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“Hey man,” Gris says one day while they’re in a bar deep in the underbelly of Hole Town. He takes a long look at the cigarette held loosely in Enjin’s hand, his fourth one tonight, and says, “Don’t you think it’s time to lay off the cigs?”
Enjin only smiles and continues smoking.
It’s not like he doesn’t understand the concern. The Ground is littered with all sorts of waste and garbage, they fight trash beasts, he’s already an alcoholic and a womanizer so why add nicotine dependence to the mix — yadah yadah, he’s heard it all from Semiu already.
Enjin doesn’t really need another pollutant for his immune system to worry about, yeah?
But aside from nicotine being a much needed coping mechanism in this craptastic world, what with the stress that comes from being a Cleaner and a Giver, there’s a dirtier reason for his recent uptake in smoking.
“I can’t,” Enjin replies after another slow drag off his cigarette, an answer to Gris and to his own traitorous desire. He catches the eye of a lady across the bar amidst the puff of cloud white, and holds her gaze in invitation.
Gris directs a mildly judgemental gaze at him, but thankfully doesn’t inquire further. They’re in this dingy bar after all, where alcohol and sin frequently intertwine. There’s far worse things than knowing the taste of another person.
“You’re a grown man, Enjin, but this is another habit you need to wean off,” the man sighs as soon as the distinct sound of heels approach their table. The girl is getting closer now, and under the fluorescent lights it’s so much easier to see her facial features. Pretty. Striking. Classic ash-blonde and blue eyes. A winning combo.
“You should think of the kids.” And here, Enjin smiles with his teeth on full display.
“What, are you my mother now?” He pushes his still full mug of beer closer to Gris, smirking. “You can't go clubbing in a place called Hole Town without, ya know,” and then wags his eyebrows at the other man.
Enjin ignores the scandalized gasp that follows as he stands up to greet his latest guest, and the heat in his belly almost feels like a betrayal.
“See ya,” Enjin exhales as he drops a few coins on the table, already hiding behind the safety of his many vices. “My treat. Don’t tell Semiu, okay?”
Gris finally takes the offered beer, looking exasperated. “Don’t do something you’ll regret,” he says to Enjin, hand raised in a half salute, before parting.
His words ring harshly in Enjin’s ears, and the coolness of the outside air does not dissipate even as his sides get squished by this eager and willing body.
Enjin slightly bends down to squint at this stranger.
The girl he’s taking to a hotel tonight is beautiful and slender, like all the women he’s been with these past few weeks, wearing skintight black and blue. Her hair is straight, her smile blood red.
Wrong shade and shape of body, Enjin thinks to himself, chewing lazily on his bottom lip, but it will do. The nightlife is perfect for masking pesky details like these.
There is a small tug on his jacket sleeve, coquettish and sweet, and Enjin willingly lets himself be distracted.
“Hey,” he says as he stubs out his cigarette on a nearby wall, casually trading one addiction for another.
“Hey,” she purrs back in his ear, too bright and perky, and all at once Enjin kisses her silent. There’s something awfully pathetic in the rush and desperation of Enjin’s movements, in the sudden insistent way he gets her moving — but the sound and diction isn’t similar at all. The accent he’s grown fond of? Non-existent.
They stumble inside the nearest hotel like this, with Enjin trying his damndest to keep her quiet. There is a tiny tingle of guilt at the back of his head, for the blatant way he’s using this stranger, but the deep-seated relief is so much stronger that Enjin can’t quite help himself.
This is how he finds himself on all fours, more beast than man, eating up all the half-spoken sighs and murmurs that could shatter the illusion.
And when Enjin further immerses himself into this act the softness is then replaced by firm muscle, the cheap studs transforming into dangling tassels. The skillful kiss slowly becomes sweet and clumsy — until Enjin finds himself kissing Zanka Nijiku instead.
Zanka, who is decidedly not singing him praises in the seedier parts of Hole Town.
Zanka, who is greedy and ambitious, though Enjin privately thinks that he should be greedier yet. Delicate in some parts, but not fragile. His subordinate that was thrown carelessly to the bottom of a well, and one that Enjin has diligently safeguarded until he is no longer so broken.
Zanka Nijiku. Seventeen.
Underage.
“F-Fuck,” Enjin’s hips suddenly stutter in surprise, his stomach clenching. The thick haze of cigarettes, clinging desperately to this wordless sex, is no longer enough for him to hide in.
It’s one thing to dream. Everyone does that.
It is another to be outpaced by it.
It’s official.
Enjin is fucked.
”How was last night?” Gris disparagingly asks from behind the steering wheel, and Enjin groans sluggishly from the passenger seat. Outside the jagged peaks of Hole Town grow distant, their distinct sharp edges blurring into the late afternoon sun as soon as Gris steps harder on the pedal.
”Don’t ask!” There’s a hint of panic in his voice. Enjin makes a move to light up a cigarette before remembering last night, and despairs. “Who asks about other people’s conquests anyway?!”
Rudo, who they picked up alongside Dear and Guita from a nearby village, quickly grows curious.
“Whaddya mean by conquests?” He pipes up, voice unnecessarily loud in the cramped space. “Did Enjin hunt a wild animal or something last night? Can we come?”
Umm, no.
“No,” Enjin says at the same time as Gris, who nearly swerves their beat-up van onto a nearby road sign. “Rudo, please… please don't ask any more questions. Especially while Gris is driving.”
The boy grumbles and squawks in response, Dear and Guita stirring into wakefulness on either side of him. Enjin at least has the grace to say sorry, like a good adult. Then there’s a kick aimed at the back of his seat, this time from an even more diminutive child (it’s Dear), and it’s so easy to just laugh it away. It's simple entertainment after all, harmless, the kind Enjin’s been craving since the first time he became aware of his… issues.
The moment he thinks that, a whisper of Zanka’s name greets the space in their small van. Enjin instantly snaps back into focus. Fixates at the sound of it.
“—anka said that I’m improving, so it can’t be a maturity issue!” He hears Rudo complain, voice muffled by a sluggish and irate-looking ten-year-old boy. Guita has settled back to sleep beside them, unbothered. “He didn't even yell at me too much yesterday!”
“Uh, Rudo,” Gris hesitates, throwing a desperate glance at Enjin’s direction. Help me, his eyes seemed to say. “You’re too young to know, that’s all. Though congrats on finally getting along with Zanka.”
(And ah, Zanka.)
(The nucleus of Enjin’s issues.)
(His heart.)
All it took was one throwaway line, and suddenly all of his efforts to move on and forget were crushed useless.
“...How’s that guy doing by the way?” Enjin finally remembers to ask, mindlessly twirling his cigarette between his fingers. He holds it up to the light, eyes it with a kind of hunger he finds frightening. Enjin wants to smoke so badly right now. “How’s Zanka?”
Gris answers, looking relieved at the change of topic. “You haven’t seen him for a while, right? Zanka is fine. He’s as hardworking as ever.”
“My bad, I was busy with work,” Enjin lies, as if that would explain the miasma of sex and smoke these past few weeks. “Tell me he’s getting some rest at least.”
“He does, though that’s because Riyo has him on a tight leash right now,” Gris admits wryly. “She threatened to shave off his eyebrows the other day.”
That gets him to throw back his head and laugh. It’s loud and a little too much, and Enjin muses if he’s being obvious. If they can sniff his sin from his actions alone.
Perhaps Rudo has an inkling, with the way his stare scorches a hole through his back.
”You know Enjin,” the Sphereite says after a while, his nose wrinkling, “you should really go see Zanka. He, umm, misses you. I think.”
“What, me?” Enjin twists his head to look at Rudo, feeling incredulous and just a little bit giddy. His cigarette carelessly falls outside the window, pure white quickly trampled beneath sepia dust. “What makes you say that?”
Rudo opens his mouth, then closes it again. It doesn’t take a genius to know that he’s uncomfortable. That Rudo regrets saying anything to him in the first place.
But Enjin is going insane with the weight of his cravings, of his guilt and this small, tender feeling he’s quite afraid to acknowledge. He’d be a fool to let such a rare opportunity go.
“What did you mean by that?” The older man presses, a little more forcefully now. Enjin is thankful that he can still maintain an affable tone, his question sounding friendly instead of dirty and lecherous. Predatory. “Did Zanka tell you that?”
Does he think of me, Enjin wants to know so badly, as much as I think of him?
No one responds at first. Then slowly, with a bitterness that surprises even him, Rudo answers, “No.”
“But Zanka’s, well, he’s always looking far away,” he continues, clearly reluctant, “or at your room every time we pass by it.” Enjin shouldn’t think about what that means. He shouldn’t. “He does this even during our training sessions together.”
“Careful,” Enjin finds himself saying, greedy, trying to fish for more. “You make it sound like I'm his favourite.”
“And he’d be right.” Gris suddenly interrupts with a laugh, unaware of the cracks forming in his colleague’s self-restraint. He’s a good man, Enjin has to remind himself. He is. He is.
“You have Zanka tamed, don’t you?”
“Do you really think so,” Enjin says as his world quietly breaks apart. He tries not to think of Zanka and tamed in the same sentence together. Desperately begs his dick to do the same.
“I really don’t see why Enjin should get special treatment.” This time he can plainly see Rudo’s face from the rearview mirror, scowling something fierce.
He’s jealous, Enjin thinks, forgetting to be virtuous, and then ruthlessly crushes the brief feeling of superiority it gives him.
But it’s nice. To know he’s missed.
To know that Zanka is still looking.
See, Enjin is a good man. He looks out for his team, (sometimes) pays for people’s drinks, and is usually a well-regarded gentleman by the ladies (in the red light district).
But even good men have their limits.
In the ensuing silence, broken occasionally by the sound of their van groaning on uneven terrain, Enjin feels strangely contemplative. There is little else to do in the undisturbed quiet, his teeth aching for something raw to bite.
You have Zanka tamed, Gris had said some time ago, and Enjin thinks back to that tiny creature he found at the bottom of a well in Kamuatari District. Small and thin, like he’d break from the faintest breeze, only to watch Zanka furiously crawl through muck and garbage on their way to headquarters.
He misses you, Enjin shamelessly savours Rudo’s words, playing it on repeat — and then just like that a seed had grown and sprouted in the back of his mind. Something wicked. Something immoral.
Because perhaps… perhaps it’s not too wrong. Not when Zanka is so pretty. Slender and elegant and strong, which he can’t always see past his inferiority complex, too content to hide under the safety of mediocrity. Zanka’s good work ethic. His drive to be better. His dreams.
They are all charming to Enjin. Cute, even.
And then there’s that slim waist, perfect for his hands to hold. A graceful neck that warrants a second look. Even though he’s eleven years younger and a man, everything about Zanka calls out to Enjin, stimulating an instinct to hunt. To give chase.
To bite.
“What sharp teeth you have,” Semiu had said the first time he brought Zanka to their headquarters, and Enjin knows that it can be so much sharper — him with his piercing nails and his aching jaw, longing to feel the fullness of Zanka’s muscles and his rabbit-quick pulse, tasting the guarded sweetness hidden beneath cloth and armor.
Despite Enjin’s best efforts, there’s this rot they call love right at the epicenter of his body, sandwiched between a smoker’s lungs and an alcoholic’s liver, growing fiercely despite his own neglect. You can’t, Enjin tells himself all the damn time, ever since the first time he truly saw Zanka. Not as a tender bud that grows in soft soil after the awaited spring, but as a weed or some other hardy plant that perseveres in the small cracks of asphalt or concrete.
Over time you can’t becomes you shouldn’t, and here he is now, contemplating if he can (Enjin will) over Zanka (underage, seventeen).
So Enjin is good (or mostly good), but his teeth are too sharp and wolfish for a man who claims to be righteous.
Then the van stops. And he’s home.
So he waits. He plans.
Enjin immediately scrubs himself clean as soon as they arrive back at headquarters, removing any evidence of his misbehaviour from the past few days.
He trades his Cleaner jacket for his well-worn red sweater, his steel-toe boots for more comfortable footwear. He’s a wolf disguised in the attire of a softer creature, lying low, pretending.
“Enjin!” Riyo is the first one to greet him. There’s a skip in her steps as she rushes to his side, a sign of a recent job well done. “You’re finally back!”
Enjin laughs, easily matching her energy. “Heya Riyo! What’s gotten into you?”
“Zanka’s been moping ever since you left for your assignment,” Riyo dutifully reports, her smirk softening into a fond smile. “You should really go see him! He’s been driving everyone crazy, especially Rudo.”
“I heard,” Enjin turns to the side to hide his pleased expression, coughing. “Where is he anyway?”
Riyo jabs a finger behind her, pointing to a door situated at the end of the hallway. “Zanka’s in his room right now.”
“Oh?” Enjin breathes, a flicker of excitement warming his face. “That’s good then. Makes it easier for me to see him.”
Riyo grins, gifting a lamb to his table. She doesn’t suspect a thing. “Get to it then,” she says, already turning around to face the other Cleaners, adding, “it’s the least you can do for us at HQ!”
So Enjin walks, his slippers silently maneuvering past exhausted workers loitering in the hallway. He’d rather run the short distance, chasing after the smell of incense and the faint tang of homesickness the runaway Nijiku unknowingly parts with. However, doing so would shatter the last of his self-control, so he doesn't.
He’s already breaking so many of his rules tonight. Enjin doesn’t need to add another.
Then the door to Zanka’s room is in sight. Enjin raises his fist and knocks, leaving a thump thump sound on breakable wood. He does this once. Twice.
“Riyo!” An angry voice yells out after the third knock, followed by an audible huff. “I told you I’m not gonna let yer scissors anywhere near my face!”
“Sorry to disappoint, but I’m not Riyo,” Enjin loudly calls out before giving an exaggeratedly sad sigh, and the door immediately slams open, narrowly missing his nose.
“S-Sorry!” Enjin’s gaze slowly travels downwards, his lips upturned, carefully tracing that fair skin and over that pale and markless neck. Ambient light spills out from the room, highlighting Zanka’s tense and lovely face in pale amber as he peers outside the door.
It’s Zanka, the real one, and it is so much better than some illusion or distant memory.
“I didn’t know it was you,” Zanka begins, fingers anxiously tugging at his dark blue robe. His usually neat hair is in disarray, his earrings swinging wildly from his rush to the door. “Riyo’s been runnin’ around with her scissors lately, so…”
Enjin takes an imperceptible step forward. “It’s okay,” he says soothingly, tucking a wayward strand of hair behind the younger man’s ear. “Hi.”
Zanka flushes and directs him a beaming smile, and then grimaces. “Hello Enjin,” he tries to say coolly, thin arms crossed over his chest. “I hope work went well. Especially since it took ya a whole month.”
“I guess you could say that,” Enjin mutters dryly as he steps even closer, savouring the small twitch it brings. “By the way,” he adds, a hint of mirth creeping into his voice, “I’ve heard news that a certain someone has been sulking ever since I left headquarters.”
“Would you happen to know anything about that, Zanka?”
“What,” the other man pauses, looking bewildered, before the realisation sets in. “What! Who told you that?!”
“Heh, a little birdie told me,” Enjin answers cheerfully, clearly enjoying himself. “Or a I guess several little birdies? Though I don’t think Rudo would appreciate being called that.”
“And I’m sure the other one is Riyo, because that woman exists solely to torment me.” Zanka doesn’t seem too impressed, sounding a little snide.
“Ah,” Enjin says. “But you didn’t deny it.”
“B-Because it’s not true!” The other man snaps back, scowling. Then, “Also, I do not sulk!”
“It’s okay to miss me, Zanzan,” Enjin outright ignores his words, one shoulder digging uncomfortably against the wall. It takes all of his willpower to remain where he is, standing helplessly by the entrance.
“So…,” Enjin grins, watching as a strong warrior becomes the unknowing hunted, saying, “are you gonna let me in or what?”
“What are you talking about?” Zanka squints at him, as though in suspicion, a hint of pink tongue as he worries his bottom lip between his teeth. “Do you really want to go in…?”
“Of course I do,” it’s not quite a purr, but it’s close, heady and threatening. Sensing Zanka’s hesitation, Enjin bends down to make himself seem smaller in front of him. More approachable. “We can catch up inside, like the good old days.”
“Like the old days,” the younger man slowly repeats in a daze, making Enjin smile.
After all, though there is something rotten colouring his words, there’s an earnestness there, too. This is the longest they’ve been without seeing each other, and while it is not wise to be this honest, Enjin’s heart is too much of a selfish bastard — if there is an unknown part of Zanka that exists in the month he’s been gone away from headquarters, then he must naturally find it and keep it safe.
So —
“Please,” Enjin says again, and means it.
And just like that Zanka softens, tense shoulders and the slight downturn of his mouth relaxing into a more subdued arc. His eyes, trusting and blue, are focused on Enjin’s.
“Okay,” Zanka says, always too lenient with his love, too eager. He takes Enjin by the hand, leading him inside, carving his stomach clean of its meat and bones to satiate someone else’s hunger. The plain warmth against his palm is exquisite, even more addictive than the nicotine.
“Leave your slippers outside. I’ll get you a clean pair.”
Oh Zanzan, this love will shackle you, is what Enjin wants to say as he obediently removes his slippers by the door. You’ll never be free of me.
But it’s okay, he thinks after a short while, a sense of satisfaction and fondness already curling deep within his belly. I’ve been told that I’m good at taking care of things.
“Is there something wrong?”
Enjin raises his head, meeting Zanka’s perplexed eyes. The other man stalks forward, carrying open-toed slippers, and Enjin unconsciously tracks the gentle sway of his hips. Eyes the shape of his legs, straight and well-proportioned.
“You spaced out just now.”
“No, everything is fine,” Enjin smiles, baring his teeth. “Thanks for inviting me in.”
He takes the offered slippers, and as soon as they enter the room Enjin immediately slams the door closed. Unheeding of Zanka’s confusion, he advances, causing Zanka to shuffle backwards until he stumbles and falls on the bed.
“Enjin?!” Zanka asks, alarmed. “What are you doing?!”
“Are you drunk?” He tries again, fingers twisting the sheets underneath him. His eyes are dark with his fear, his uncertainty. Enjin gently cups his face, and Zanka shivers.
“No,” Enjin laughs, his thumb wiping away an unshed tear. He then sucks it clean, the taste mellow and sweet. “I swear I’ve never been more sober. No cigarette, no alcohol, no nothing.”
Zanka’s mouth twists even as his face flushes, like he couldn’t believe him. “Then why are you doing this?”
“Do I really need a complicated reason,” the words are spoken slowly, savouring the drag of each syllable. Enjin brings Zanka’s face closer to his own, fingers digging into the meat of his cheeks, his heart; acting like he couldn’t breathe without dragging Zanka’s every exhale into his own system.
“I like you,” Enjin says at last, blunt. “Isn’t that enough?”
They're quiet, the both of them. Then:
“Enjin is too forward,” Zanka quietly complains, clumsily pushing his face away. He then angrily brings a pillow closer to his face, flustered. It makes Enjin’s smile widen, a small upturn of his lips that makes his cheeks dimple.
“Anything else?” Enjin moves to nuzzle his throat, picking up the characteristic woody and fragrant scent there. “Or is that your only complaint?”
“Y-You–!” Zanka bites out, sounding furious, but the fingers that reach out to touch Enjin’s hair, tugging and untangling strands, are definitely careful. There is strength there, in his fingers, held back just enough to not be painful.
“I’m serious.” Enjin looks up, keeping Zanka close the second he feels him move away. He latches even more, muscular arms holding tight around his torso, saying, “I’m crazy about you.”
Zanka unconsciously leans into the touch, as if he couldn’t help it. “Enjin,” he mumbles into his chest, shivering faintly from the comfortable warmth — or perhaps from hearing Enjin’s heartbeat, loud and monstrous. “I’m scared.”
Zanka may be serious and steadfast, but he’s still so young. So inexperienced. A sheltered young master who only knew the physical and emotional thrills born from blade and staff, blood and steel. Regarding matters of the heart, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that Zanka is clueless.
“Don’t be, sweetheart,” Enjin murmurs, serious. “I’ll take care of you.”
And it’s true, isn’t it?
Zanka’s always been his to take care of. Since that well. Since their fateful meeting in Kamuatari District.
Carefully, Enjin tries again, asking, “Won’t you kiss me?”
“You ask for too much…,” and yet Zanka obeys, because love has made Zanka soft, thoroughly defanging him, leaving his belly vulnerable to the whims of another.
Their bodies shift once more on the small bed, Enjin squirming to accommodate him. Squeezes the flesh of Zanka’s thighs consideringly, thick tattooed fingers holding one of his legs hostage.
“You’re a terrible adult,” Zanka says hotly, the last of his walls spilling to the floor, helpless. He solemnly brings his face closer to Enjin, his little nose pink, his skin a deep, alluring red. “A complete fucking pervert.”
“Zanzan,” Enjin’s fingers travel upwards, from his thighs to the edge of his pants. “Don’t curse.”
“I’ll curse however I wa–”
Before Zanka could finish his sentence, Enjin grabs him by the collar and kisses him hard. The taste of his first kiss, innocent and honey-sweet, instantly seduces him.
Zanka obediently opens his small mouth a little wider, allowing himself to be pulled along. It is impossible to resist him like this, so Enjin doesn’t, instead sucking on his tongue and stealing the puffs of air from his slender, shaking body.
“Be good for me,” Enjin says when they finally separate for air, carrying a heavy adoration that seems incompatible with the lust that drips nakedly from his teeth. “My beautiful, strong Zanka.”
There’s an awfully pretty blush on Zanka’s cheeks as soon as he registers the praise, and damnit, damnit to hell.
There must be a limit to being perverted and greedy, because a first kiss isn’t enough. Not anymore. Enjin wants to slip his tongue deeper, closer, prying into Zanka's wet heat until he gorges himself full of his sweetheart.
“C-Can we do this some other day?” The teenager begs quietly, wetly, his lips puffy from Enjin’s kisses. Enjin moves to wipe his tears away, and the younger man lets him. “I’ll die if you continue.”
From a place where Zanka couldn't see, Enjin’s eyes had already darkened. He carefully brings one pale wrist closer, gently rubbing and squeezing the fragile skin in his palm.
"Didn’t I say I’ll take care of you," Enjin murmurs in a low voice, smiling.
“I’ll make sure to take responsibility.”
Enjin quietly leaves after a few hours, locking the door shut with one hand. He needs to get dinner for Zanka to eat, remembering the thin legs locked around his back, clinging to him.
No one pays attention to Enjin as he scurries to the kitchen, which is a relief, because all he wants to do is hurry back before Zanka wakes and sees him gone.
"Fuck," Enjin tiredly curses once he realises he took a detour to the lobby. He turns, ready to stumble back, until he catches sight of fierce, amber eyes looking at him from across the room.
They are both silent for a moment. Waiting. Then Semiu closes her eyes in defeat, saying, “What big teeth you have, you despicable scum.”
Something like a smile graces Enjin’s face. The incense on his clothes, replacing the smell of cigarette smoke, tells more than words can say.