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The evening air isn’t cool yet. Zanka is leaning on the wall in an alley, twirling Lovely Assistaff while he waits. Night is falling, and he’ll be damned if Jabber catches him looking impatient.
This fucker is late again. Zanka turns Lovely in his hands while he thinks of how he’s going to make him pay for keeping him waiting.
He hears the vehicle before he sees it. Then the headlights round the corner and they’re coming right for him and they aren’t slowing down. Zanka activates Lovely Assistaff and stands his ground.
The car comes to a screeching halt just before it’s close enough for Lovely to hit.
Zanka hears boisterous laughter and he’s still squinting in the headlights, but he knows Jabber is responsible for this attempted vehicular manslaughter.
“MAAAANNN WHO YOU THINK YOU ARE, TAKING ON A WHOLE CAR WITH YO STICK?!” Jabber’s voice gets louder as he leans his head out the window. “Get in, Zanka.”
Zanka deactivates his Lovely Assistaff and against his better judgement walks over to the passenger door. “Yer. Late. Where on the Ground didja steal this from? I’m not helpin’ ya with wha-”
Jabber interrupts, “Nah, man, this is ours. If you give your eyes a chance to adjust, you’ll notice she’s our signature Raider Purple.” He pats the passenger seat, “Get in. I need to drive.”
Alarm bells should be going off in Zanka’s head, but if he were to be honest with himself, meeting up with a raider (the one who poisoned him and was going to offer him to an artificial trash beast) somewhat regularly without the knowledge of a single member of his team is also a bad idea… He gets into the car.
Jabber’s reversing before Zanka can fasten his seatbelt. He rolls his eyes at how not surprised he is that Jabber isn’t even wearing his. “Where are we going??
Jabber is ornery and he needs to smoke and he thought it’d be fun to steal the company car and he didn’t want to stand Zanka up and just- “Here, man, take this. We’re gonna get so high if the stupid Sphere floats by we could smack it.” Jabber looks him over, “Hell,” he grabs Zanka’s wrist and smells the joint, “you might gon’ be able to kiss it.”
Zanka thought they were going to fight? They always fight! Zanka is now thumbing the joint Jabber handed him. And then sniffed. He smells it, too. Not sure what he was supposed to get from that. More importantly, how the hell did Jabber know he’s been starting to crave the highs from Mankira? The damn genius probably just figured… yeah… most people know about that… Okay, Zanka is NOT feeling Seen by his greatest rival and enemy right now, NOPE.
~*°~•*°*•~°*~
In the dark, Zanka watches the faint glow of the joint Jabber holds so close to Mankira as it slowly races towards his lips. Pulls even slower at the one Jabber gave to him, sipping. The high feels nice. Different from losing to Jabber and Mankira.
Zanka watches Jabber exhale, the smoke dissipates and he’s wishing he were that smoke. He wants to rush into Jabber’s mouth, scratching his throat, filling his lungs and clouding his mind, choking off airways and sobriety before leaving just as quickly. Settling in his clothes and skin and hair.
Sweat begins to form at the nape of his neck. Zanka reaches down to crank the window open, and Jabber slams his back against the seat. “I’m already sharing, man, do not open the fucking window.”
Jabber snatches the rest of the joint in Zanka’s hand from him. Zanka doesn’t even find it rude, he just laughs. There he is. This is the Mr. Bad Attitude he laughed through broken ribs with. Jabber smirks as he takes another drag. Yeah, this is exactly what he needed.
Something about the way Zanka isn’t trying to kill him over his own attitude or slamming him into the seat makes Jabber feel funny. The number of people who give Jabber space to exist like this can be counted on one side of Mankira. Mr. Bad Attitude’s famous bad attitude is nowhere to be found. “Zanka,” Jabber says his name to get his attention before taking another drag. He turns in his seat, pulling his knee under him as he sits up, facing Zanka. Smiling, he reaches an arm out to grab the back of Zanka’s seat and leans towards him. With his other hand, he roughly grabs Zanka’s jaw, squeezing it open and pulling his head to line up their mouths. Jabber exhales, instructing Zanka to inhale with a slow and breathy, “Breathe.”
Jabber’s eyes don’t leave Zanka’s. He can’t tell what the emotion he’s seeing in them is, but he’s blowing into his mouth and he can feel how it’s filling his cheeks and crashing down into those lungs. He’s almost jealous that it’s tearing up his throat and drying out his mouth. He is NOT at ALL thinking about how Zanka’s not hiding who he is right now. They really are free together.
He lets go of Zanka and sits back down, chuckling softly. Yeah, he kinda feels better.