it's the quiet, true forgiveness and trust in Keith’s eyes. Maybe it's the fact that despite enduring something no child should ever have to, Keith is still so distinctly human that it hurts. Regardless, it makes Shiro want to hug Keith again, and so he does.
Just like before, Keith melts into the hug easily, and with that Shiro thinks that maybe it really will all be okay.
🌩
It's rainy season.
Now, logically, Shiro knows this. The usually-dry desert is prone to rain around this time of year, but they usually get through it with minimal water-related interference in their days. Therefore, Shiro almost always forgets that it is, indeed, rainy season until the heavens are opening up to soak him to the bone.
It just so happens that today, Shiro forgot to check the weather forecast.
It just so happens that today, he's gone out to see Keith.
It just so happens that today, Shiro had finally noticed Keith eyeing his bike and offered the kid a ride.
Keith eagerly accepts, even with the stipulations that Shiro sets. Keith will wear Shiro’s helmet, and he'll hold on tight and do exactly as told, and he won't ask to go any faster than the bike is already going. He swears up and down that he'll follow all the rules, so Shiro shrugs and tells him to hop on.
Keith’s warm weight is a comfort behind him. It reminds Shiro starkly of the little cousins that used to demand rides on the back of his bike when they were all still kids playing in the neighborhood. Those small arms squeeze so tightly it's almost uncomfortable, but Shiro doesn't complain. He hears Keith's breathless laugh behind him, and it's suddenly all so incredibly worth it.
They fly across the sand, significantly slower than Shiro’s solo speed, but Keith enjoys it all regardless. It's amazing, and Keith shouts excitedly over the din of the hovercraft about things they're passing and how much fun he's having. Shiro grins widely, not risking a look back at Keith but knowing the look on his face all the same.
About an hour into their joyride, Keith tugs Shiro’s jacket. Shiro slows to a minute speed, turning.
"Yeah?"
Keith looks worried.
"It smells like it's gonna rain." Shiro furrows his brow.
"What do you mean, it smells like it's going to rain?"
"I mean it always smells a certain way before it rains," Keith says, "and it smells like that right now! We need to go home." Shiro sets his mouth into a thin line. Fine, he acquiesces. Keith knows this desert better than Shiro could ever hope to. He can trust this kid's judgment here. If Keith thinks they need to go home, then they'll go home. Shiro turns the bike around and heads back to Keith’s cabin.
The only issue is, halfway there, rain starts coming down. At first it's manageable little drizzles, pleasant in the desert heat. But very quickly, those little drops turn into sheets of water that soak both of them within minutes. They have to yell at the top of their lungs to be heard, and Shiro can hardly see where he's driving. Thunder seems to shake the very earth, and one too many times lightning strikes too closely to be comfortable.
There's no way they're finding Keith’s house in this weather. The Garrison, however, with its beacons and light towers, is still visible through the thunderstorm.
It's not really much of a choice.
🌩
“Takashi Shirogane!”
Shiro flinches at the use of his full name, ducking his head even though it means the back of his hair soaks his collar. Beside him, Keith freezes, eyes wide. Matt stands with his hands on his hips, looking remarkably like a “not mad, just disappointed” mother in the moment.
“Is that a child? ”
“No,” Shiro tries, just as Keith says “Yes.”
But Matt is ignoring the both of them anyway, letting out a breathy “ Ohhhh my god, ” and shifting closer to Keith, pulling the helmet from his head and twisting him this way and that. Keith turns easily under Matt’s hands, blinking widely up at Shiro as he does. Finally, Matt looks up at Shiro.
“Did you kidnap this kid?” Before Shiro even has a chance to answer, he turns back to Keith, pointing an accusing finger at Shiro. “Did this guy kidnap you?” Keith scrunches his nose.
“I don’t think so?” Matt looks at Shiro incredulously.
“He doesn’t think so? ”
“I didn’t! I swear!” Shiro shrieks. “Do you actually think I’d grab some kid off the street and bring him back to our dorm?” But Matt is back to ignoring him, looking over Keith again, checking for bruises or scrapes.
“Oh my goodness, you’re soaked, aren’t you,” Matt laments, smoothing a hand over Keith’s hair. Then, suddenly shoving the helmet into Shiro’s hands, he hefts Keith into his arms with a strength Shiro didn’t know he had. “Let’s get you some dry clothes.”
And with that, Matt (and subsequently Keith) is disappearing into the bedroom of their dorm, Keith remarkably pliant in the hands of a complete stranger.
Minutes later, Shiro, seated on one of the main room's couches, hears the shower start running. A moment after that, Matt slips out of the bedroom, closing the door firmly behind him. His gaze is locked on Shiro like a sniper on their target.
"Takashi," he hisses, "why is there a child who, may I add, did not know how to turn on a shower , in our dorm?" Shiro can practically feel the red creep up his neck.
"Because it's raining?" Shiro tries. Matt stares at him, wide eyed, for a moment, before he begins to pace back and forth. He pauses his steps to point at Shiro with an accusing finger.
"You, my friend, are going to tell me everything ." Matt is in front of him now, upset and confused in a way Shiro has never seen before. "You're going to tell me why you had me look up someone who doesn't exist, you're going to tell me why you started taking so much food from the cafeteria. And , you're going to tell me just where it is you fuck off to every few days on that hoverbike of yours." Shiro can't tear his gaze away from his best friend even though he really, really wants to.
He takes a deep breath.
And tells Matt everything.
By the end of it, they're sitting across the low coffee table from each other, with Matt having eased down onto the couch opposite Shiro. He looks like he's trying to gather his wits, mouth hanging open as he rakes a hand through his messy hair.
"Holy shit," he finally breathes when Shiro’s done explaining. Shiro gives a wry smile.
"That about sums it up, yeah."
It's at that moment that Keith emerges, looking remarkably small and shy in one of Matt’s sweaters. He hovers in the doorway for a moment before crossing the room to sit next to Shiro, tucking himself under the older boy's arm. Matt looks Keith over for about three seconds and announces that he's making soup, standing grandly and making his way into the kitchen.
Keith looks at Shiro.
Shiro looks at Keith.
"Your friend is weird," Keith says. Shiro can't help but laugh.
"You? Or Matt?" For that, he gets a pointy elbow to the stomach. Ah, well. He supposes he deserved that.
It's a remarkably short amount of time before Matt comes back out, meaning he definitely used the ready-made Costco soup they've had in their fridge for a little while. Notably, he’s carrying only two bowls and spoons. He places one set down in front of Keith and keeps one for himself.
"Pot's on the stove" he says to Shiro, before taking a pointed spoonful of his soup. Shiro sighs and stands. He wants soup too, goddammit.
Later, when Keith is dead asleep on the couch, Matt speaks up, voice quiet, but still impossibly loud in the quiet of the room
"I'll help," he says. "I'll help Keith get documents, real or fake. Whichever. I don't care. It's not an apology – Matt doesn't owe one. But it's a gesture of good faith. It's a very Matt Holt way of telling Shiro that Matt does understand and agree with what he's doing.
🌩
A long while later, Shiro sits and watches a desert sunset. Keith is beside him, hair newly trimmed and therefore mildly less messy. They're on Keith’s rooftop, savoring the quiet evening air.
"Keith, I know you love this desert, but this kind of isolation isn't good for you," Shiro tries. It's been weighing on him for a while, and now seems as good a time as any to bring it up. "I mean, you're just fourteen and you're all alone out here."
And Keith just smiles, that strange smile with too many teeth and too much knowledge behind the eyes.
"I'm not alone."
Shiro looks at him, a little concerned. He knows that solitude does things, scary things, to a person's mind, but Keith has seemed fine so far. He dares to ask, "What do you mean, you're not alone. " Keith shrugs, creeping closer to the edge of the roof he's sitting on to swing his legs back and forth over the side. It sends a brotherly pang of worry through Shiro, the way Keith scoots closer to the ledge without a fear in the world.
"She talks to me sometimes," Keith says vaguely. "She says I'm not the right one, but she's glad I'm out here to keep her company." He grins at Shiro, every bit the excited child he really is somewhere underneath all that- that strangeness . "She even says that one day, she might show me where she's hiding, if the time is right."
He pauses, sighs, scrunches his nose. His next words are just as much of a cryptic mystery as the boy himself.
"I don't really like the water all that much though."
Shiro frowns and reaches out to touch the back of his hand to Keith’s forehead, worrying at his lip. The skin there is cool, and he turns the gesture into a smoothing one over Keith’s hair. The younger boy frowns, tearing his gaze away from the sky and staring at Shiro instead.
“What was that for?”
Shiro gives him a smile.
“I love you, kid.”
Keith’s ears turn red. As he turns his gaze back to the setting sun, he mutters a quiet and run-together “ Iloveyoutoo” under his breath.
If the time is right, Keith says. Well, Shiro supposes, in that case, he’ll just have to stick around until it is.
🌩
Four years later, Shiro wakes on a familiar couch. His body throbs in pain, and his mind feels scrambled so far beyond what he ever thought possible. His gaze meets the deep violet that are Keith’s eyes, and for a moment, he swears they glow gold in the dim light, like lightning in a desert storm
“Keith,” he breathes, hardly registering the three confused faces behind him. Keith sweeps a hand through messy hair, looping it around with an old pen. It’s something he used to do whenever he was getting ready to head out into the desert, when he knew he wouldn’t be back home for a while.
Keith holds out a hand and takes a deep breath.
“It’s time.”