Archive of Our Own

“Son of a bitch!”

There’s a longer tirade of expletives that leaves Kittan’s mouth as he pounds one fist against the wheel, swerving King Kittan down one final turn and slamming the brakes to the sound of screeching tires and smoke into a rough spun halt. He doesn’t need to even look at or acknowledge Kinon calling placements as he roughly jerks his door open, already mentally composing the seething rant he’s about to deliver to the obvious winner. He’s pretty sure in an hour or two he’ll regret the rough treatment of his poor Speedtail’s door, considering the car is his baby, but at the moment all he can see is the smoke off the rest of the racers’ tires as they skidded to a halt and the smug grin of Daigurren’s current reigning hotshot as he leans an arm against the hood of his dark red, blue-streaked Civic Type-R.

“ KaminnnaaAAA! ”

“Well, if it isn’t my favorite second-place buddy!” Kamina’s shit-eating grin doesn’t waver as he anticipates Kittan’s incoming right hook and grabs his fist with a boisterous laugh. “C’mon, c’mon, with all the boasting you gotta beat me one of these days! Heard that the Teppelins are thinkin’ the spot of rival to the great Kamina Giha is open lately!”

“Like hell it is! Fuck you! I had you that lap, you asshole!” Kittan howled, already yanking his arm back to wind up for a second punch. “No one can beat King Kittan, and no one but ME can beat YOU!” 

Kamina doesn’t even dignify that with a response, already cracking up from how easily he was provoked; Kittan’s seething and shouting grew louder as he threw his whole body into Kamina, and the pair crashed into the cement with a loud, undignified howl. Across from the “winner’s circle” - really a formality marked out by some string Nia had thrown their flagger before the race started - Yoko grimaced slightly with a shake of her head, already leaving the customary ‘rival scrap’ behind her as she approached Gurren to check for damages. 

“Those two are idiots.” She muttered dryly, glancing at her fellow mechanic. Kiyoh’s response was an undignified snort and a head shake of her own as she left to inspect King Kittan. There wasn’t much else to be said on the matter, really; everybody in the street racing scene in Daigurren was accustomed to Kittan’s second-place tantrums. Kamina didn’t help either, always meeting his rival’s tirades and seething with teases and taunts, and at this point Yoko was pretty sure the brunt of injury that came from street racing with him was solely from getting into post-race fights with Kittan.

It’s days like these that she’s more and more thankful she opted to be Kamina’s mechanic and not get into the racing herself, really.

------------------------------------------

“Easy, easy! Kittan, get the hell off me for a second! A bet’s a bet, jackass!” Kamina sputters it between spitting whatever debris that they keep kicking up in the unceremonious pavement squabble out of his mouth. “I won, and you can’t keep your mouth shut, so stop being a poor loser and get off of me!”

Kittan seethes something that sounds vaguely like “motherfucker” to his ears, and scowls as he rolls off from his attempt to at least crack the stupid shades that Kamina was wearing to stumble to his feet, clothes predictably dusty from rolling on the pavement for a good ten minutes. Most of the other racers have already scrambled out of the shitty alleyway before the cops could show up; the few that stayed were all watching with degrees of amusement across their faces, because at this point he was pretty sure the rest of the racing circuit of Daigurren just wanted to watch Kittan’s reaction to coming second place, again.

Well, most of them. Simon’s sitting on the hood of his BMW M2 swinging his legs back and forth with something between amusement and concern on his face, like usual;  considering he had a race against Viral the upcoming week (something that firmly established in his mind that no, the Teppelins weren’t at all interested in stealing his coveted position of Kamina’s #1 Rival, thank you very much!), Kittan’s pretty sure the only reason Simon’s even there is because if he misses a race Kamina’s in he’ll die, or something. He does sort of wonder if the kid knows he can just sit out races when there’s a bigger one scheduled soon and just watch from the sidelines, but it’s not really his problem. The only thing it affects is that Kamina always breaks up their scuffles faster when Simon’s attending, and if that kind of disappoints him, that’s his problem to not think too hard about. 

“...You aren’t even listening! What the hell?!” The shout breaks Kittan out of his wandering thoughts, because it’s accompanied by a gut punch that almost promises to reignite a street fight. He scowls as he stumbles back upright, automatically throwing an arm in front of his stomach with a wheeze. Kamina’s glowering at him, shades tipped down so he can see over them, and he takes a moment to be a little giddy over managing to change his expression to ‘mildly annoyed’. And then the rest of his brain cells fire at once, and he quickly regains his attitude and waves a hand at Kamina with a scoff.

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” He grumbles, gritting his teeth through his next response. “Not my first fucking loss to you, buddy, I know how it goes. Drinks on me.”

Kamina peers at him for a bit longer than he’s used to; usually, there’s boisterous laughter, the smarmy clap on the back, the “better luck next time, Kiitt~aan!” . Instead, Kamina’s dead silent as he fixes his gaze up and down Kittan, and the intensity makes him suddenly nervous and jittery. He’s about to just bolt and hightail it out of there in King Kittan, Kiyoh’s check-up be damnned, when he finally gets a response. 

“Yeah, drinks are on you.” There’s a pause, and Kamina’s expression rapidly cycles through a few emotions that almost baits Kittan into asking if he’s feeling alright tonight before it settles on a familiar smug look. “See you at the bar tomorrow… Kiiiittt~aaan!”

“ Asshole! I’ll beat you NEXT race, and you better BELIEVE I’ll hold it over your head for the rest of time!” Kittan howls, hopping backwards with a scowl. He waits for Kamina’s usual boasts that Kittan will never beat him, but instead he’s given a slight grin and a barely audible chuckle as Kamina shakes his head and walks away to Lagann, Simon already having swung his legs off the hood to jump down.

Somehow, the break in their usual song and dance fills him with a sense of unease that he uncomfortably brushes off the best he can as he walks away. Throwing himself into the driver’s side of King Kittan with a groan, he does his best to just write it off as Kamina being remarkably tolerable a sign of his good mood, or something. 

He does not acknowledge the little part of his mind complaining that he knows Kamina, really well in his opinion, and that’s why it’s so freaky. Instead, he decides that if this is a sign the guy doesn’t respect him as his rival anymore, then he’s going to train twice as hard and beat him so badly that Kamina will be cleaning his car for weeks. 

Oddly enough, the thought doesn’t really lift his mood as he drives home.

----

“Hey, listen, bro. My brotner in crime. My homie. My best little sib.” 

“...I dunno if I wanna justify all that with a response, bro.” 

“Fine, okay, Simon. Happy?” 

“Marginally?” There’s a click as Simon finishes unlocking their insanely fiddly apartment door, casting a curious if not worried glance at Kamina while he leans on the door with his weight to push it open. “What’s wrong?” 

Kamina visibly pauses as he bolts to the awful, half-destroyed leather couch that made up a  good 1/3rd of their total furniture and collapses on it, somewhat carelessly tossing his glasses to Simon. He’ll never understand how he has such blind faith in him to catch them, but he never misses either as he rather reflexively snatches them out of the air to set on the three-legged table in the center of the room while he hangs his coat up. He’s almost convinced he might’ve imagined their door conversation from exhaustion before he finally gets a response.

“Listen… do you think Kittan’s, like, actually upset about always coming second?” Kamina’s tone is so serious and genuine, and that’s the only thing that somewhat lessens the impact of surprise as Simon makes a noise halfway between a cough and a laugh, almost dropping one of their only good cups in the process. “He’s an insanely competent racer, especially for a dude who just jumped into street racin’ cause he saw me doin’ it once… and I don’t want him to seriously think he’s not doing fuckin’ awesome, y’know?!”

“Kamina,” Simon wheezes, clearing his throat to try and regain a normal composure. Kamina’s being so genuine in his concern; it feels mean to laugh at him. “What’s this coming from? You guys always fight after the race.”

“I know that! It’s awesome! It’s fun, and funny, and it’s like half the reason I even frequent Leeron’s shitty bar!” Kamina scowled at the ceiling, throwing one arm over his face with a groan, and Simon seriously has to wonder if he even hears himself sometimes. “But, see, today he just seemed so genuinely upset! He was even spacin’ out when I was giving him the usual speech on how he has to hold his bets and he can challenge me anytime and who does he think I am I don’t lose that easy! Like, I’m suddenly worried I totally misinterpreted this and we’re not rivals, he’s just genuinely upset he keeps losing!”

Very few things from Kamina left Simon speechless nowadays; this conversation was one of them. He let the silence hang for a few minutes as he tried to think of a response that didn’t just boil down to ‘you realize you can just ask Kittan to hang out normally’ or ‘you pay enough attention to him to notice that?’. They don’t really give you lessons on giving advice to your brother about his drag racing rival’s temper tantrums in school, after all. Finally, he cleared his throat and attempted to fight the small smile that kept creeping up his face. “He might be having a rougher tantrum than normal, bro. You… know Kittan well enough to notice when he’s spacing out; you know he can be sulky sometimes after his losses.”

“Yeah, but… this one’s different, yanno?” He most certainly did not know, but he hummed something of an affirmative in response anyways. “Like… he gets sulky, but he always bounces back and yells he’s not payin’ for my fuckin’ drinks and what-have-ya.” 

“You notice that much of his little quirks?” Simon couldn’t help the tiny bit of teasing that infiltrated his voice. “Geez, Kamina...  I know you’ve been rivals for months now, but I don’t even know what Viral’s response is to losing most of the time.”

“Of course I do! What kinda man would I be if I didn’t keep track of little stuff like that?!” 

“It’s sweet of you to care so much for him.”

“Wh-- that’s not the point!” Kamina practically howls, overtheatric anguish creeping into his voice as he rolled over on the couch to pout. “Siiiiii-mon, this is serious! What if he quits racing?!”

Simon has to fight back a grin as he walks over to the couch, quietly setting a cup on the floor next to it in case he rants his voice hoarse anytime soon. “I really don’t think he’s just going to quit racing. But, you know… if it bugs you that bad, you can just invite him to hang out outside of the tracks and then ask how he’s feeling about the racing?”

There’s a beat of silence before Kamina groans and drags his other arm over his face, muttering something completely unintelligible to Simon before raising his voice enough to be heard. “No.”

“No? Why not?”

“It’s… I dunno, you don’t usually invite your rival to catch up with outside of making bad bets at a bar and revving dust in their face at the starting line!” 

“...Says who?”

“Says me!”

“Says the guy asking me advice on what to do if his rival’s genuinely upset over losses?”

“Look, it’s just weird, okay?!” Kamina’s sputtering was only barely coherent, and Simon bit back the urge to laugh out loud. If he squinted a bit more in the fairly dim lighting, he was pretty sure Kamina was blushing, and that was just a little too baffling and hysterical to ignore. 

“Are you, like… embarrassed at the thought of being nice to him?”

“NO! Forget it, go to sleep! You have a race with Viral this week an- and you need to ask Rossiu if Lagann’s up to snuff! And he only has his dorm room open in the mornings, so chop-chop! Lights out, lil bro!”

“...Kamina, I don’t have to adhere to his ‘mechanic hours’ that aren’t even official, me and Rossiu are… you know what? Nevermind. Goodnight, then!”

Kamina let out a muffled whine in response, which Simon took to be a “good night” in return, and flicked the lights out, retreating to the bedroom with barely contained laughter. He honestly didn’t know if Kamina would take his advice, or even maybe realize that rivalry generally didn’t constitute the amount of worrying or excitement that he personally got out of riling up Kittan, but at least he’d have a good story to tell Nia and Rossiu tomorrow.

On the couch in the dark, Kamina blankly stared at the ceiling, far too jittery to sleep at this point. He’s pretty sure that if refusing to acknowledge his own knee-jerk responses to things was a race, he’d be the undefeated champion of two tracks, not just the Daigurren circuit. It was… embarrassing, to think that drifting half-paved turns at 100MPH was less scary and nerve wracking than the thought of asking Kittan to hang out. A thing that people did all the time! Friends regularly just asked each other to drop by places and chat for a few hours! Hell, he even had somewhat of a rapport with Viral himself (oh, he was so lucky Simon didn’t point that out. ) and had definitely invited Yoko over to relax and break some controllers playing Mario Kart with him.

So why the hell did it change so drastically when it was Kittan?

He didn’t think he wanted the answer to that, but the thought kept him up tossing and turning the entire night. 

------------------------------------------

“-- And he’s being weiiiiiird, Kiyoh!” 

Kiyoh peered over the top of King Kittan’s hood with a slightly quirked eyebrow, the wordless confirmation she both was hearing Kittan’s rant for the past 30 minutes since they got home and was silently judging him for it. Kittan himself couldn’t stop pacing back and forth in Kiyoh’s garage, barely even conscious of time passing as she slammed the hood shut, evidently satisfied with her inspection.

“He usually gloats and brags and gives me that stupid smug grin I can’t ever wipe off his face and says my name in that stupid sing-songy way just to piss me off and even when Simon’s there I usually throw another punch and we get into a second fight and then he tells me to be at the bar next week!” Kittan scowled to himself, mostly, as he kicked the empty air near his precious Speedtail and tried not to acknowledge how horrifically whiney he sounds complaining about a guy he regularly loses to in races being slightly less showy once.

Kiyoh, to her credit, waits until he finishes and is inhaling sharply to start another tirade before she interjects. “Firstly, don’t kick in my garage. We’ve been over this, Ki. Secondly, are you seriously throwing a tantrum because he’s being less of an overconfident, gloating bastard to you?”

“I am not throwing a tantrum!”

“Yes you are! You literally are!”

“That’s-- it’s the POINT of it all, sis! Do you think he’s bored of me?!” The thought stings unexpectedly hard, which he decides not to acknowledge. “That bastard, does he think I’m not good enough to be his rival anymore?!”

“No, I think he just didn’t feel like showboating as hard tonight, and you’re blowing this way out of proportion.” 

Kittan scowled, leaning against King Kittan with a quiet groan as Kiyoh sighed behind him. So maybe he was blowing this all a tad overboard; doesn’t that just make him the best rival? To care so much that he beats Kamina at his peak performance that the signs of him being off-tilt for once freaked him out? People would kill to have friends half as attentive as he was.

“Kittan, be honest with me.” Kiyoh cut into his thoughts with a sudden clang as she slammed her hands down on the hood of the car next to him, startling him into making eye contact with a horrified yelp of protest. “Do you have a crush on the guy, or what?”

He inhaled so sharply it sent him into a coughing fit, barely choking out a strangled “What?! ” before doubling over in mild stomach pain, coughing violently into one hand with wide eyes.

“Don’t ‘what’ me! All I ever hear you talk about is Kamina, and occasionally some of the other loser racers from Teppelin you beat when they cross over to challenge us!” Kiyoh demanded, shaking her head viciously. “Be honest! I can’t give you love advice if you’re just going to waltz into my shop at 1 in the morning after every second-place finish and whine about Kamina like a scorned lover with no further context every week!”

Kittan was vaguely aware that his face was burning as he attempted to clear his throat with a horrified gasp. “That’s not-- I don’t--”

“Kittan, you have been in my workshop every other week at ungodly hours to complain about Kamina doing this or Kamina said that or at least twice ‘ohh, that bastard Kamina, he showed up in a crop top and shorts to show off for the crowd ’! If you’re going to deny it that hard, just get out of here and I’ll see you in the morning at breakfast!”

He made a strangled, flustered noise as he covered his face with his hands, feeling absolutely mortified. “T-that’s… like, you worry about that shit when you’re trying to beat someone!”

“You know his victory lines so well, you came here to ask if he was tired of you because he cut back a little.”

“Wouldn’t you worry about that?!”

“No!”

“Seriously?!”

His response to that deflection was a wrench hurling towards him, so he took that as his cue to bolt out of her garage, eyes wide with shock at the concept still. With his King Kittan now held hostage by his sister that was apparently dead-set on killing him with words or machinery, he couldn’t just drive mindlessly away and wash away this conversation with the sound of late-night FM radio, either. So instead, he picked the third best option and wandered out for a late night walk before he had to return home and make up a smart sounding excuse about his composure for Kiyal. 

He tried to comfort himself with the thought that Kiyoh was definitely, definitely wrong; how could she understand the intricacies of a manly, friendly rivalry? This was normal. Rivals were supposed to keep each other on their toes! He’s sure that if he asks Simon, he’ll get the affirmative that his rival would do the same. And… and any other Daigurren racers with established rivals, which he’s sure there are some, just… not any that he can think of under stress.

He tries, and yet he can’t shake the thought out of his head. Him? In love? With Kamina? It’s absurd, really. Being in love entailed a lot of things, not just worrying about someone. It’s having your heart race at the thought of seeing them, and having your breath catch in your throat when they speak sometimes, and feeling giddy at making them happy or annoyed, and feeling your face heat up when they’re dressing particularly well, and--

He stops. Thinks about the roaring in his ears earlier that very night (the race had happened tonight! He felt like several days had passed in the last few hours.) when he managed to change Kamina’s expression from smug to the intense, irritated look that practically threatened to burn a hole in him. His breath catches. Kiyoh’s words also echo in the back of his head, as a memory stirs - one particular race when the bets were a little more drunkenly established, and the loser had to be the “cheerleader” of the winner’s next race, horrible skimpy outfit included. It was humiliating. Kamina also showed up to that race in the most uniquely awful yet so very him outfit Kittan had ever seen, sporting a flame-patterned crop-top that barely even qualified as a shirt, a leather jacket tied around his waist and awful neon blue shorts, and he swore that the feeling in his stomach was just rage that he was showboating that hard already.

He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding and tilted his head up to the sky.

“Fuck.”

------------------------------------------

“So, he’s avoiding the bar.” Kamina mumbled glumly as he knocked a shot back, trying very hard to not seem like he was actively pouting and failing miserably. Leeron, to his credit, only gave him a sly smile and kindly refrained from pointing out his sulking.

It’d been a week, more or less, since their last race and while Kamina had been trying very hard to take Simon’s advice and assume Kittan was just having a particularly sulky night, he’d been sitting at the counter for a good five or so hours on a Friday night and officially had crossed into the ‘freaked out’ territory. Kittan never missed a full week’s worth of attempts to antagonize and needle him. 

“He could be busy this week, you know.” Leeron offers kindly, easily collecting his empty glass to refill. “Kittan doesn’t attend that often, he just calls to check in a lot.”

“He’s missed a week since he got into racing?”

The silence was more than enough of an answer for Kamina, and he let his head drop into his hands with a groan. “Damnnit. I told Simon that somethin’ was wrong!”

“You could call him?”

“No! S’weird! What am I gonna say, heyyyy, why didn’t you come to the bar so I can tease you while I’m a little off of it and goad you into racing me again?!”

“Sure!”

“No!”

Leeron gives him another one of those sly smiles, the ones that made Kamina feel uncomfortably like he knew something that he didn’t, and he lets out a long sigh. He eyed the next shot with a grimace and was about to just set it down and take his leave when the sound of someone stealing the barstool next to him made him frantically turn so fast he almost spilled it, ignoring Leeron’s small yelp in protest as his hopes instantly skyrocketed.

“Hey. Didn’t think you were a guy who sulks at a bar,” Viral greeted him with a slight smirk. “But nice to catch up here, I guess.”

Kamina tried not to let the disappointment show visibly on his face, though he suspected he did a very poor job of it as Viral’s eyebrows shot up with a quizzical expression in response. He quickly shifted to an overblow grin, trying to stick the landing. “Hey, Viral. Nice race this week! Pretty soon my lil’ bro’s gonna have to kick it into overdrive against ya!”

“I’ll beat him next time.” Viral affirms it so easily, not a hint of doubt in his voice, and it’s conversations like these that remind Kamina why he loves the racing scene so much. “But, geez, are you getting stood up? I’ve never seen you look so disappointed before… or seemingly expecting someone that bad.”

“I’m not getting stood up!” He protests weakly, ignoring Leeron’s barely swallowed giggle in the background. “I was just-- y’know, Kittan, he owes me drinks and all!”

“...You’re waiting for Kittan? Ah, no, scratch that - you’re upset he hasn’t shown up?” The sudden amused look on Viral’s face immediately told him that he wasn’t surprised to hear that, and for some reason that knowledge made him feel self-conscious. 

“I’m worried, not upset! Get it right! It’s not like him, y’know?!” Kamina snapped, ignoring the slight hint of heat creeping up the side of his face. It’s the alcohol, he supposes. “You’d do the same for Simon! He’s your best rival!”

“...Kamina, I literally wouldn’t worry if Simon deviated from his schedule unless Nia told me Rossiu told her that he’s been deviating constantly.” Amusement seeped out of his words as Kamina’s mouth dropped open. “So no, I don’t think that’s normal rivalry behavior. But it’s kinda sweet of you to worry so much about him. Speaking of Simon, he said you asked him after your last race if he thought Kittan was upset! You worry so much about him, it’s almost sickening.”

He tried to find a very good, smart retort for that, especially the knowledge Simon had told him about their conversation last week, and instead knocked back his shot with a scowl, well aware his face was flushed by this point. “Race me.”

“Sorry? What?”

“Race me!” He slammed his empty glass down as if to emphasize it, meeting Viral’s disbelieving gaze with his own intensity. He needs out of this bar, he needs to not think about Kittan, he needs-- “Now.”

“Are you serious? You’re in it worse than he told me. Fine, whatever, Enki’s in the parking lot. Meet me in Lozen alley in 10.” Viral easily pushed off the counter, throwing a quick glance backwards at Kamina as he strolled out. 

He thought about asking if he was supposed to get a flagger and everything, but decided that it probably didn’t matter and mumbled a quick “put it on my tab” to Leeron as he bolted after.

------------------------------------------

“This is on incredibly short notice, Kamina!” Nia’s voice is chipper as always, and unfortunately for Kamina in the middle of a mildly liquor-and-Viral-induced headache, it aggravates him a bit. Still, he manages what he hopes is a pretty polite smile and gives the most confident laugh he can manage.

“Sorry! I just need to race the damn guy! If I don’t race today, I think I might die from being deprived of adrenaline!” 

“You sure this isn’t an incredibly impulsive excuse to stop talking about Kittan?” Viral cuts right into their conversation as Enki pulls up next to Gurren, a smarmy grin on his face as Kamina instantly rounds into an embarrassed scowl. Embarrassed for what reason, he has no idea, but he’s just not going to let him keep running his mouth. 

That, and so maybe he does miss Kittan. He’s had more fun racing with Kittan on the block than he had ever before. Sure, racing other racers like Viral was fun; it was sharp, dangerous, real injury and pride and money on the line on bets. It was incredible, even. 

But racing Kittan was fun in a different way, like a game of cat and mouse that he adored. And if he voices that out loud, he’s pretty sure the two of them were going to absolutely obliterate him for it, so he doesn’t. Nia’s got a sparkle in her eyes already from Viral’s words, though, and as he swings into the driver’s side of Gurren she leans down to his window to speak.

“I’m sure Kittan will be very irritated to learn of your impromptu race with Viral! He will certainly hear of it, as we already have a small crowd-” Well, he’ll be damnned. Amazing how people hear that Gurren’s going to be in a race and somehow still find him, even if he only hears the location in a semi-crowded bar at 10PM. “-and he will likely contact you immediately after being informed!”

“Yeah, well…” He mutters, glancing down at the dashboard in a slightly dazed attempt to ignore the visible blush on his cheeks. “Whatever. I warned him that I got a Teppelin tryin’ to be my new rival!”

“I’m already with my hands full with Simon, you know!” Viral yells it over the roar of Enki’s engine as Nia retreats to the side, glancing between the two cars in an unspoken question. “I don’t have time to be your rival too!”

“Tough shit!” He hollers back, and rolls the window up; he gives Nia a quick, fierce nod, revs Gurren’s engine, and waits for her to swing down the checkered flag.

There’s the tense pause as Nia waits for Viral’s own signal, revving Enki’s engine as a ‘yes’; Kamina leans forwards into his steering wheel and holds his breath, the radio already kicked on to a good medium volume and blasting one of Simon’s CDs. The familiar and comforting feel of race adrenaline seeps into his veins, and the thought of Kittan gradually blurs out into background noise as the world seems to grind to a halt in those tense few minutes.

Nia swings the flag down.

The two of them tear off, engines roaring as Kamina floors the gas, already trying to pull ahead of Viral by just those precious few inches, few seconds that make all of the difference. The early start sets the tone. Enki can reach speeds far outmatching Gurren, because Nia has been souping up Viral’s fucking Corvette since he’s known the guy (he’s pretty sure Leeron’s illegal mods are somehow making their way into her hands), and in a straight line race he’s already lost. But this isn’t a straightaway, and he knows the loop - figure eight around the neighbourhood, three laps. He has the turns and the opening to pass Enki and keep the lead, and he’s going to take it.

It’s tense; as Gurren flies down the track, his speakers pumping, he sees Enki in his rear-view and feels that little thrill of terror, the reminder that his competitors are always right there and right behind him and any small movement could jeopardize his lead. It’s always the truest with Enki, especially. 

He can’t stop himself from thinking reflexively ‘and King Kittan, too’, and his grin turns into a scowl as he shakes his head frantically. He’s racing Viral to avoid confronting any of his thoughts on Kittan, not think about them harder. 

And yet.

And yet it’s practically all he can think about as he shifts the clutch down a gear and slams the brakes for a second to drift through his third turn, barely conscious of the first lap having flown by. It’s horrifying in some ways; he never thought about anyone else this much before during a race. It was always just the race , the thrill of the chase and landing after someone slams their car into yours, recovering and winning above all odds. 

With a painful swallow, he realizes that maybe he’d stopped racing just for the thrill and danger of being caught or collisions after he’d started racing Kittan regularly. At some point, his main priority shifted from racing just to race to “racing Kittan”, specifically, and the thought utterly terrifies him.

Because it’s foreign. Because he’s definitely never had a-- a thing, a crush, whatever for anyone before, but here he is impulsively racing the guy that crashed into his car and flipped them both the first time they raced just to avoid thinking about Kittan having not shown up to something that wasn’t even a weekly agreement in the first place. He was most definitely not acting rational, and all of his attempts to justify it to himself flew backwards in the face of the simple, easy logic of the road - he loved racing Kittan.

He loved teasing Kittan, he loved provoking Kittan, his heart went a little faster every time they fought on the bare cement every race, he--

He deeply liked Kittan’s company, and he was pretty sure he wasn’t ready to acknowledge it was probably a whole lot more than that. 

Nia’s remark about him probably going to show up pissed that Kamina raced someone impromptu flew back to him abruptly, and he couldn’t help but grin slightly at the thought. If Kittan really did show up, he was going to--

To what? Ah, well, he’d figure that out if it happened. Antagonize him, probably, because he doesn’t think he can bring himself to do anything else.

Enki slams into his side abruptly and he’s sent out of his thoughts spiral into a physical spiral as Gurren spins wildly, and he grits his teeth as he slams the brakes hard enough to gain just enough friction off the cement to swerve the wheel counter to the spin. It’s barely enough to force Gurren back onto a half-straight trajectory, but it’d have to do; he manages to correct himself back onto the road and floors the gas, leaning into the remaining spin to accelerate around the fourth turn and line back up. Enki’s already a good way ahead of him, but it’s not like he hasn’t been having Yoko and Leeron mod Gurren over the past two years himself; he leans over towards the radio buttons and pushes one of the smaller, haphazardly-painted red ones under the display and feels the engine roar into overdrive.

Fine, if he wants to be that way. Two can play at the demolition race.

He cranks the radio music to max as the speedometer cranks over 100, a sharp grin forming on his face as he gradually begins gaining on Viral. Because sure, Kamina might lose in raw speed, but he had the techniques to make up for it and there was still a lap to go and two more turns. And Viral knows that, and that’s what always makes these races so addictive.

They lean into the turn, and Kamina floors it.

The sound of metal crunching is always pretty unpleasant to people, but he lives for it as Gurren slams into the side of Enki as they drift through the turn; Viral’s only a bit ahead of him, and now he has a choice to make himself to maintain that lead. He pushes back; Kamina watches him whip the wheel to the right, and he meets it head on. Enki’s already got a spin to it from the angle of the first collision; now he just has to follow through.

And follow through he does, as they streak out of the turn and Kamina frantically spins his wheel back for a second before slamming Gurren into Enki a second time, and he can see Viral’s dangerous smile as the man mouths a series of curses at him when the silver Corvette goes spinning. Kamina makes some sort of an awful, howling victory laugh and shifts the clutch up one, just barely regaining enough friction on the road to maintain his original trajectory and not veer directly off to the side of the road. It’s not enough to keep him down, he knows, but it might be enough to keep him out of the inside for the final half of this lap and the last turn.

Still, he lets himself have a bit of a victory gloat, already thinking of how irritated Viral will be for the whole ramming-Enki’s-side-at-90MPH thing. As if he hadn’t definitely done worse to other cars just to try and win a race. And then his thoughts drift again, back to Kittan, and he can’t help but picture the sheer amount of ranting he’s going to hear when Kittan hears he challenged Viral to a race and won, and didn’t even invite him. Nia’s right; as soon as word spreads after the race, Kittan was going to be livid. It almost scares him, actually; his concerns of Kittan genuinely being upset over his repeated losses rushes back to him, and his breathing hitches. He doesn’t want him to think he’s actually replacing his rival, or anything; he just desperately needed a distraction from thinking too much, and racing mindlessly usually did just that for him. 

Except, he supposes, it’s not doing that right now because all he can think about is apparently Kittan in one way or another, and he’s grimly aware that he’s deeply surpassed normal rival behavior in worrying if his rival was going to be - going to be what? Jealous? He sort of regrets teasing about getting a new rival after their last race now; the thought that was taken seriously makes him cringe a little inside. He can’t actually think of the possibility of not racing Kittan again, because it just doesn’t make sense to him. 

Of course, the divine punishment for celebrating victory too early and going on autopilot to think about your complex feelings on your rival is the awful crunch of your competitor’s car slamming into the back of your own.

Kamina made a somewhat undignified, horrified screech as Gurren spun sideways, momentum carrying him forwards; the abrupt turn of his view gave him a terrifying visual of Enki’s landing as Viral floored it and slammed into the side of the car. 

He grit his teeth as Gurren went tumbling side over side, Enki soaring past him. Viral had the audacity to roll his windows down after the second crash, and Kamina could hear his roaring, vicious laughter for all of ten seconds before he was gone. Yoko was gonna kill him.

He shifted to damage control mode, frantically jerking the wheel to one side and slamming the brakes during a roll that he vaguely guessed one of the tires was connected to the ground; it helped slow his momentum, but only a little. Another roll or two was enough for him to get Gurren relatively on the pavement, and the awful grating screech of his tires making a far too sharp and still somewhat uncontrollable turn around the final corner filled his ears. It wasn’t a pretty finish, but he managed to shift the clutch down one and vaguely straighten Gurren back from sideways sliding as he rolled across the finish line, slamming the brakes a good four or five times to force the car to a haphazard halt a few inches past Viral. 

Kamina could already hear the crowd that had formed whooping and hollering, frenzied beyond belief with shock and excitement; it had been a while since he’d lost a race. He took a minute to inhale painfully through gritted teeth, giving himself a once-over for any injury;  thankfully, he seemed… relatively in one piece. His side hurt like a bitch, which he could attribute to being thrown unceremoniously into the driver side door, but he hadn’t broken anything.

Finally, he quit his stalling and groaned, kicking open the door to Gurren and staggering out to the finish line where Viral was waiting with a raised eyebrow and a killer smirk.

“The great Kamina Giha, losing in a race he started.” Viral called out, and Kamina grimaced before shifting to an irritated smile, strolling over with one hand extended for a shake. He took it with a chuckle, and Kamina inhaled sharply, bracing himself for the expected trash talk and already mentally planning his own retort. Instead, he got a different jab than the one he was expecting.

“Seriously, you challenge me to a race you then lose just to stop thinking about Kittan? At the end there, it barely even looked like you were paying attention.” 

“That’s not the reason I-- I was paying attention, and--”

“Oh, save it, save it.” He waves Kamina’s protests off with a low laugh, and Kamina’s pride burns at the roaring laughter of the crowd. A lot of nerves to taunt him, even in front of such a tiny one. Viral watches him with a smug, intense look of pride that gradually fades into a much more genuine look that he can’t place, and turns to Nia, waving her over with one arm. “Tell the onlookers to scram. Cops’ll be called on that crash noise, you know it.”

Nia gives him a short nod and quickly moves away to shoo away the crowd, and Viral pulls him to the other side of the cars, cocky attitude quickly fading once they’re out of sight. Kamina’s about to shake off his hand and go home and sulk for a few hours when Viral speaks, his tone abruptly serious. “Listen, say whatever you want to save face. I’ve lost to you enough to know when you’re distracted, Kamina, and I’ll tell you this - the fact you’re seriously that worried over Kittan should speak volumes to you, not just me.”

He opens his mouth to retort, but he’s at a loss for words. Viral lets his wrist go with a shake of his head and opens Enki’s passenger door, glancing at him one last time. “I’m serious, dude. Just go talk to him. And I’ll pretend this didn’t happen, because I can’t boast about a victory when you’re buzzed and off your game like a schoolboy with an unrequited crush.”

Once Nia hops in, the Corvette tears off a minute later in a cloud of smoke, and Kamina stands there staring at a now-empty backroad with his damaged Type-R feeling very small.

He swallows his pride and limps home, and thinks about asking Yoko if she has Kittan’s number in the morning.

------------------------------------------

Kamina waits about all of two days between his awful race with Viral before he crosses from “concerned” to “batshit afraid” when Kittan doesn’t burst into the bar during his visiting hours at all. And he knows for a fact word has spread, because most of the locals have been gossiping about what could possibly be so stressful that Kamina lost a race, even tipsy? And it gnaws at his pride, sure, and he sat through Yoko’s hour long angry lecture on how he was a fucking dumbass and how she had been fortifying Lagann for months so Simon could withstand Viral’s rough collision-style racing defeatedly giving an affermative nod every now and then so she didn’t restart from the top, and that had been humiliating, but by this point the distinct lack of yellow-haired men yelling and bragging and throwing punches at him for over a week was at least a few tiers above his pride in order of importance.

He’s still not ready to confront anything about that and what it says about himself, either. 

“Leeron,” he mutters, not looking up to make eye contact with the other man. “Be honest with me, has Kittan showed up when I’m pointedly not hanging out here?”

“He honestly hasn’t, Kamina! And that’s the fifth time you’ve asked me.” 

“I just--” 

“Do you want his phone number?” 

He hesitates a bit at the offer, staring into his water glass (no drinking actual alcohol until Fridays or if Kittan was around, his hard and fast rule even if it was tempting to drown his thoughts in it instead of confront them) and trying to think of the possible outcomes of calling him. He supposes that he might just get hung up on, but if Kittan asks why the hell he’s calling, he’s not going to have a very good answer for him.

He’s about to swallow his pride and say ‘yes’ when a deep, booming voice behind him shatters the idea.

“Kamina Giha?” 

He felt confusion immediately override his thoughts as he turned on the barstool to face the source of the inquiry, and was greeted by a stout, shifty looking man in what he’d guess to be his early to mid sixties on look alone. He wasn’t alone, either; a small group of people were crowded behind him, shooting dark looks to the bystanders who glanced over quizzically at the newcomer. He unconsciously felt himself push his sunglasses up on his face before raising a hand to wave at the group. “That’s me. Who’re you?”

“They call me Guame the Immoveable in Teppelin,” Kamina sucked in a breath. This guy’s from Viral’s territory? “And I’m here to challenge you to a race, current champion of Daigurren City.”

“That’s it? Well, sorry, I’m not takin’ challenges right now, I’m waiting for someone to deliver on a b--”

“It wouldn’t happen to be Mr. Bachika, would it?”

That shut him up real fast, and he barely was even aware he’d stood up with a fist clenched until a gentle tap on his shoulder from Leeron made him realize. “What’s your game, Guame?”

“I told you - a race. I am here to expand my collection of victories and championships.” Guame’s expression never wavered, but Kamina could swear he had a much more smug look in his eyes. “For your information, I’ve already raced Mr. Bachika. The terms of our challenge were simple; if he loses, he must join my team. And he lost, of course.” 

Kamina’s blood is boiling . “Where is he?” 

“Waiting at my track of choice, Mr. Giha.”

“Fine. I’ll race you.” He spat the words out through gritted teeth, clenching his fist tighter as Guame’s expression deepened with amusement. “He’s my rival, not your shitty crewmate, pal. When I win, you’re gonna release him from your shitty street gang and get the hell out of my town.”

“And if I win?” 

“...What do you want?”

He regretted asking as soon as the words left his mouth and Guame broke into a sinister smile. 

“I told you; being champion of Daigurren and Teppelin is already quite good for me. But if you insist - if I win, Kamina Giha, you must quit the racing scene. Forever.”

The thought terrifies him. Kittan being stuck racing for, or even worse, a stupid pit crew member of this crusty old fuck’s gang terrifies him more, he finds. “Fine. I’ll follow you there.”

“Good, good. A deal it is.” He chuckled and turned around, waving a hand at his lackies behind him to move out of his way as he left. Kamina ignored the stare threatening to drill a hole in his head from behind him and moved to leave, when Leeron grabbed his wrist abruptly.

“I’m telling Yoko.” His voice was firm, and it wasn’t a question. “In the meantime, you’ll need a mechanic. I’m coming with.” 

“No, I don’t!” Kamina hissed, feeling a well of impatience spring up in his chest as he yanked his wrist free from Leeron and tensed to bolt out. “Tell Yoko if you have to, but I don’t have time for this!”

Any further protest was like white noise as he bolted out and hurriedly threw Gurren’s door open.

------------------------------------------

Bad news: Kittan’s impulsivity to drown out his abrupt realization that yes, he was in love with his longtime rival and arguable closest friend has caused him to both get in a very high-stakes race and lose said race. Now he was currently stuck racing on behalf of Guame’s stupid racing gang, and who has a street-racing gang in this day and age? Who cares about territory that much?

Good news: At least it bought him time to think about it for a few days. And man, Kiyoh was right, as much as he hated to admit it. He had it bad . Too bad he could probably never tell Kamina, between the 100% chance it was unrequited and now in an attempt to avoid further incentivizing Guame to challenge him.

This was pretty much the only thing Kittan had been focusing on for the past five days between making up poor excuses to Kiyoh and Kiyal why he hadn’t been racing as much (and in Kiyoh’s case, talking to Kamina) and begrudgingly beating the newer racers that were attempting to carve a name for themselves in Teppelin. Hopefully, he could get Guame to race him again, and then get back to his normal circuit in Daigurren.

At least, that was his plan until today, when he was abruptly told to be at the Gundo outskirts for Guame’s greatest race in awhile. The concept left a bad taste in his mouth, and even though he really didn’t have any other options, he protested anyways and forced the rest of the gang to physically drag him there.

“What’s the fucking idea, anyways?! I hope he loses!” He hollered, scowling violently and landing a kick on one of the people doing their best to keep his arms restrained; he was rewarded for his efforts with a swift kick to the stomach, sending him into a coughing fit. Fucking Gundo gang. Who names their gang after their favorite outskirts to race, anyways?!

The blaring sound of an engine revving shattered his thoughts and momentarily halted his protesting, as a dark orange AE86 swerved around the corner, headlights forcing him and the rest of the gang members to shut their eyes for a second as Gember skidded to a loud stop at the marked-out starting line. Guame sauntered out with a smug, satisfied look and leaned against the trunk, glancing behind him at the road he’d sped out from for a minute or two before looking back through the small gathering of Gundo members until he spotted Kittan. Seemingly pleased by his presence, much to his deep annoyance, Guame gave a small nod and walked off to speak to the flagger of the race. 

“...What’s going on?” Kittan leaned over to mutter the question to one of the nearby mechanics, who gave him a surprised glance in return.

“He’s got a champion challenger on the line! Word’s already getting out quick, see,” The man paused to gesture to the other side of the road, where a small crowd of people were rapidly gathering and growing. “‘Cause it’s been a while since Chief Guame has had a real race that wasn’t a curbstomp.”

Kittan felt the tips of his ears go hot at the implication his race was nothing but a curbstomp to the old coot, but the full realization of a champion challenge made his blood run cold. 

There’s no way that he’d challenge Kamina that fast. Even if Kittan had been bragging about how unbeatable his rival was, and how if Kamina ever heard about this he’d beat Guame seven ways to Sunday even though he actually didn’t believe his own bragging in that regard because Kamina’s busy and Kittan had gotten himself into this anyways, there’s no way he would’ve hunted through Daigurren to get a tip off where Kamina frequented.

There was no way, yet as the distant sound of a motor got closer and Kittan began to make out the outline of a Civic Type-R on the horizon, his mouth dropped open.

“That DUMBASS! ” 

“Quiet! No shouting until the race begins, newbie!” 

“Newb--?!”

Gurren, with quite a few more dents than when Kittan had seen him last (he was well aware of the Viral race by this point, and he was seething at the nerve of the damn guy to just go and race his established rival, but he wasn’t expecting it to be that bad!), swerved into the second position next to Gember, and Kamina Giha hopped out of the driver’s side looking more pissed than he’d ever seen the guy before.

“ KAMINA?! ”

The shout - scream, really, if he’s being honest with himself - came out much more shrilly than he intended, and he didn’t wait for a response as he threw himself shoulder-first through the crowd, sprinting towards him as fast as his legs would carry him. Kamina, to his credit, reacted similarly as fast, head whipping around immediately to find the source of the shout as Kittan slammed a full-body tackle into the man.

“HEY! Easy!” Kamina wheezes, but there’s a surprising lack of bite to his tone and Kittan is outraged the guy is stupid enough to accept a random championship race request from someone out of town and not even have the courtesy of sounding somewhat ashamed or mad about being tackled.

He is also most definitely not overjoyed to see the guy after over a week, because that would imply that going that long without seeing Kamina actually made him upset, which is what a guy way too deep in a crush would feel like. And maybe he’d accepted that he was a guy way too deep in a crush, but seeing Kamina again undid about 80% of his progress on the realization on impact.

“You dumbass! Why the fuck did you accept his request?! The only person who can challenge you--” The angry taunt dies in his throat, because he’s suddenly hyperaware of how jealous he sounds, but Kamina’s expression hits relief and shock within ten seconds of each other. He’s about to tangent himself to ask a million questions, like why he raced Viral randomly, when Kamina gives him a shit eating grin and steps backwards, forcing Kittan to stand up instead of leaning on him.

“Is you, asshole!” He cheers gleefully, eyes glittering with eagerness. “And you can’t fuckin’ challenge me when this crusty fuck has you in his outdated little street gang, so leave it to me! When I win this thing, you’re coming back to Daigurren with me and we’re having drinks on the house!”

Kittan’s mouth drops open, again. “You’re not even racing him for his champion’s trophy?” You came here because of me?

“Sure ain’t!” Kamina’s voice is gleeful, almost giddy, and he’s already walking back towards Gurren before Kittan can even really process that. “Let’s get this show on the road, Guame!”

He sort of stands there, allowing some of the crowd and Guame’s mechanics to push him back to the sidelines of the road as Gurren and Gember take a slow lap around the circuit to make the race technically “fair”. The concept that Kamina, who never usually raced on other people’s territories, had agreed to race Guame on his home circuit just to drag Kittan back home made his chest warm and simultaneously filled him with shock. 

He was definitely going to have to apologize for at least one of his tantrums, maybe just his last one, after this. 

The practice lap seemed like it took forever from his point of view; then again, standing dumbly to the side trying to mentally replay what just happened tends to distort your perception of time. Gurren and Gember finally pulled up side by side at the crudely painted starting line after what felt like an hour, and the flagger ran over to both cars before returning to the side of the road and watching the two with an intense look. 

Kittan thought about his options, his previous loss to Guame, Kamina apparently coming here not to be a champion but just to free him from his own stupid lost bet.

Gember revved its engine.

He thought about how it was his own inadequacy and being too distracted by his thoughts on Kamina that lead to his loss to Guame in the first place.

Gurren revved its engine.

He took a deep breath, and sprinted.

------------------------------------------

Kamina had never felt more adrenaline or determination at the start of a race before. 

Oh, sure, he was always filled with the thrumming of action and danger through his veins in a race, especially against someone like Viral who always went for bumps and smashes. But this was different. This was his pride, his lifeblood on the line, and his… rival’s racing career on the line. 

He took a deep breath, revved Gurren’s engine to signal he was ready, and shook his head to clear his thoughts. He can’t have a repeat of the race with Viral. He can’t. 

“ I’M COMING TOO! KAMINNAAA! ”

Many things happened in the blink of an eye right when the flagger swung the flag down and Kamina went to slam the gas. 

The first thing that happened was out of the corner of his eye, he caught a blur of yellow sprinting towards them both, and his mouth dropped open. The second thing was Gurren’s passenger door being abruptly yanked open, and Kittan swung himself in with a howl. Kamina screamed in a mixture of surprise and disbelief as Gurren rocketed off, the race already having begun as Kittan frantically yanked the door shut and turned to face him with wide eyes.

“Are you FUCKIN’ INSANE?!” Kamina yelled, unable to glance off the road to his unexpected passenger but desperately wishing he could. “Who DOES THAT?!”

“ME! Who the fuck runs all the way to backroads he’s never ran before just ‘cause he heard his rival lost a fucking bet, jackass?!” Touche.  

“You JUMPED IN A MOVING RACE CAR! As the race began!”

“So?! You would too!”

Kamina has to concede that he has a point. He definitely would too. “Yeah, alright, just hold on tight, okay?!”

“To what ?!” 

“The door! The seatbelt! I dunno, anything!” He can’t really spare more of a thought as he frantically downshifts the clutch and whips the wheel around to drift through the first turn; Gember was neck and neck with him, and it did irritate him how effortlessly the old fart seemed to hit the same drift. Stupid old man, it took him seven crashes and a lot of practice to get it down so automatically; then again, the geezer probably spent half his life racing. The thought’s sobering, but it’s not a death sentence; he thinks of Viral’s simple, steadfast confidence in his ability to beat Simon, and he understands.

He will beat Guame. There’s nothing else to think about.

Kittan whoops and hollers in excitement through the first drift, leaning slightly over the clutch to stare at Kamina’s laser focus on the road, and it does give him a swell of giddy joy of his own. It was… different to have someone else in the car while he was racing, that’s for sure. And Kittan himself seemed to be delighted in experiencing Kamina’s point of view in a race, which was… nice to hear.

He shakes himself out of the beginnings of whatever stupid daydream he was about to get lost in and focuses, and not a moment too soon; he sees Guame suddenly peel to the side, and it’s like it plays in slow motion as realization clicks.

For a second, it isn’t a dark orange, worn AE86 about to ram him, it’s a silver Corvette with a smirking, cackling man his age behind the wheel, and he can almost hear Viral’s whisper in his ears. When you know someone’s gonna bump you, speed up or overcorrect.

He slams the gas and frantically hits the nitro almost on instinct as Gember makes its move, and Gurren soars ahead, barely getting the tail end clipped by Gember’s slam as it veers wildly to the left behind him. He’s set slightly off course, but he’s already overcorrected; he shifts the gear up one and down one to turn the overcorrection into a hasty drift through the next corner, and allows himself a single tick of a smirk as he catches Guame’s wide-eyed, snarling expression for a split second in his rearview.

Serves you right, you smarmy, crusty fuck.

“Holy shit! Did you know he was gonna do that, Kamina?!” Kittan hollers, his eyes wide with excitement and disbelief; Kamina allows himself a bit of a smug grin of his own before he replies.

“Viral’s got the same style of racing. Same bump ‘n dump win at any costs. Must be a Teppelin city style.”

“ Damn! No wonder you’re so- so- so untouchable!” There’s a twinge of wistfulness to Kittan’s voice that makes his stomach lurch, and even though he knows he can’t afford the distraction, he can’t just be silent.

“You’re pretty good too, Kittan! Don’t sell yourself short - ever!” He snaps; maybe a bit more forcifully than he intended. “Listen, help me out if you’re stuck in here with me. See the red button, the blue one and the yellow one under the radio LED? That’s nitro, super nitro, and ‘Yoko-hasn’t-tested-this’ nitro.”

Kittan catches on almost immediately. “You want me to pilot your nitros for you?!”

“I’ll tell you what to push!” 

He listens to Kittan hum for a second, clearly thinking it through, when Gember’s sudden paint job rears its ugly head in his mirrors. He scowls and frantically adjusts to stay in front of the guy; he knows that if he’s anything like Viral, he might get a bump or two, but he can’t afford to lose the lead. “Time’s up for thinking, you’re my no. 2.”

“You got it… Kamina.” 

He almost thinks he’s imagining the sudden serious shift and intensity in Kittan’s voice. 

Gurren drifts through the next turn seamlessly; Kamina’s not at all comforted by his performance in the first lap. Four turns, three laps; just like the race at Lozenn street. Except where that was a figure eight, this was just a plain loop, and two laps were more than enough for him to lose this race. They streak by the starting line to start off lap two, and he can’t help but be unsettled by the lack of attempt to pass him Guame’s made. He’s planning something, but he can’t anticipate what, and all he can do is hold his breath and focus.

Kittan’s finally settled down into eerie silence, as well; he chances a quick glance to his “co-pilot”, and is momentarily startled to see the intensity of his gaze as he monitors the windshield, the mirrors, and the rear view, hand hovering near the boosts. He recognizes it, though; it’s the same look he gets when he’s racing Kamina.

His breath catches, and he wrenches his eyes away and towards the road.

The next lap passes by disturbingly uneventfully; Guame tries to pass him, Kamina keeps in front of him with dark determination, and tries to think of what he’s planning for lap three. He has to be planning something to snatch victory at the last second, maximize his chances of winning, he just doesn’t know what that something is. He tries to think of the other, prominent Teppelin racer, and then it clicks.

Boosts. Crashes. The momentum of spinning or flipping combined with a mod boost. It’s the same trick he used to parry Guame’s first bump; it’s the same trick Viral uses. 

It clicks right when he hits the drift of the first turn out of the lap and sees Guame hit it in his side mirror at way too high of a speed to drift, sending Gember into a violent spin hurling towards him, and Kamina instantly realizes what’s about to happen. 

“He’s gonna try and crash us off the road so we don’t finish!” He hisses; it’s like it’s in slow motion. He can’t overcorrect to one side because getting hit even on the side will send him into a spin, and it’s easier to move a spinning object slightly left or right to hit something even indirectly than it is to hit something just with the side or front of your car alone. 

Kittan yells something that barely registers in his brain as “ Trust me! ” and suddenly, Kamina feels Gurren lurch under him. 

He blinks, and Kittan’s hands are on his own on the wheel frantically correcting Gurren into a drift; his mouth drops open when he realized Kittan had slammed the “untested-by-Yoko” button and activated the very experimental even for him “breaker” boost. His speedometer was reading so high that the needle was just helplessly flapping to the most extreme side. Gurren itself was taking its momentum sideways - sideways, but still forwards, still barely ahead of Gember, which was still spinning and Guame was trying his best to right his car back onto the road with the bit of rebound he got off the collision with Gurren.

Kittan yanked the wheel to the hard right, and Kamina jerked back to reality to slam his own weight into the steer; Gurren’s tires screech as it unhappily forces itself back into a generally straight-ish position, and Kittan cackles in victory.

“Are you- are you like,” Kamina gasps weakly. “Fucking insane?”

“It was the only way! If you got even an inch ahead right when he was about to slam into you, it’d be just enough to minimize the spin you were gonna get caught in!” 

He’s amazed by how well Kittan thought that through, actually. “This is why I promoted you to co-pilot.”

“Heh heh!” 

 The realization Kittan’s hands were still on his on the steering wheel abruptly shattered the brief moment the two of them were having, and while he couldn’t really shove Kittan’s hands off of his, he could feel his face heating up slightly. Kittan withdrew his hands after another few seconds, satisfied that Gurren was fully back under Kamina’s strength, and switched the nitro down to low instantly.

“Hey, what g--”

“Your engine’s making the worst noise I’ve ever heard, dude!”

Ah, so it had been. “Well, Yoko hasn’t tested the super secret one much.”

“Field tested, now, baby!”

He dared to sneak a glance behind him as he ungracefully shuddered through a turn; he still had a bit of a momentum struggle, and his drift was slightly off. Behind him, Gember was finally righting itself and speeding up; Guame was barely visible slamming his fist into the wheel, and Kamina let himself give a full, sharp grin as he floored the gas. “Kittan? We got two turns left. Think you can shift that nitro up and down enough to let me drift?”

“Fuck yeah!”

It’s such a stupid plan; it relies on Kamina giving his longest rival such blind faith that he can accomplish such a stupid maenuver to keep their lead, instead of trying to divert his focus to do it himself. If he shifts the boost down too late, they’ll have too much speed to make it through the corner; too early, and Gember will catch up. It’s so risky. It makes his heart skip a beat, his breath catch in his throat.

It’s why he thinks it’ll work.

They hit the next turn, and Kittan doesn’t even seem to think when he downshifts the nitro as Kamina shifts the clutch down into a drift through it; Gember’s catching up behind them, but he knows as soon as they hit the straightaway, unless Gember’s own boosts are anywhere near Viral’s level he’ll still be a good distance behind them. Kittan shifts back up to the blue boost straight out of the turn, and Gurren roars as it streams down the road.

As they fly through the last turn down the road, Kamina lets the wind tear a hoarse victory scream from his throat, an almost hysterical laugh welling up from his chest as Kittan shifts off the nitro for the final time and slams one of his hands over Kamina’s on the wheel, whooping and hollering himself as the shocked flagger swings the checkered flag down.

Loss was never an option for this race.

------------------------------------------

“I win, Guame; you stay the fuck out of Daigurren, and Kittan’s comin’ back with me, y’hear?!”

Kamina doesn’t even stop to catch his breath as he jumps out of Gurren, yelling as loud as his voice would let him; the shocked members of Gundo were dead silent, but the crowd of onlookers from both Daigurren and Teppelin were going crazy as Guame silently stepped out of Gember, his expression stormy.

“Now you know what it means to challenge the great Kamina Giha!” He asserts it with an aggressive point as the crowd, quite literally, goes wild; he only realizes at least part of the large surge of excitement when he realizes Kittan’s voice had been layered under his own boast, and his rival stepped forwards to stand side by side with him. The realization that Kittan could predict what he was going to say word-for-word made his heart beat faster, and he swallowed down the sudden hammering in his throat. Not the time. 

Instead, he turned a humorless grin back to Guame, who if looks could kill would have already shot him dead where he stood. It’s time to hammer in the disrespect.

“And, hey, you’re a Teppelin racer, ey?” He added, leaning forwards with a low, dangerous laugh. “Here’s some advice: take some fuckin’ lessons from Viral, geez. He gave me more of a challenge than you did.”

He bolts to Gurren with Kittan whooping and cackling on his heels before Guame can escalate it into a literal gang fight, and they rocket out of the outskirts.

------------------------------------------

“Listen, drop me off at my house for a second and meet me down Gunkai alley, okay?” 

Kamina blinked slowly at the abrupt request; he’d come down from the adrenaline high of the race an hour ago as he took the drive back home a lot lazier, and almost had forgotten Kittan was with him from how quiet he was being. “Why?”

“Just… I need to pick up King Kittan.”

The implication hits him abruptly. “Kittan, I’m not racing again tonight.”

He purses his lips for a second, before letting out a bit of a defeated, halfhearted laugh. “Yeah, fair enough. But, um…” 

“...Meet me there tomorrow night.” Kamina mutters, leaning back to balance one hand on the wheel as he meets Kittan’s eyes with a serious, quiet stare. Kittan sort of shrinks back in surprise, which doesn’t feel great. “If- like, I… I wanna talk. So.”

“...Tomorrow,” Kittan agrees with an exhale. “I’ll be there.”

He drops Kittan off and streaks home, feeling suddenly more exhausted and jittery than he ever has before.

------------------------------------------

Kamina’s legs are dangling off the hood of Gurren as he lights up, shivering only slightly in the cool night breeze; in hindsight, he guesses that he should’ve taken a jacket and not just a t-shirt when fall was already approaching, but the cold gives him an excuse to blame the shivering on anything but nerves. He’s sort of already regretting asking Kittan to meet him out here the next night, especially because he had only a vague idea why Kittan even asked him to begin with and smoking before a race was one of the stupider things you could do.

He’s realizing that he might act a lot more stupid around Kittan nowadays, though. Maybe since forever; he’d have to ask Simon.

He exhales a puff of smoke with a sigh, and decides that if Kittan hasn’t shown by the time his smoke’s finished, he’ll go home and pretend the last 10 days hadn’t happened at all. 10 days. God, time feels so much faster when you have the stupid, soul-crushing realization you might be in love with your rival, lose a drunk race, and win a race that said rival and your own racing careers are on the line in.

He’s gently stirred out of his own thoughts as the low humming of a motor makes its way closer, and he only has to glance back once to make out a neon yellow Speedtail streaking towards him.

Despite the nerves, he smiles.

“Hey! Shit, dude, why are you smoking?! I called you out here yesterday to race , asshole!” Kittan snaps almost instantly as he hops out of the car, and Kamina lets out a good-natured laugh in response.

“Took too long, Kii~tan.” He retorts teasingly, and for a second it’s just like their post-race banter again. The moment passes, though, and he hops off the hood of Gurren and flicks his cigarette into the gravel.

There’s a lot of things he wants to ask, like ‘do I actually make you feel bad?’ and ‘do you like racing me as much as I do?’ and maybe apologize for being such a constant jerk to keep his appearance up, but the words die in his throat as he uncomfortably scuffs the ground with one shoe. The silence is deafening as Kittan seems to wait expectantly for him to say something.

“Let’s race.”

It’s not what he wants to say, but it’s the only thing he can say; he gives Kittan a bit of a pleading look, and is rather startled himself to see the varying degrees of surprise that passes his face.

“Yeah? Let’s race. Got a flagger?”

“No, just…” He swallows. “Fuck it. We don’t need one, dude. One lap around the Gunkai backstreets and end near that awful alley that Dayakka ate shit in chasing a stray cat through.”

Kittan raises an eyebrow at him, but before he can uncomfortably try and explain that he’s pretty sure if he tries to verbally communicate anything instead of through racing, he splits into a wild, dangerous grin and throws his head back to laugh.

“Oh, you’re fucking on . Let’s go!”

It’s quick, rough, and dirty; it’s one lap through backroads that the two of them probably know by heart, and it’s a clean race. Kittan overtakes him a few times; Kamina overtakes him back. They hit curves in tandem drifts and Kamina’s practically howling with glee by the end of it, because even a shitty dirt race with Kittan is fun.

Kittan pulls ahead at the last second and swerves King Kittan into a park in front of the alleyway, and Kamina knows they’re both aware that he lost.

He jumps out of Gurren with a roaring laugh; Kittan’s already cackling to himself, standing smugly near one of the awful, graffitied walls as Kamina sprints towards him. “ Asshole! Your first victory against me has to be on these shitty streets?!”

Kittan catches his punch with practiced familiarity, laughing violently; Kamina can’t help but give him a wide grin, even when he’s trying to be mad. It’s so easy to just lose himself and have fun when Kittan’s involved.

It’s so easy.

He’s contemplating that thought to itself and the ‘click’ it made in his head when Kittan catches him with a hard left hook to the stomach, and he doubles over in a howl of surprise and pain. 

“Did you let me win?! You asshole, you slowed down at the last drift!”

“I didn’t!” Kamina protests weakly, his eyes wide; had he slowed down? He didn’t feel like he had.

“Don’t fucking pity me, Kamina Giha! I’m your fucking rival, show me some respect!” Kittan’s voice is suddenly sharp, aggressive; Kamina’s almost aghast at the sudden 180 in the mood. He realizes in surprise that Kittan’s hands are shaking as he speaks. “Just because I lost to that bastard, Guame--”

“I don’t pity you, dumbass! ” 

He evens the score with a sharp kick to Kittan’s knee, and he goes down with a yelp; Kamina manages to straighten himself, casting a sharp glance downwards at the man. This is what he was afraid of - that Kittan really did feel like shit for losing.

“Then why did you--”

“I don’t pity you. I do not, ” He hissed through gritted teeth. “Intentionally handicap myself or let you win. Don’t fucking mock me like that.”

Kittan is silent as he stumbles up, so Kamina sucks in a breath and keeps going. “You’re a fuckin’ incredible racer. And that’s not bravado. I really, really fuckin’ think that, and I don’t have as much fun racing anyone else as I do you! I’m starting to feel guilty that I’m better, ” And he feels a twinge of normality as Kittan scowls at that. “Half the time, because I don’t want this to be unfun for you! I don’t- I don’t want you to stop racing, or any of that shit!”

He lets the words hang between them for a minute as he straightens up; Kittan’s watching him with wide, shocked eyes before he manages a muted, startled laugh. 

“You think I don’t have fun?”

“...I don’t know,” Kamina answers honestly. “I- our last race, you seemed so genuinely upset, and then you vanished for over a week, and-- and I thought maybe you genuinely were mad at me, or I totally misread us being friends, or you just… gave up on racing.” His voice had dropped to a bit of a whisper by the end, but he can’t find it in him to raise it.

“Oh, I…” Kittan looks so thrown that Kamina honestly had to wonder what he’d expected; after a moment, he abruptly burst into loud, unrestrained laughter, and Kamina’s mouth dropped open in confusion.

“We’re-- we’re both fucking idiots,” Kittan gasped, leaning one arm on the hood of King Kittan for balance. “I was so scared you got tired of humoring me and being around me, ‘cause you didn’t boast the entire time last race, and-- and, uh-- and then I ended up avoiding the bar, and Guame challenged me and I said yes on stupid impulse so I didn’t have to think, and…”

Kamina inhales sharply and wheezes, feeling like a mild weight was lifted off of his chest. “Oh, god, we are stupid. I challenged Viral to a race drunk so I could stop worrying and lost horribly!”

“...You were worried about me?” The laughter stopped abruptly, Kittan’s voice dropping to more of a shocked note; Kamina immediately felt the laughter die in his throat. 

“...Um,” he started elegantly. “A bit. It wasn’t like you, yanno.”

There’s a somewhat awkward silence that follows, and Kamina immediately regrets owning up to his verbal slip; he should’ve just pretended Kittan misheard, or lied, or anything but the truth. Kittan scratches behind his head with one hand somewhat hesitantly, and Kamina’s about to bolt out of there when he finally speaks.

“Listen, I… uh… I was avoiding running into you ‘cause I did a lot of thinking-”

“Surprising!”

“Oh, shut up, I’m having a moment! Anyways, Kiyoh chased me out of her garage until I got my thoughts in order, and, uh…”

There’s another heavy silence, and Kamina’s heart sinks. So maybe he had read the situation correctly, after all. Kittan, for all it was worth, looked like a deer caught in headlights as he seemed to consider very carefully whatever he wanted to say, and he inhaled sharply as he began to walk towards Gurren.

“...Look, I’m sorry for being… smug, all the time. I just, like… figured it was part of our rapport, part of the pretenses I keep up an’ stuff.” Kamina manages an only half -looking fake smile, as Kittan gapes at him. “So, uh, if you don’t want to race or be my rival anymore, I get it. It’s c--”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, that’s not what I’m saying at all, you dumbass--!!”

And before Kamina really gets a chance to either apologize further or examine whatever the hell that was supposed to mean, Kittan practically sprints at him to grab his shoulder, yanking him ungracefully towards him; Kamina makes a very startled yelp that dies in his throat when Kittan rather clumsily slams his mouth against his own.

It lasts for a very brief amount of time, all teeth and very unelegant, before Kittan stumbles backwards away from Kamina somewhat awkwardly, his eyes wide with embarrassment and surprise at his own actions, and Kamina’s brain quickly connecting back to reality and frantically grabbing Kittan’s wrist.

“I--” Kittan’s breath caught, clearly unsure of what to say. “I’m, uh-- you can forget that happened, I--”

“Nah,” Kamina cut in, trying very hard to keep up a facade of semi-composed. “Nah, I want to remember that just happened.”

“Wha’?”

“Listen, I…” He thinks, tries to come up with a speech of bravado or smugness that he’s usually so good at spinning. His words, lately, have always seemed to fail him when he needs them most, though, so he just yanks Kittan back towards him in lieu of a proper explanation and kisses him first, this time.

Several things happen after a few minutes. The first thing is Kittan gently breaks away with wide eyes; the second is his hands linger, and Kamina’s breathing is way too erratic to pass off as anything besides “horrifically nervous” and “deeply excited”. The third is that the point connects in his brain too, and Kittan grins wider and more genuinely than Kamina’s ever seen before, and he manages some very poetic and coherent thought like “oh, he’s really cute when he’s happy” before Kittan leans back in to press his mouth against his, and then they’re somewhere against the shitty concrete alley wall that vaguely hurts to be up against but he’s somewhere between shock and cloud 9 euphoria so the pain sort of fades out as he winds his arms back around Kittan’s neck and gives a soft exhale against his mouth.  

He is, somewhere in the back of his mind, fairly confident that he’s coming home late just from being horrifically distracted between “calling my rival out to an alleyway for a shitty straightaway race to talk about my feelings” and “accidentally kissing him, which seems to be some sort of confession, and now we’re too busy kissing in said alleyway for me to look at the time”. Especially when Kittan pulls away for a moment to catch his breath, and Kamina’s blinking fairly owlishly, and then he leans down to press slow kisses against Kamina’s neck and he makes a very undignified noise in embarrassment.

Ah, the dignity of the top street racer of Daigurren. The only way his night could break any more of his pretenses is if the fucking cops showed up and busted them.

Then again, as he leans into Kittan with a shaky sigh and tilts his head a bit to the side in sort of an unspoken (as if he’s capable of using spoken words right now. What a joke .) invitation to keep going, he’s pretty sure the cops will not stop two mildly dusty, exhausted men kissing in an alley because that’s not technically illegal and there’s no proof they were racing.

He also makes a mental note in a slight daze as Kittan finally leans back with a vaguely overjoyed, if not dazed himself expression to absolutely antagonize Kittan over this as soon as he’s capable of making coherent sentences.

“Ah, Rossiu, I didn’t do the readings for biology. You know that!”

Simon pulls away from the phone with a tiny grin as his boyfriend starts on an exhausted, if not familiar lecture on proper studying; he’s preparing his playful dismissal of ‘but I race too much to study full time!’, and nag Rossiu into inviting him over instead of him dropping by unannounced when the apartment door ungracefully opens.

He pauses, before returning to the phone with barely contained laughter. “Rossiu?”

“< -- What? I’m not done- >”

“I know, but this will have to wait until tomorrow. Bro just walked in, and he looks…” He punctuates it with a low whistle, and Rossiu is silent for a moment.

“< I see. Well, goodnight, then. Come over to my dorm tomorrow so I can lecture you while we study, and presumably, so you can fill me in on whatever trouble your brother’s gotten into now, >” Rossiu’s voice is predictably exasperated, if not used to these kinds of things, and Simon can’t help but laugh a little bit.

“Yeah, I will. ‘Night, Rossiu, see you tomorrow!” He whispers into the phone before hanging up, unable to stop himself from giving the exhausted, disheveled Kamina somewhat of a shit-eating grin.

“Oh, sorry,” Kamina mumbles, blinking somewhat owlishly at him. “Didn’t mean to interrupt your phone call. Didn’t mean to be out this late, either.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, sorry… I invited Kittan out for a race and to talk to him, like you said, and all… lost track of time.”

Simon couldn’t contain his laughter at that point. “Congrats, bro! I’m happy for you!”

Kamina gives him a blank stare that sends him into further gasping laughter until it suddenly clicks in his brain as he frantically glances down to realize how completely crumpled, dusty, and coated with concrete dust and dirt his clothes were; Simon also didn’t have the heart to point out his vaguely dazed, happy look either, nor the fact that his hair was significantly more fucked up than it was when the rivals ever got in a fistfight. “I-- uh, it’s- it’s not--”

“I’m glad you finally figured it out!”

“Figured WHAT out?!”

“Oh, don’t tell me you didn’t ask out Kittan! C’mon, bro, I’m not that dense!”

Kamina stares at him looking for all the world like he was caught stealing, and Simon practically collapses to the floor wheezing when he finally responds, refusing to make eye contact, “We, uh.. I kissed him, if that counts as a confession, and uh… wait, why am I telling you this?!”

“Ooh, am I gonna have to stay at Rossiu’s more so your boyfriend can visit?!”

“ SIIIII-MOOOON! ”