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The first time it happens, they find each other by accident. Jabber is skipping his way out of Root Town, happy with his haul: some new mystery seeds that match none of his records, gotten from an active waste zone; several liters of his favorite fertilizer, which may or may not be made with human remains; and a good dozen new pots, most of them not even cracked! He's got so many ideas for his poison garden. Fuck, he's going to cook something deadly today. And then he's going to microdose it for weeks. It's going to be hellish. He's so excited!
Jabber is debating which of his children he's going to try and crossbreed today, and imagining what his new babies may do—some of the seeds are hot on his hands, his expectations are high—when he feels it. A squeeze in his chest, a closing in his throat, and a buzz in his hands where Mankira rests; he grins, taking one last jump before he settles, excitement filling his chest.
He turns, and there, standing atop a crumbled building and looking all princely, is his man.
“Hi, Zan-zan!” He sing-songs, waving, bouncing on the balls of his feet. Zanka looks down on him with a neutral, bland face, but Jabber knows him. He sees it: the way Zanka's shoulders adjust, how his feet take a stand, the way his hands settle properly over Lovely as his eyes, an icy blue, start to glow faintly. He's in good condition, clean and put together, but there is a tension around him that, coupled with the downwards tick of his mouth, speak of a disappointing fight.
Zanka is clearly itching for a good brawl, and has just found his—better be—favorite opponent.
But the Cleaners and Raiders are in a bit of a truce right now, after little Rudo agreed to share information about the Sphere with the Boss in exchange for them stopping interfering in their missions, so Zanka doesn't charge right at him right away. Jabber looks at him, raising his eyebrows in expectation, teeth piercing indents on his lower lip as he waits.
Finally, Zanka sighs, hopping down from the barely recognizable pile of concrete. When his feet touch the ground, he sets Lovely beside him with a tap, eyes dim and annoyed but otherwise stoic.
“Hello, Freak,” Zanka bites out, and leans into his staff, all casual and unbothered and sexy as fuck, looking at Jabber as if he's dog shit, like he could drop dead right now and he wouldn't even bat an eye, like he's too good for him.
But he's not. Zanka is neither too good nor not good enough—he’s perfect, Jabber's fated match, the guy that will kill him someday, or that Jabber will drag himself into a grave with.
Damn, he can't wait. Either way will be bloody and painful and dragged out, teeth for teeth and eye for eye until they are an unrecognizable mass of blood and tissue, indistinguishable from one another. As it should be.
Zanka’s eyes him, suspicious, wary of his long silences.
“I was jus’ thinkin’ about how good 's gonna be when we finally kill each other,” Jabber offers cheerily, knowing his honest thoughts are more disturbing to Zanka than any taunt could ever hope to be.
“Yer fuckin’ sick,” Zanka winces, predictably, but there he is, getting into position again, lips twitching up slightly before he gets his mask family in place again. Such contrary words, when he looks like he would gladly rip Jabber's heart out of his chest and eat it.
Damn, he's getting kinda hard.
“Yea’, sick of waiting, pretty boy,” Jabber winks, letting his bags drop at his feet and then sprinting away, not wanting the goods to get too damaged. “Get ‘em while their hot, come on!”
But Zanka is already pouncing when he sets off, no doubt having clocked his intentions the second he had them. Lovely Asistaff twirls in his hand, growing taller and bigger in the blink of an eye, and Jabber is quickly dogging her sharp spikes—or trying his best, really. Zanka is not a born genius, not someone who hides his strength. Jabbed pegged him wrong, that first time, but now he knows. Zanka is not the kind of person to whom things come easily to, but he's a born fighter, ready to claw his way to the top if he has to, and doesn't have to, not really, which is better—because he will anyway.
In the months they have been clashing against each other, Zanka has gone from losing every match, to losing most of them, to losing some—and then to winning. They go toe to toe, now, each other's foil, a neutralizer. Jabber goes into every fight drooling, knowing he can let go and it still may not be enough. Even drugged with his numbing cocktail or out of his mind, it doesn't really guarantee him anything anymore. He will put himself under and wake up the same, Zanka meditating on top of his chest while Jabber's ankles are bound, Lovely pressed against his neck, and his hands in Zanka's as he cleans Mankira, the silver glinting and humming in appreciation.
The fucker takes so many liberties while Jabber is out of it. And with his girl, too. His soul.
Jabber may be in love.
Lovely arches down, a spike catching on his shoulder and tearing, Jabber's arm jerking in pain as the bones dislocate. Blood sprays, and he can only moan a curse before a boot gets him in the throat. Jabber gags, and grins. Zanka smiles that wide smile of his, all teeth, his eyes twin pools of ice, leaving afterimages behind as he charges forward, Lovely Asistaff held in both hands and coming sideways in a hard curve. He catches Jabber on the jaw this time, throwing him into a wall with several crunches, and then Zanka closes the distance, fist connecting with Jabber's other cheekbone and making his teeth rattle.
“Fuck, man!” Jabber shudders, feeling on fire as his vision whitens, blanks, and then focuses again. His whole face feels battered, and there is blood on his mouth, coppery and hot and sweet. Grinning makes him feel like he's being stabbed, tears pricking in his eyes as his battered bones whine and crack. But he can't help it. It's so good. “Ah! Can't—fuuuuck fuck fuck, it hurts. Fuck!”
“N’ yet yer stil’ talkin’,” Zanka scoffs, standing over him, Lovely Asistaff pointed at him, spikes first. “Can't hurt that much, yea? Should make sure yer filthy mouth stays shut for longer.”
“Watcha’ waiting for then, babe?” Jabber baits, and surprisingly, Zanka doesn't attack him for it. In fact, he stills completely, frowning, head tilted to the side. “What? Don't tell me yer done,” this he whines, hands sneaking up to cling to Zanka's calves, intending to fully press his face against them, filth in the tip of his tongue and ready to roll.
“Yer high or something? Fuck yer doin’?”
“What?” Not his most eloquent answer, but—seriously, what?
“Fight back, ya bitch, what's this bullshit?”
“Uh?” And that's the exact moment Jabber realizes he hasn't even activated Mankira yet. He looks down at his hands, clocking all of his rings, perfectly normal, gripping the cloth of Zanka's pants. “Holy concussion,” he mutters, finally noting that the buzz in his head is not coming only from Zanka's presence.
“Yer seriously hurt?” Zanka sounds disbelieving, crouching down and taking Jabber's head between his hands, Lovely held upright between his torso and his bicep.
Jabber’s mind empties out, the soft contact impossible to process, especially coming from Zanka, who has only touched him directly knuckles first. Jabber may flirt all he wants, but Zanka has never engaged, never expressed any interest back. He looks at Jabber like he's lunch, sometimes, but his teeth have never strayed close, much less his lips. They have only held hands in the most technical of senses, and always while Jabber is barely conscious or outright not, Zanka letting go as soon as he gets his brain sorted out again.
So this—warm, calloused skin and short, blunt nails skimming over his face and scalp, light and gentle and so precise, clearly experienced, in control—is new.
In the shock of the moment, he activates Mankira, her claws digging quick and deep into Zanka's legs.
The man jumps back, hissing, and Jabber drags himself to his feet, brain rebooting. Fight. Fights he knows. They are going to—
“Fuckin’ finally,” Zanka whistles, and there is something merry in him, now. Happy. “Hi there, wild girl,” he croons, leaning forward on Lovely.
Wild girl.
He croons.
Motherfucker is flirting—with Mankira?
When he's right here?
“Right in front of me, man?” Jabber whines, disbelieving. “You serious?”
Zanka scoffs, throwing and catching Lovely in the same fluid, easy motion in which he points her back at him, widening his stance and setting his shoulders.
“Are yer gonna stand there all day or what?”
“What, we ain't gonna discuss the attempt at homewrecking going on?” Jabber throws himself at him claws first, noting how Zanka's eyes follow Mankira, nothing but admiration in that gaze. Seriously!? “And I'm the sick fuck? She's my girl, Zan-zan! Keep those paws to yerself!”
And, Jabber thinks, you are mine.
“We have bonded,” Zanka dismisses him, Lovely Asistaff clashing against Mankira in a hiss of metal, sparks flying as the Instruments meet. In his hands, Mankira feels almost electric, clearly eager, and Jabber can’t help feeling both pleased and indignant. Because of course Mankira should be admired and cared for, she's literally the best, but also, hey, they are kind of a package deal here! Jabber would 100% pamper both Lovely Asistaff and Zanka if given half the chance! This is unfair!
“Without me!?” He cannot believe the favoritism.
Wanting to prove exactly how much he can indulge them, Jabber fully unleashes Mankira, her greater size not unbalancing him a bit as he disengages Lovely, sidesteps Zanka, and sinks her right through Zanka’s shoulder.
“Damn, and she bites too,” He grunts, and blood sprays in Jabber’s face. “Lucky me, uh?”
However, Jabber doesn’t even get to enjoy the sweet taste of his blood, or process his words, before Zanka is sinking Lovely through the ground and, in a move that will fill his spank bank for years to come, using the leverage to jump and send Jabber flying back, both his feet colliding against his solar plexus and pushing with the strength of an honest to God trash beast. Mankira is dislodged in the same movement, ripping away with a gory, glorious sound.
“Hope it leaves a mark,” Zanka comments, and with literal holes in his upper chest, he follows the kick with a hit to the ribs from the butt of his Instrument. Jabber doubles over, dizzy, his own right arm mostly limp. He’s lifting a claw to inject himself with his pain-numbing neurotoxin when Lovely crashes through his hand, every bone cracking like dry wood.
“Aw, shit! That’s going to be a bitch to heal!” He jumps back, not managing to pierce his thigh and feeling kinda glad for it. The pain is wonderful, better than anything else in the whole world, filling him from the inside out until every single one of his usually clashing, wild thoughts are easing and fitting together like puzzle pieces. He can’t imagine anything more satisfying than this: the height of battle, and against Zanka of all people, who never pulls his punches and always comes back with heavier ones.
But this is it for today. The wound he put in Zanka’s chest was with the paralyzer, and he’s totally going to take advantage of Zanka’s inability to move to see if he can endear himself to Lovely. Fight fire with fire, right? Let’s see what Zanka does when it’s Jabber making a move on his girl—
A soft clink, then the sound of glass breaking, and suddenly Jabber has his back against the floor again, Lovely flush against his throat and Zanka’s boots planted firmly over both his wrists.
“Wha—?”
“Ya were sloppy as hell today, man,” Zanka hums, stepping down harder. Jabber moans, unashamed. It feels like he’s dying. “Same trick over and over, and ya thought I wouldn’ ever think of a counterback? Lame as fuck,” he curses him, and Jabber watches in real time as his hands and neck spam briefly, but don't stiffen.
“Ya—ya brought an antidote… to my poison fest?” He’s gasping now. Very close to falling through an edge that will put them both in an uncomfortable position. Not that Jabber wouldn't let Zanka out him in all types of uncomfortable positions.
“Can't let ya and ‘Kira get too comfortable, now can I? I… need my trainin’ dummy and my second favorite girl in da world to be in top condition,” he seems to take a moment to consider his next words before rasping: “How else would I get any fun ‘round here, yea’?”
His poisons and neurotoxins are homemade, so to get an antidote, Zanka must have made it himself.
Jabber is smiling so wide his cheeks hurt.
“Ya think I'm fun now, sweetheart, ya should try me with less clothes,” he teases, and doesn't bother holding back a sigh as Zanka's heel digs further into his torso.
“Ya had to make it weird, didn’ ya, ya bizarre little freak,” Zanka grimaces, an expression completely at odds with how intense his eyes are on Jabber, and the way heat creeps to his face until he's as pink as a peach.
“Shit babe, keep going, that’s so hot.”
“Ya should be on a list dude. Like for real.”
“Fuck yea’” Jabber grins, blood in his teeth and jaw aching. “Are ya taking names? I'm down for any of the options on kiss, marry, kill.”
“Can’t ya just—?” Zanka scoffs, and instead of finishing the sentence, he just kicks down at Jabber's head.
Jabber passes the fuck out.
When he comes back to consciousness he's at his room in the Raiders’ secondary base, and Kiko must have gone against his wishes again because he barely feels in pain. He checks, and sure enough his bones are fine and dandy, and his body all pierced together. All the scars are there, of course, otherwise he would be tearing some throats off with his teeth, but the injuries are long gone. Jabber can't even feel their ache. What a fucking waste of Zanka's violence.
Briefly, he wonders how Zanka would feel knowing someone else has technically killed Jabber a few times over. He knows that he would rather finish the job that let Kiko anywhere near Zanka with that damn scalpel of hers.
Teeth bared into a smile and cradling the new scar on his jaw, he's sure his man would feel the same. Damn, maybe he will tell Zanka next time, how exactly it is that Jabber can spring back into fighting so often. Just to see what the Cleaner may do.
Maybe he will kidnap Jabber and force him to heal naturally. That could be fun. Funnier if it involves a bit more torture and maybe some shackles.
Damn, can he go tell him now?
Sitting up in his unmade bed, his attention is redirected to he notices he's still in his ragged, bloody clothes, and that Mankira shiny as fuck on his fingers, is the cleanest part of him by far.
(Though he notices idly that he's not as grimy as Kiko usually leaves him, no crust in his eyes or dried blood on his nose and mouth. His hands, too, are wiped clean, the small cuts on the joins of his fingers oily with long-applied ointments to prevent inflammation that he's well aware Kiko doesn't need or care about).
(He wonders if maybe he got to the base already cared for, and Kiko healed him herself just to spite him.)
(Food for thought, and all of that. Or poison in Kiko’s food, to give her something to think about next time.)
Anyway.
“Ya don't like him more than ya do me, right girl?” He asks Mankira softly, pressing his palms against his chin and his fingers against his mouth. Mankira hums softly, warming his hands pleasantly. “Good. Ya can like him, I like him, but I gotta remain yer favorite, yea’? Don't go ‘round breakin’ my heart.”
Pleasant tingles creep up his arms, and Jabber laughs.
“‘kay, ‘kay, I get it,” he huffs, dropping his hands and letting himself fall back on the bed. “He sure is something tho’, right?”
Electricity, faint but there.
“Yea’. Bastard. Can't believe he flirted with ya, but he won't give me the time of the day!” Buzzing. She's laughing at him. “Not funny! He's practically married to his stick, ya looooove that thing, and now you two have something going on, too? Can't believe I'm the one being left out of the polycule. I should, like, protest or somethin’!” More buzzing, then bone-deep, impossible warmth. “‘kay. No protest then. How would I even go about that anyway, right? Not like I can deny any of ya a damn thing,” he sighs. “Still. What a bummer, man.”
He threads his hands through his hair, recalling the way Zanka's voice had sounded saying wild girl, how his eyes had looked when Mankira pierced through his flesh, pain creeping in but not entirely consuming the awe. It was the exact way people should react to Mankira, who was both herself and also the physical manifestation of his soul. It was nice. It was baffling, too.
He knew Zanka was freaky about Vital Instruments. Rumors went around fast in the Ground, and most of them pointed at Zanka being the one to go if your Instrument was having any kind of problem. He seemed to connect with them faster than anyone, and sure as fuck was very interested on them, though on none more than his stick. Ongoing bets among Givers would be settled the day Zanka decided to confess if he just tucked her in his bed or if he read her a story too.
And Jabber was well acquaintanced with Zanka's care routine for her, having seen him polish and lacquer her; having come back to consciousness several times to him lavishing praise at her. He knew Zanka didn't play about his Lovely Asistaff.
And now Mankira was getting a similar treatment.
Fuck, Jabber wanted some, too!
He was wild too! He deserved to be looked at with bedroom eyes and fully grinned at! Fuck, Mankira has been inside of Zanka, both his body and even his mouth, now he thinks about it! And Zanka has been putting his hands all over her lately—!
Not fair! Not fair at all!
That man better treat him right next time, or Jabber would have to resort to extreme measures!
In his hands, Mankira buzzes, but he feels her laughter in his chest, sharp as a knife and warm as blood. His girl.
Their girl.
Yeah, that sounds about right.
After that, it keeps happening.
“Eager much, beautiful?” When the Raiders attack a transport the Cleaners are watching, Jabber going right for Zanka and a swipe of Mankira missing millimeters away from his face. Zanka beats him, and when Jabber wakes he has five broken ribs, a femur, and the tarnish on Mankira's fifth ring he was going to take care of that night is gone as if it was never there to begin with.
(Also, all of his wounds are disinfected and dressed, his face and hands wiped clean of blood and the dust he ate, but that's another matter entirely)
“Woah, ya look different today, darlin’. New poison? That pinkish hue looks incredible on ya.” When the Cleaners interrupt a Raider mission and find Jabber halfway through shedding some random low-level goon that got too handsy with undercover Momoa, Mankira so deep in the guy's guts it's poking through his back, the new poison—because of course Zanka noticed—quite literally evaporating his blood as it falls on her. Zanka's team leader gives him a nasty side eye for the heady comment, but it's Jabber who jumps him for it.
Jabber wins, and injects Zanka with the poison, admiring how the hue looks against the softer pink of Zanka's fevered skin and the deep red of his blood as it pours from his eyes and ears.
(And if he stays there with him the whole time Zanka writes in pain on the ground, carding his hands through his sweaty hair and making sure he gets back to the Cleaner's HQ afterwards instead of injecting himself as well, that's nobody's business but his own.)
Over and over again: they find each other, they beat the shit out of each other, Jabber tastes the sharpness of Lovely Asistaff’s staff, Zanka savors a kiss of steel and poison from Mankira. Jabber calls for Zanka, Zanka flirts with Mankira, Mankira sings for Lovely Asistaff, and Lovely—well, Jabber doesn't know what Lovely is thinking, as the routine settles. With how hard she collided against him, it must be something sweet.
One time, when Jabber wins and Zanka is too out of it to remember, he gets his answer: he reaches for Lovely Asistaff, the palm of his hand settling propertarily over her shaft. Lovely burns him in a flicker of bright, blue fine, and while someone else might think that's not a good reaction, not comparing the oozing heat that Mankira gives off when Zanka reaches for her, Jabber understands: Lovely gets him, and his quest for pain. What's more, she's giving him a taste of what she and Zanka are cooking, because Jabber is certain the flames are new.
Blue fire, searing against Jabber's skin.
Zanka has finally come into his powers.
Jabber grins, the smile so wide it makes his cheeks hurt for hours afterwards, the tips of his fingers singed where they still hold onto Lovely. Hope it leaves a mark, Jabber thinks, and then, when the flicker becomes a single, small promise of a flame, stable for all of five seconds, and Mankira reacts as if trying to absorb it, to bring it into herself: our girls work so well together.
Their girls. That feels right. Perfect. His smile becomes even wider, testing at the edges, happiness so great it makes him see stars.
Or maybe it's the broken jaw, who knows?
(And if Jabber takes advantage of his nerves getting almost fried to also run his hands through Zanka's fine, silky hair again while the other boy too out of it to mock him for it, the sensation sending shivers all over his body, then that's nobody's business but his own)
Much later on, they are flat on their backs in an abandoned building, spent and beaten to hell and back. Zanka won, but Jabber remained conscious, so he's well aware of one of Zanka's hands absentmindedly playing with the rings on his left fingers. His hands are surprisingly soft, though even his thoughtless motions carry a fierceness that Jabber is unable to ignore. Like he could break every single one of his digits in a single pull out of nowhere if he wanted. Zanka being Zanka, he probably could.
Obviously, Makira purrs contently about the ministrations, Jabber's body gooey with warmth and comfort as well. He can feel Zanka's oddly cold fingers, their careful caress, right under his skin, inside of his bones, in the fibres of every muscle. And Zanka knows he can, because he has his face angled his way, icy blues digging into the core of his being; because there was nothing casual or accidental about the way he had laid Lovely down on Jabber's chest before reaching for his left hand.
So it's Jabber's right hand that remains closed over Lovely Asistaff’s shaft, smoking lazily and beating like a heart due to the pain. It's peaceful. He wonders how that feels for Zanka. With the way he blinks so slowly, it must be good.
“Marry,” Zanka says sleepily.
“Mm?"
“If yer still down for any of the options, ya know, in kiss, marry, kill. Guess I would pick ya to marry.”
“Oh.”
“I would pick ya for the other two, too. But later.”
“Marry, kiss, kill?”
“...yea’.”
“Kinda romantic, Zan-Zan. Didn't know ya had it in ya.”
Zanka stares for a while longer
“I don’ think I did, before,” he says, fingers squeezing Jabber's hand, eyes on his, blue as the sky. Jabber feels his heartbeat speed up, shivers up his spine as Lovely becomes heavier on top of him, settling him before he can even start to freak out. “‘Suppose yer kinda special, freak. Not just assa’ head case study.”
Jabber blushes. “And so ya finally compliment me, uh? Almost made me think ya didn't like me, pretty boy.”
Zanka lifts Jabber's hand to his mouth, and it's something, the way he doesn't kiss his knuckles, where Mankira lays, but the center of his palm, hollow and now made full, and then his wrist, right over where his pulse thrums madly.
“I don’ like ya,” Zanka says, pointedly. And then, “dumbass.”
“Yea’” Jabber chokes out. “That… sounds about right.”