Blackout (A Keith Fanfiction)

Chapter 15

 "Paladins, I have a bit of an announcement," Allura beams as she stands in front of us lounging on the couch. The way she and Coran called us all in here to 'have a talk' was initially scary, like 'when your parents are about to tell you something important and everyone has to sit on the couch and listen intently' kind of scary. Of course her beaming face changed that fear to a more unique kind of 'what alien tradition are we obligated to take part in now' kind of fear.

"We're going to a royal ball!" Coran jumps in way too excitedly.

"N-not exactly a ball..." Allura is a bit surprised by Coran's sudden outburst. "We prefer to call them diplomatic galas, but yes, they are quite similar to royal balls."

We all blink as Allura goes on a tangent about royal balls or diplomatic galas or whatever. When she's finished, Hunk takes a breath, pauses for a moment, then speaks, "So... what...?"

"We have been invited to a diplomatic gala on the planet Kronaxus on a rather short notice," she repeats.

"Ok... why...?" Keith asks the next question.

"Several representatives from other planets will be there and this is one of the best, most traditional method of forming allies, of course," Coran exclaims in a 'duh' tone.

"Next question: when?" Pidge moves on.

"Tomorrow!" Allura practically squeals before repressing only a bit of her excitement to tell us more details. "It's customary that you five will wear your armor... with a few small adjustments. Valerie, I might have some options for you..." she looks me up and down as if taking in some rough measurements. "Which means... we're gonna have a sleepover!"

It's easy to forget how young Allura is. She has a powerful way of carrying herself that makes her seem older and more mature, having been thrown into her position in the team so suddenly. Seeing her acting like this was somewhat unfamiliar and odd, but she looks too overjoyed to take no for an answer.

* * *

Lance easily wormed his way into our 'sleepover', and I can't say I'm upset about it. He seems to know a lot about what typical teenage girls do at sleepovers.

I sit on the floor, back pressed against Allura's bed, where Lance sits cross-legged braiding and unbraiding my hair. Allura disappears into her closet and Lance reminisces about his life back on Earth, which I find oddly comforting.

"Ok!" Allura emerges from her closet with a clothing rack of long dresses. "Fortunately, we happen to be similar in size, and I've taken the liberty to pick out what I think would look amazing on you!"

Lance finally finishes my braid with a hair elastic, and I stand up to look through the dresses. The majority of the dresses are red, a few of them in various other colors, but the rack is very noticeably red. Allura notices my just barely surprised expression, "What, do you not like them?"

"No, they're gorgeous... I just assumed you'd pick out a lot less red... y'know, since that's Keith's color..." I shrug.

She crosses the room to stand by Lance, "Yes, I was initially going to put you in white because of your armor," a funny smirk grows on her face, "I just think you'd look great in Keith's color." She whispers something in Lance's ear, and the same funny smirk transfers to his face after giving a small snicker.

Maybe it was the suggestive smirk or the fact that she referred to a color which they were intentionally dressing me in as 'Keith's', but something made my cheeks heat up, "What?"

"What do you mean 'what'?" Lance raises his eyebrows innocently at me.

"What?" I repeat with a higher tone. They both just shake their heads. I roll my eyes and grab the first dress to try on.

It took long enough to get each dress on, and I was rather exhausted by the time we got to the last one. I didn't even look at it for myself in the mirror before trudging out of Allura's massive closet to show Lance and Allura.

Allura and Lance exchange another look. Allura beams, "I knew red would look amazing on you!"

"I still don't understand why you're not putting me in white," I shrug off their obvious train of thought.

"Have you seen how gorgeous you look?" Lance turns me around to the mirror. He was right, honestly. I look like a princess. The gown is simple, but still gorgeous. The 'straps' rest loosely off my shoulders around my arms and the wide, hoop-like skirt falls elegantly to the floor.

My eyes fall to the black gloves on my hands, then I look back up at the mirror, trying to decide how terrible they look with the dress.

"Valerie," Allura gives me a look that's disciplining in an almost reassuring way. "You look amazing."

I shake the thoughts about the gloves out of my head and smile at Allura, "What are you wearing?"

Allura rushed to her closet and changed cartoonishly fast. She emerged from the closet in a gown with a portrait neckline, short,puffed sleeves that fall off Allura's shoulders, and a similar, but more bubble-like skirt to the dress I'm in. The under part of the skirt is white with a pink hem matching the sleeves, while the bodice and top, upper part of the skirt was a slightly faded royal blue.

"Well don't I feel underdressed," Lance scoffs.

* * *

I gotta be honest, having a very teenage-girl-esq sleepover with Allura wasn't bad. Getting myself into that dress the next night was still as tedious and difficult as I expected, though. On top of that Allura was encouraging me to wear heels and hoping that we're the same shoe size as well. Thankfully we were, but heels still seem unnecessary when you can't see them under the dress.

I know I'm making everyone wait for me with how long I'm taking to get ready, but they can wait if they insist on making me get so dressed up. When I finally do make my way to the ballroom on the castle everyone is waiting. The paladins little extra 'something' that Allura had promised was a color-corresponding cape that made them look less like a bunch of kids and more like superheroes.

While the dress I'm in is gorgeous, it's not the most comfortable, making me quite jealous of Pidge in the same paladin armor and cape as the other four.

I have to lift the dress up as I descend down to the bottom of the stairs. I don't notice everyone's eyes till I get to the bottom of the stairs and approach the group.

"Valerie... you look amazing..." Shiro compliments, most of the group finally breaking their stare, bar Keith, until Lance elbows him with a shit-eating grin.

"Dude, you're staring. Just tell her she looks beautiful," Lance snickers.

Keith blinks and meets my eyes, "Y-you look beautiful." He seemed to be entranced enough to do as Lance says and too entranced to really think of his own words, but I don't doubt the sincerity of his compliment.

My cheeks might as well blend in with the dress, matching Keith's complexion as well. As we exit the castle-ship, I swear I see Allura and Lance give each other a discrete high five. Those little-