Work Text:
Contrary to what Riyo seemed to believe, what they were doing wasn’t ‘roleplay’ because Jabber doesn’t roleplay.
“Fuck,” Zanka swears as he recovers from the latest venom Jabber had concocted. Venom, because he had told Jabber to stop using paralytics a while ago, and Jabber had been itching to watch him twitch again anyway. “Yer so good for me. So damn mean with yer lil’ poisons,” he grunts as he forces himself to sit up, an action that had to have been excruciating, given the pins and needles sensation this particular mixture caused. He knows because he tested it on himself, as he’s begun doing again, albeit in smaller doses. Wiggling his fingers made him feel like he was dragging them through an ocean of sharp metal pieces, the kind that the Rudo would collect on his trash runs to use for repairing other items. It hurt like all hell, yet he couldn’t stop.
“Yer a masochist.”
“You keep callin’ ‘em poisons an’ I’mma up your dosage, man.” Jabber huffs from where he sits beside Zanka, the threat weakened by the fact that he didn’t look particularly angry, merely inspecting Mankira for any new nicks and scratches she might have garnered during their latest clash with Zanka and Lovely Assistaff. “Have you seein’ sounds, smellin’ colours, and wishin’ you were dead.”
Zanka snorts, wiping blood from his nose. “Ya know I love it when ya threaten me, baby.”
Jabber scoffs to hide the way his heart misses a beat, as it always does whenever Zanka uses one of his many pet names on him. “You fuckin’ weirdo.” He grumbles halfheartedly.
“Yet you love it, dontcha?” Zanka reaches forward to grab one of Jabber’s wicks.
“In your dreams, maybe,” Jabber retorts, voice much less firm than it was just a moment ago.
They are not roleplaying. He’s not roleplaying. He means every word he says, just...just to varying degrees, was all.
“You ain’t push me away yet, so that’s gotta mean somethin’,” Zanka says, his eye twitching as his other hand reaches for Jabber’s waist. The pins and needles travel fast, racing through his nerves and completely wreaking havoc on them. His hand freezes halfway there, fingers spasming, forcing another pained grunt from his throat. It enraptures Jabber, the agony he knows Zanka is experiencing, but his decision to push through it anyway. He watches the way the raider’s face contorts, watches the muscles in his neck jump as he swallows down what was sure to be another sound. Likely a gruff one, too, like sandpaper, except it’d be soothing as it rubbed against Jabber’s skin, scratching every itch he’s never been able to reach on his own. Really, Zanka was too—too—
His hand shoots out, grabbing Zanka’s wrist, and in the next instant, he’s forcing the raider onto his back once more, wrenching a gasp from him. He pins him with a knee to his chest, holding his arm captive the way Zanka had at the start of…whatever they had going on now. Jabber didn’t dare define it, and Zanka didn’t seem to care either way.
“Damn!” Zanka exclaims, the back of his head smarting from where it connected rudely with the ground, not hard enough to do any serious damage, but definitely enough to feel. “So damn terrible!” He sounds almost elated by this, and Jabber can’t stop himself from saying,
“Yet you love it, dontcha?” He makes sure to imitate Zanka’s accent as best he can, leaning over the raider with a sneer that feels as though it came from the depths of his soul, a thing subdued until now. He settles his weight on Zanka’s midsection, a dangerous thing to do when there’s that telltale heat simmering low in his stomach, but Jabber’s always been a risk-taker. Spontaneous and fun, he would say. Reckless, Enjin would counter.
“Fuck yeah, I do. Makes ya all the more gorgeous, love.” His voice is like a growl now, and his free hand makes it to the destination of Jabber’s waist, sliding down to his thighs, which encircle him like a vice, almost. He’s got the traitorous urge to squirm, to shift his hips, to rub and grind, to wrap his hands around Zanka’s throat and squeeze, to drag his nails down the skin of Zanka’s back—
“What the fuck.” A voice that isn’t new breaks through the bubble they've found themselves in, and both Zanka and Jabber look up to find…themselves(?) staring back at them.
Zanka had been having a…a day. He couldn’t quite say it was good or bad. It started as it usually did, with him cleaning and caressing Lovely. Then, he had taken a shower, trained a little bit, and then went to breakfast. Rudo chewed as loudly as he always did because he never took small bites, and Riyo was quiet as she always was, despite her large bites. After breakfast, he has a training session with Rudo, who was making leaps and bounds in his progress with 3R, a thing he was slowly learning to become more proud of rather than envious.
Semiu had a mission lined up for him after breakfast, one that shouldn’t even need the company of a supporter, but he had the option of one if he so wished. Obviously, he had refused, then immediately set out.
At that point, the day was decidedly good; nothing terrible had happened yet, so that was a good sign.
Of course, as soon as the thought crossed his mind, he was confronted with claws and something so corrosive that, as soon as it made contact with his sleeve, it ate away at the fabric of it.
“Hey there, bad boy,” Jabber’s voice follows the sound of Zanka ripping his sleeve off before the corrosive could go any further. “Been missin’ ya real bad lately, so I figured why not pay you a visit? Didja miss me while I was gone?”
And Zanka hadn’t answered him. Not verbally at least—the way he readied his staff and swung without a moment’s notice was answer enough for Jabber.
Zanka was pent up.
His sessions with Rudo never got too violent because that wasn’t the point, and trashbeasts weren’t satisfying because they didn’t feel pain, and that wasn’t the point either, and there was a horrible restlessness that had made a home under his skin. His fingers twitched, and he felt more irritable than usual, and Jabber hadn’t interrupted one of his missions in weeks, not since the last time, when…
“Oho, what’s got you so riled up, bad boy?” Jabber giggles as he dodges the first of Zanka’s swings, only to allow himself to be hit with the next.
He uses the strength of it to gauge just where Zanka’s emotions lie, whether his heart was in it, and from the way he felt like puking his guts out, it seemed like more than Zanka’s heart was in it. There’s something special about the way he grits his teeth, about the melted metal in his eyes, about the way Lovely Assistaff seemed to sing as Zanka twirled her. That sweet, addictive warmth seeps down the ridges of his spine, fills the spaces between the bones, coagulates into a lump that sits heavy in his gut. Another hit like that from Zanka and it’d heat up again, softening into a liquid that slips downward, making him want to clench his thighs. All he wanted was another hit, but this one, he wanted Zanka to earn.
Zanka wants to earn it. Frustration had jolted through him when Jabber allowed the hit, and he pulled back to glower. “I ain’t in the mood for yer games today, Jabber.” He spits. Then, in a quieter, firmer voice, he says, “You know what I want.” The grin that forms on Jabber’s lips is a horrifying one, but Zanka can only see the promise in it. Jabber knows intimately what Zanka wants.
When they fight this time, there’s a viciousness to it that was absent in their past spars. When Zanka attacks, it isn’t just to hurt for the sake of it, but a second thing as well. A desire he harbors that he knows he really shouldn’t, but his last battle with Jabber had left him starving because Jabber had left in what felt like the midst of it.
Well, middle for him, maybe not so much for Jabber. Zanka remembers vividly how strung out Jabber had looked, how his thighs had twitched, and how pretty little whimpers escaped those lovely lips. How hazy his eyes were, and how good he smelled, how good he might taste—
Zanka’s last battle with Jabber left him ravenous, a hunger not to be fulfilled by anyone—or anything—else.
When they fight this time, Zanka pushes. He prods and pokes and swings and slams, does everything he can to be everything Jabber desires because he wants that, too, and maybe he pushes too hard because in one moment, they're standing on what he thought was solid ground, and in the next, they're falling.
When they land, though, it isn’t where they should be.
“...Am I hallucinatin’ again?”
Zanka’s—his Zanka’s—voice breaks Jabber out of his vehement bewilderment. The Other Zanka only continues to stare, and it is here that Jabber realizes two things. One: The Zanka wearing a Cleaner uniform was the one who had spoken earlier, and two: Jabber's position with his Zanka definitely looked more than compromising. Well, technically, there were three things that he noticed, but he was trying desperately to ignore the last one.
In the end, Jabber decides he can only focus on one of these things at the moment, and it isn’t either of the two (three) things he listed. “Nah, I only hit you with a neurotoxin that fucks with your muscle contractions. Plus, I see it too.”
“Is it the one that makes ya feel like you’re runnin’ through a pile of glass shards?” The Other Jabber refuses to let himself be ignored the way Jabber wanted to, chiming in with an excited expression that certainly didn’t match that of his…partner’s. “I love that one! Sucks that I got used to it after the third trip, though.”
“What the fuck?” Other Zanka repeats, this time, in sync with Jabber, and they both startle once they realize. Zanka’s grip on his thigh tightens, and he pulls Jabber subtly closer to him. Unfortunately, that subtlety mattered little considering the people they were around, and Other Zanka’s gaze flies to it immediately. His eyes widen as they roam over the way Jabber’s legs wrap around His Zanka’s waist, at the firm hold of His Zanka’s hand on Jabber’s thigh. Jabber is about sixty percent sure he hallucinates the way Other Zanka’s throat bobs when he swallows, yet the heat stewing in his guts heats up anyway.
Zanka has always been a greedy bastard.
He’s wanted for many things in life: the approval of his family, the feel of Lovely Assistaff in his hands, the warmth of Zodyl’s scarce praise, and most of all, the drug of Jabber’s submission. He’s always been greedy, yearning for things he knows he likely wouldn’t have, but that certainly wouldn’t stop him from trying, because he’s always, always, itched for a challenge.
It only makes sense that this trait would be present in other Zankas as well; he sees it in—in Cleaner Zanka’s eyes as he looks at His Jabber. The sight of the hunger he knows so well, directed toward something already in his hold, stirs up a tumultuous, swirling thing in his chest, and he discards subtlety this time when he—
“Who are you people and where did you come from?” His Jabber asks, pushing himself off Zanka and standing up. It has Zanka attempting to reach for him so he can pull the cleaner back down, but the venom in his veins stops him, seizing the muscles in his arm once and leaving him to writhe instead. Other Jabber watches him intently, his gaze seeming to burn a hole through him, and as much as he despises the greed in Cleaner Zanka’s eyes, he can’t deny his own.
“We—uh—” Other Zanka stammers, clutching tighter to his staff as his gaze roams unabashedly over Jabber. Despite it definitely being different from when his Zanka will look at him, he still can’t help the rush of—of embarrassment that passes through him. “We were fightin’ and—and we kinda just…fell through the floor.” He motions vaguely behind him, as if they’d be able to see the hole they supposedly fell through. Then he clears his throat, straightening up suddenly. “Are the two a’ you—”
“How do we know you ain’t an illusion from someone’s jinki?” Jabber cuts him off loudly, taking another step away from his Zanka. It’s in vain, though, because his Zanka proceeds to follow him, practically breathing down his neck. Jabber’s eye twitches. “This could be a trap made specifically for givers—”
“C’mon, man, you can’t be that dumb. I know you feel her.” Raider Jabber interrupts him now, kissing his teeth petulantly before he rolls his eyes, lifting his hands. On his fingers is…is Mankira, all ten of her rings glinting playfully under the sparse lighting. “I feel her too, vibratin’ on my fingers. She’s itchin’ for a tussle, an’ I think we should give her what she wants. Don’t you agree?” And as much as he tried to ignore it, Raider Jabber was right: Mankira was vibrating, trembling in the presence of another version of herself. It felt a bit like an itch, small but insistent, and Jabber doesn’t often refuse her. He’s never been known for his self-discipline, and Mankira has never steered him wrong anyway.
When the two Jabber’s clash, Zanka is so distracted by them that he doesn’t notice the alternate version of himself creeping closer until it’s too late, and there’s an arm being slung casually around his shoulders.
“Why don’t you an’ I have a lil’ chat while they duke it out, huh?” The Raider version of himself grips his shoulder tight, as if Zanka were prone to running at a moment’s notice. He scoffs unabashedly, slapping the arm off his shoulders and turning to face himself.
It’s weird, looking at someone he technically knows so intimately, yet almost not at all at the same time. This Raider Zanka carries an easiness to him that Zanka has hardly ever known, and he almost wonders if this Zanka went through the same Hell Guard training he did. The sight of Lovely Assistaff strapped to his back, though, is evidence enough, and in this, Zanka feels slightly comforted.
Steeling himself for what is sure to be an interesting conversation, Zanka lifts his chin, intent on looking down at this backwards version of himself. Raider Zanka studies him in kind, the intensity in his gaze hardly bellied by relaxed demeanor. Without a doubt, he knows these eyes, and that, too, is a comforting thought.
“Fine by me.”