Lance did indeed wake up when Keith threw the pillow into his face. He let out a startled squawk of confusion and thrashed around, trying to sit up, but only succeeding in tangling himself in his blankets.

"WHAT?!" he shouted. "WHAT THE HE-"

That's when he got the other three pillows in rapid succession - one to the head, one to the stomach, and one to the knees. He flailed wildly, falling back onto the floor. Instinctively, he grabbed hold of one of the pillows and used it to shield his face. He felt groggy, but something was nagging at him.

They'd all been sleeping in the - no, not the lounge - they were sleeping near the healing pods - and - oh, right.

Huh. So that's how it was going to be, then.

Pidge and Hunk were roaring in laughter somewhere nearby him, and then he saw Keith's feet approach him from the other side of the room.

"I warned you," Keith was saying. "I told you I'd hit you when you least expec-"

With a victorious howl of "AHA! I GOT YOU NOW!", Lance lunged to his feet and used the pillow he was holding to clobber Keith in the chest. At least, that was the idea.

Keith ducked just as the pillow would have connected, and suddenly he'd dodged around and behind Lance, who then found himself suddenly in a very effective hold. Keith wasn't putting a lot of pressure on Lance's arm or neck or anything, he'd just managed to put Lance into a headlock that Lance - was - having difficulty - getting out of.

"HA!" Kieth was saying. "There's no way you can get me now-"

"AHH! Hunk! Pidge!" Lance shouted, but without any real panic in his voice. He wiggled and tried to elbow Keith in the side with his free arm, continuing to squeal in a fake terrified voice. "Heeeeelllp! Keith's got meeeeee!"

Suddenly Hunk and Pidge had joined in on the fun, and Keith found himself completely overwhelmed by various pillows, flung at him from all directions. He let go of Lance and managed to roll to one side, turned, and got to his feet again, hands held up in front of him, palms facing out.

"Okay, okay, I give up," he said. "You win."

Pidge plopped the pillow she'd been just about to throw onto the ground and settled onto it, cross-legged.

"Aw, that's no fun," she said. "You can't just surrender." Beside her, Hunk and Lance had begun to swat at each other's heads with their pillows. Sounds of 'Ooomph!' and 'Oomph! Hey, nice one, Hunk!' continued in the background.

"I just did," Keith said, feeling a satisfied half-smile tug at his mouth. "And anyway, it's not surrendering - it's more of a strategic retreat."

Pidge snorted and started to shove her glasses back up onto her nose before she realized they weren't there anymore. She sighed and started checking under some of the pillows and blankets on the floor around her. "Coran and Allura got up about half an hour ago," she said almost absent-mindedly in Keith's direction. "They said something about breakfast - "

Hunk's stomach made a growling sound, and he perked up immediately. "Ooh - breakfast! I should go and see if they've got anything like pancakes - or eggs - or bacon!"

Lance made a smacking sound with his mouth and rubbed a hand over his stomach. "Oh, man - bacon," he said, and there was longing in his voice. "I sure hope so - here, I'll come with you, Hunk," he added, finally disentangling himself from the blankets around his ankles with a few final kicks. "Maybe we can even find coffee - or, the space version of coffee - I mean, gotta have that caffeine, right?"

"Oh, I miss coffee so much," Hunk agreed as they headed towards the door. "But I think there's got to be something like that in the kitchen-"

As Hunk and Lance headed down the corridor, Keith started picking up the blankets and pillows, piling them onto a couch that was a little further away from the others.

"Do you know where you saw them last?" he asked Pidge, who was still searching for her glasses on the ground around her.

"I think - " Pidge stopped short as she realized he was trying to help her look for her glasses by clearing away the floor.

"Oh - thanks, Keith," she said. "I thought I'd brought them in from the lounge - but - "

There was an unfurling of material, followed by a gentle ting as the frames of the glasses bounced gently onto the ground. Pidge turned her head to see Keith bending over and picking them off the floor. They'd been in the folds of a blanket he'd just put onto the couch.

"Got 'em," Keith said, turning back and coming over to hand them to her. "Hey - uh, did these - ever have glass in them?"

"Nope," she said, taking them from him with a grateful half-grin and putting them onto her nose again. "Well, they did at Garrison, but the lenses actually fell out when we found Blue in the cave."

"Oh." Keith said. He thought back for a moment, narrowing his eyes and casting his gaze to the floor. Then his eyes came to rest on her face again, his expression clearing. "The water slide?"

"Yeah," Pidge said. "The glass fell out of the lenses then - but I didn't even notice - well, actually, I didn't notice they were gone until Shiro and I were on the shuttle - heading to get Green. But it's not like I needed the glass lenses. It was just part of my disguise. And I'd just gotten so used to having the frames on - I just kept them. I guess now it's more habit than anything else."

"Yeah." Keith said. "I know how that is."

Pidge looked over at him, and saw that he was looking at where Shiro still slept in the healing pod. Keith's eyes were serious, his face lined with concern.

The Black Lion was still sleeping at the foot of the pod, just like a regular cat would. The mice weren't in the room anymore - they'd probably left with Allura when she and Coran had gone to get breakfast ready.

"What do you mean?" Pidge asked curiously. "I mean - you don't have to tell me if you don't -"

Keith looked back at her and shrugged a shoulder. "No…no - uh, it's - " He blew out a breath, crossed his arms, and leaned back against a nearby wall. He looked over again at Shiro, and thought about how nearly he'd lost him - again - and how Pidge was still looking for her family. Keith knew she worried about them.

"What I meant - was - that - uh - I know it can be hard to break a habit," he said. "For me - my habit - is to…worry." He looked back down at Pidge then, feeling his eyes narrowing slightly in an effort to find the right words. "I worry about…well, pretty much everything."

Everyone, his mind said. You worry about everyone - because you can't stand the thought of losing them.

He didn't know how to say that, though. Not out loud.

Words didn't came easily to him. They never had.

He turned his gaze back to Shiro. He knew his friend would be okay…but old habits died hard. Worry stayed at the corner of his mind, a constant, nagging sensation that remained just out of reach.

It seemed that Pidge understood what Keith meant. She nodded and spoke, understanding coloring her voice, which was soft, and just a little bit sad. "Yeah, I know."

She sighed then, just a short exhalation of air. "I worry too."

She looked over at Shiro as well. She and Keith just stood there for a moment, together in a companionable silence.

When Pidge spoke, it was quiet, almost inaudible. But Keith heard her.

"Lucky us, huh?"

Keith looked down at her again. She hadn't taken her gaze from Shiro's still form.

Keith huffed out a breath that might have been a brief attempt at a laugh.

"Yeah," he said. "Lucky us."