Chapter Text
The first time they met was at a pub bar in a no-name town that Zanka happened to be in for a mission he’d just finished up, he was tired and in a worse mood than usual since the mission took a lot longer than he’d planned for.
He walked around in town looking for a place to grab a bite to satiate the hunger he’d had since before the mission when he stumbled upon a quaint looking bar, the outside of the bar was nothing special a place mostly locals or people who often visited the town would go to opposed to the busy market stalls that people there for a quick visit would go to for some food, but Zanka preferred places like this to the busy of the market.
When he walked into the place and could tell he’d chosen correctly, the inside was calming with the smell of pub-food slightly wafting through the room mixing with the tell-tale scent of different alcohols and tobacco products mixed through the air with slightly worn down but clearly well-loved variations of high-chairs and lounge chairs littering about at the bar.
It wasn’t too busy with a few clusters of people loitering in groups here and there with the occasional lonesome person in a corner drunk chatter filling the space and creating a relaxed atmosphere, some type of indie-rock playing in the background, he wouldn’t know.
He sat in one of the high-chairs at the bar and ordered the first decent looking thing on the menu along with a drink while letting his eyes roam about judging the type of people that occupied the space.
He’d just finished with his food and was nursing a second drink when he’d noticed the growing tension and shouts which had started with slightly louder tones of the average drunk but had grown to full out hostile shouting by the time he’d noticed it.
Zanka noticed one of the loners who had been sitting not far from him was standing by a group on the opposite side of the room and was clearly looking for a fight by the way he was holding himself, “tch, dumbasses will still be everywhere I guess” Zanka mumbled to himself cocking his head slightly to the left to get a better view of the ordeal happening while taking a sip of his drink and wincing at the burn following “man these fuckers make these drinks strong as hell.”
Just as he was thinking of leaving the drink the situation escalated and a shout echoed through the bar as one of the men sitting in the group shot out of their chair and punched the patron previously riling them up clean in the face.
The person flew into a table behind them which caused the table along with the chairs to crash down, the person who Zanka could now identify as male stayed down for a few seconds and promptly sprang up.
He finally got a good look at the chaos-causing patron standing there, the man was around 6 feet, caramel skin toned and seemed to be in his early twenties from what Zanka could tell, he had wicks reaching till his middle with golden cuffs threaded through them making a clicking sound as he shook his head seemingly amused and pushed some of his hair out of his face.
A shiver ran down Zanka’s spine when the man looked to his side right at him, his eyes were magenta and his pupils were slightly dilated with thrill although they held no light in them, blood running down his nose and mouth twisted in a grin, he stared for a while seemingly uninterested in the man who’d punched him mere seconds ago screaming at him then..winked at him? What the fuck? And proceeded to start a full on brawl with more people from the man’s group ganging up on him.
Zanka was an experienced fighter, he had to be one whether he wanted to or not due to the environment he grew up in, he could tell the man was a fighter too, the scars all over his body would’ve told him as much if it wasn’t for the fact he could tell because of the way the man threw and held his punches.
So why the hell is this weirdo letting these guys land hits on him?
He could’ve easily avoided every punch the group landed on him, which meant he was letting the hits land on purpose.
What kind of masochist freak is he!?
While Zanka was lost in thought the man had already beat the group and left them in a pile to collect themselves and started walking towards Zanka.
He stopped in front of Zanka who looked up at him, up close Zanka could see the man had symmetrical piercing in his brows which had slits in both, he was wearing a black sleeve-less tee which with arms down rode up his stomach exposing some of his stomach and a pair of baggy purple cargo pants which his hips poked out of.
Zanka could also see a black tattoo peeking out of his left side of his hip which stopped at right above his hip bone and black painted nails with silver rings, well cared for by the looks of it, adorning all ten of his fingers.
The man ran a tongue over his upper lip taking some of the blood that had dripped down with it and shot Zanka a cheshire grin, blood staining his teeth and eyes half-lidded he asked Zanka the question he’d least expected to come out of his mouth “can I buy you a drink?”
The man had a semi-deep and surprisingly pleasant voice “the names Jabber, Jabber Wonger.”
Fuckkk why's that attractive Zanka cursed internally, he knew he shouldn’t accept but he hadn’t found anyone this attractive for a while and it’s not like he was hurting anyone by doing so.
“Zanka” he told Jabbere who settled next to him on one of the other chairs “I like my drinks more on the less sweet side” he informed the man who only waved down the bartender who seemed to be familiar with him and ordered two drinks.
Zanka found out Jabber visited this bar occasionally when he came to run errands at the market and that he had a habit of picking fights wherever he went, he was twenty-one and had a slightly concerning love for poisons which is why he often visited this market which apparently had a steady supply of poisons brought from various parts of the ground.
Then the second surprise of the night hit Zanka was fully expecting the man to want a one-night stand or something of the sort, which he was fine with since he hadn’t gotten laid for a while anyways and had been a bit pent-up, instead of this Jabber opened his mouth and said “well I saw you and your staff sitting here and thought I should come say hi, you’re a giver aren’t you?”
“Yeah?” Zanka answered warily, confused by the sudden switch-up of excited chatter mood Jabber had been in earlier.
“You seem strong, wanna give me a good time?”
Ah there it is, this was the question Zanka was waiting for the man to ask him, he was about to answer when Jabber said “Sooo wanna fight me?” and grinned at him
Now that was not what I was thinking he was going to ask me, Zanka thought, baffled by the question.
Caught off guard, Zanka's mouth moved before his brain could catch up and said what he was previously going to answer with “Sure”.
Jabber’s grin widened impossibly at that “I knew I liked you for a reason!” he exclaimed while grabbing his wrist, Zanka barely had time to grab Lovely Assistaf before he was dragged out of the bar.
“Where the hell are we going!?” Zanka yelled at Jabber who just grinned at him and answered “somewhere we can fight!”
Man why do I always end up with the weird ones?
They arrived at an open area a little away from the town when Jabber jumped away from him and his eyes started glowing as anima surrounded his rings and he moved to a fighting stance.
Shit, of course he’s a fuckin giver, I should've realised by the fact he noticed I was one from that far away Zanka cursed himself for the second time that day as he himself activated Lovely and got into a offensive position ready for Jabber to lunge at him like he had at the group inside of the bar.
Jabbers vital instrument made Zanka pause for a moment “She’s pretty aint she” Jabber said more as a statement than anything, admiring the sharp blades on her and how clearly taken care of she was Zanka had half the mind to jump back as Jabber swiftly plunged forward with her aimed at his torso.
They were stuck in a dance like that for a while with Jabber going in with attacks while Zanka did his best to deflect the blows when he got nicked on his forearm, his body started burning up unbearably making it hard for Zanka to dodge the blows Jabber was unforgivingly dealing out.
FUCK! I should've known his vital instrument had something to do with poison with how animatedly he was talking about it earlier.
Frustrated with himself Zanka swung upwards at Jabber’s arms forcing Jabber’s arms into the air leaving his lower body unguarded, almost like a reflex Zanka brought Lovely back down and hit Jabber right between his stomach and liver.
Jabber was flung backwards by the force and hit the ground hard, he groaned in pain when he jumped back up “man you hit me nice and good right where it hurts” he moaned.
Zanka made a face at that right he’ a fucking masochist he’d forgoten with Jabber talking so happily and semi-normal earlier making him forget all about his behaviour during the fight with the group.
“C’mon man were you holding back on me all this time?”,”c’mon, c’mon hit me like that again!” Jabber whined breaking him out of his stupor.
“Fuck that you freak!” Zanka yelled pulling a face that showed clear disgust.
They exchanged blows for what seemed like hours till what was probably past midnight, Zanka was out of breath and having trouble evaiding hits when Jabber dodged past Lovely Assistaf swinging his way and “did you just-” Zanka looked down where Jabber had stabbed him in his gut “Are you kidding me”.
“Well this was fun but I do gotta be on my way, thanks for showing me a good time, we should do this more often!” Jabber jumped back and Zanka’s knees hit the ground as he clutched the gash where blood was flowing from.
Fuck I gotta close this wound
“I’ll see you around Zan-zan, remember me when you wake up k?” is what Zanka caught from the nonsense that Jabber was babbling about while his vision was blackening.
The last thing he saw before blacking out was Jabber walking towards him.