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“Yello?” Jay answered, clicking the ‘receive’ button with one hand as the other stayed on the wheel. Kai looked back, eyes leaving the window.
“Zane and Cole found the shipment. The lead we had east was a hoax. You can come back” Lloyd said, his voice slightly static from the transmission. The service in the eastern section sucked, to put it lightly.
“So…” Kai began, sitting up straight. “We’ve been chasing nothing for the past week?”
Lloyd paused, the lack of visuals preventing them from seeing his expression. “..Yeah”
Jay laughed, shaking his head as he checked the rearview mirror for cars. Nothing. “We’re comin’ back then,” He replied, hand migrating to the red button on screen.
“Alright, see ya” The blonde said, finishing his last word just as Jay clicked ‘hang up’.
Pressing his foot on the gas harder, Kai looked over with a shit-eating grin. “U-turn?”
“Oh yeah.”
Jerking the wheel to the side slamming on the gas, the car did small donuts as they screamed inside, a mix of laughter and yelps before he finally stopped turning and resumed course back home.
Kai held the door, hair in his face as he recovered. Jay was still giggling as he had to put more effort than usual to unstick his hands to the wheel.
The laughter died down, and their hands found each other after silence welcomed the car once more. That was, until Kai broke it with a charming smile, like he was about to sell him a shitty used car.
“Do it again?”
—
Leaning over the opened hood, he squinted his eyes at the engine. This wasn’t good.
“Can you hand me..” he started, trying to diagnose the problem.
Kai stood next to him expectantly, not knowing what he was looking at. “Hand you the what?”
“I uh..” Jay began again, looking back at Kai. “I don’t think I can fix this.”
The brunette gaped at him, chocolate browns staring into his soul for answers. Jay smiled sheepishly, looking back down at the smoking engine.
“The radiator fan and shroud weren’t able to keep up with the RPM when we were doing donuts, so the engine melted. Same thing with these parts. We revved too much. Oh, and I definitely can’t fix this either…” He rambled, pointing to more small parts of the car and explaining what went wrong with those too.
When he looked back at Kai, he tried not to feel flustered as the man’s pupils were dilated more than usual, a dreamy expression strewn on his face. “Kai. Were you even listening?”
“Hm?” He mumbled intelligently, smiling. “Something about RPM?”
Jay sighed, shaking his head as he pressed a kiss to Kai’s cheek. “In short, I can’t fix it.”
The other frowned, looking down at the engine. “Do you think we should radio in and ask for pickup?”
“And wait a week in this forest?” Jay asked, gesturing around to the trees surrounding them. It was late at night– yes, maybe not the most ideal time to be doing donuts without adequate lighting– and he had no plans on staying in the darkness for too long.
He loved the car, but they didn’t have more than a day’s worth of food. And he loved his boyfriend even more, but he knew that staying with him for more than a day in the same spot was destined for slight disaster.
“Yeah, that’s not an option.” Kai sighed, pursing his lips as he looked back at the car, which was now smoking. "Lloyd's gonna kill us."
Laughing-- not from amusement but rather fear-- he looked back at his boyfriend. "I'm not worried about Lloyd. I'm worried about Nya."
Kai's face paled, and he pursed his lips. "Shit. You're right."
"She's gonna kill us. This is the third time we've busted this car." Jay added, only stroking the flames of Kai's fear.
"Yeah.." He agreed, breaking his gaze away from the car. Jay watched as he tried to conjure up a solution, hoping the one he was about to say was adequate enough to actually use it to get out of here.
“Wanna start walking?”
Nevermind.
Sputtering, Jay turned to him. “Are you insane? That’ll take us a whole month!”
Kai rolled his eyes, grinning. “We could run?”
Pausing, Jay looked around before something clicked in his head. “I think I have a better idea.”
—
Kai let out a whoop, the sound drowned out by the wind.
Jay had summoned his dragon in a last minute solution to their car breaking down. The two had agreed on shifts, allowing the other to regain any lost energy from maintaining the dragon's form. If they had managed to fly off Chen’s island back to the Sam X cave, then they could totally fly back from the east.
Hoisting the reins again, he tapped Kai’s leg in an attempt to signal that he was going to do another barrel roll. Kai tightened his arms around Jay’s waist in response, and the two laughed as the dragon dipped, turning like a corkscrew.
After he tightened the reins to stabilize the dragon, he breathed out a sigh. Kai’s arms didn’t loosen, and he leaned back against the warmer chest. The wind was appreciated, but after a while it began to get cold. Thank god for the fire elemental, or he was pretty sure he’d eventually get hypothermia in the air.
“I thought you were afraid of heights?” He asked, scooting closer.
Kai scoffed, the sound audible now that Jay’s ear was much closer to his mouth. “This is different.”
“Yeah, sure,” Jay offered, earning him a small punch to the shoulder.
“Hey!”
“This is different.”
—
“Jay! Jay!” Kai yelled over the wind, causing Jay to redirect his attention to the boy behind him.
The brunette pointed a finger down below, shifting his gaze to the ground as he tried to pinpoint what the man was showing him.
“There’s a McDonalds.” He explained, the light in his eyes brighter than ever.
Jay found it, the bright yellow M shining up like it was an oasis in the desert. “Oh hello” He grinned, his stomach suddenly reminding him that it existed as small vibrations moved throughout his body.
“Wanna go?” Kai yelled again, trying to beat the wind in terms of volume. Jay turned back to the boy, a smile evident on his face.
“Do I ever??”