#the others have gotten very good at translating him skskskddkfj

[hum--hallelujah]

don't want to kill time like it doesn't matter - 3.5k words, (platonic) funkobra hurt/comfort

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Ghoul is actually younger than Kobra. They always forget it though.

At least, they usually do.

Kobra's stopped shooting upright and reaching for his blaster whenever someone wakes him up at night. Stopped two years ago, honestly, when him and Ghoul started sharing a room. That was a collective decision that is very much not discussed. It left the old office as a perfect room for the Girl, in the end. Between Ghoulie and Girlie, the former of whom has wild, sleepless tendencies and the latter liking to scramble her way into bed with somebody else every other night of the week, Kobra's knee-jerk reaction has become more of a lack of reaction.

"Yo," hisses a pitchy voice. It's dead daylight, the heat of the day. This is the time of the year when you sleep while the sun's up, wait until the darkness falls to do anything or else it's too miserable or too dangerous. "Kobes."

Kobra utters a verbose "Hrrmngg?" and rolls over. He cracks an eye open to see Ghoul standing at the end of his bed. If it hadn't been light out, he'd be doing a good job of living up to his name. His hands are shaking, but when aren't they?

"You good, man?" Kobra asks groggily. He's half awake, half asleep, drifting in between the two states of being. Ghoul is shifting his weight back and forth on his feet. It makes the floor creak. It makes him look even smaller than he is. "Ghoulie?" He mumbles again when he gets no reply.

Ghoul makes a noncommittal half-whispered sound. "Wanna go for a joyride?" He asks instead of an answer.

Kobra blinks himself more fully awake and pushes up on one elbow. "Mirage or the 'Am?"

Ghoulie shrugs. Won't meet his eyes. Oh shit, that's not good. Something's got him worked up. It's too late for this. This is why they share a room now. They didn't used to, but Kobra refuses to let him sleep alone anymore. Kobra knows how he got that wicked scar that runs from the corner of his mouth nearly to his eye.

"Either," Ghoul says. "Doesn't matter much to me."

"Mirage," Kobra decides. He'll never say no to a late-night joyride. Not this kind. Party'll have his neck for sneaking out on the bike without letting anyone know, but the 'Am is too conspicuous when strange crews are out and from the look of him, riding double on the motorcycle will be good for Ghoul.

It's still too hot to be out. But going for a spin won't take too much exertion, getting to someplace with shade, so long as it's away from here, won't take too long. Ghoul's gonna get sunscorched. Maybe that's the point. While Kobra covers up with his jacket, Ghoul is still in the loose, half-covering clothes he sleeps in.

The sun glints painfully off the sand when they climb quietly out the window. No reason trying to get past Party when they've got an exit right here. Ghoul clambers out first with a probably accidental but surprisingly graceful roll and then flinches, violently, when Kobra jacket catches on what's left of the glass in the window and he tumbles haphazardly to the ground. They both hold still for a long dozen seconds, Kobra staring at the diner wall and straining to tell if anyone heard them, and Ghoul staring at Kobra and shaking.

When Party doesn't come along, eyes glinting with annoyed amusement, and yell at them for sneaking out, Kobra sits up and checks the hem of his jacket where it caught on the sharp edge. "Great," he mutters when he sees the tear in the lining. He'll have to sew that back together later. "Ghoul, you good?"

Ghoul shrugs and stands up. "Aren't I always?"

"No."

They stare at each other for a few seconds while Kobra rubs his palms together to clear the sand off them and reaches into his pocket for his gloves. "You're wearing a helmet," he says flatly.

Ghoul rolls his eyes and sneers. It crinkles the scar running up his face. "No way."

"Fine." Kobra doesn't push. Half the time he doesn't even wear his helmet. He's the driver. He'll keep them safe. It was worth a try, though. "Come on."

The heavy bay door of the garage makes too much noise to open without being caught. They slip in the side door and Kobra brings Mirage carefully back through it. He wears a helmet this time. Ghoul stands and waits, bouncing impatiently on the balls of his feet, while Kobra starts the bike and, out of habit, does a couple checks.

"You ready?" Kobra says, with the visor of his helmet flipped up.

Ghoul grins, but it's lacking in heart. So often, Kobra thinks he's not all there. So often, Kobra thinks this is his best friend. "Born that way," he replies.

"Come on then," Kobra says and nods for Ghoul to get on the bike with him. "Hey, hey. Hey, Ghoulie-" he says, when Ghoul is standing right at his shoulder, about to throw a leg over Mirage and climb on. "You okay?" He asks again, because he needs to know how safe any of this is.

Ghoul doesn't respond. Just settles himself behind Kobra and wraps his arms, tight, around Kobra's middle. Kobra stays there a second, until he's sure Ghoul's grip is solid, so that he can feel Ghoul breathing against his back, before he kicks off. He doesn't care if Party and Jet wake up now, they won't catch them. The bike's tires kick up a fountain of sand as he spins a loop, leaning into the turn until Mirage tilts close enough to the ground that Kobra could touch the sand if he reached out. Ghoul asked for a joyride. This is that.

"What the hell, man?!" Ghoul yells over Kobra's shoulder, muffled by the engine noise and his helmet. Kobra feels Ghoul's hands grab at the fabric of his shirt as he pulls around the first turn, bringing them around the back of a sand dune at full speed.

"Trust me?" Kobra shouts back. He's getting into it now, relaxing into each wide, showy swerve and fishtail. He slows down just a bit when he can feel Ghoul's fingernails start to bite into his skin. It makes him edgy when Ghoul is like this.

Ghoul sniffs sharply. "Well, yeah, but I've seen you crash out enough times at the track-"

"Aw, shut up," Kobra snaps back, without venom. Ghoul's his mechanic. He's seen his best wins and worst losses. "Where you wanna go?" He asks, after a few random turns, just drifting around in the sand. Ghoul is quiet. Kobra reaches back with one hand and smacks him on the leg after awhile. "Ghoulie, where we goin'?"

"I'm thinki-" Ghoul cuts himself off and when he speaks again his voice is flat and so quiet Kobra has to strain to hear him. "Turn right up here."

There's the remains of a road cutting across their path and Kobra hops Mirage up onto it, swings right and follows the pavement. Ghoul's grip around his chest has loosened, but Kobra can feel the fast, shallow rhythm of his breathing and the shaking of his hands even still. The road goes on for ages, long enough that it starts to feel infinite. This must have been a highway, back before the wars and BL/ind. At some point, Ghoul leans forward and puts his forehead against the back of Kobra's neck. Kobra can feel him pressed just below where his helmet sits.

"Get off at this turn," Ghoul mumbles suddenly, but not soon enough because Kobra completely overshoots the exit. He flips around the empty lanes of the highway, admittedly showing off mostly just to make himself feel better.

The group of buildings along the former highway off-ramp isn't really a ghost town. It's a cluster of old stores and restaurants, like the diner but mass produced, and down at the end is an ancient truck stop and gas station. Kobra slows the bike to a crawl as they drive down the street, struck with an eerie sense of deja vu. He's been here before. They both have.

He pulls over and stops in the middle of the road, beside what used to be a coffee store. Coffee is usually made in the form of compressed, dried out shots now, called Motor Juice in the Zones when rehydrated. They don't have coffeeshops in the City. They have prescriptions.

Ghoul is off the bike and Kobra's back suddenly cold even under the heat of the sun before Mirage even comes to a full stop. "Ghoul-" Kobra snaps, angry for reasons he can't even say and unsettled in ways he doesn't want to. This is a ghost town. Just not in the normal way. "Ghoul. What are you-"

But Ghoul is walking away, his back to Kobra and the bike as he moves toward the gas station as if it's a magnet and he's the blade of a knife, trembling so hard with the pull that it might break. Kobra hesitates, then swings his leg over Mirage and bumps out the kickstand. Ghoul is standing stock still, or as still as he can, on the faded pavement of the gas station parking lot. Kobra's glad it's faded. He doesn't want to see the bloodstains.

Ghoul looks small as he approaches, absolutely miniscule. He's got his arms wrapped tight around himself and Kobra can hear the harshness of his breathing even from several strides away. He doesn't want to get too close too fast. Ghoul's enough like a wild animal that it could turn out badly, and Kobra for once really doesn't want to fight him today. Not out here, at least.

They're within two years of each other, Kobra and Ghoul. They usually forget they're not the same age. But right now Ghoul looks so small and so, so young and Kobra doesn't know what to do.

"Gh- Ghoul. Ghoulie." Kobra calls carefully, stumbling over his tongue. He clamps his teeth together, takes a deep breath. "Ghoul."

Ghoul doesn't turn, doesn't look away from the door into the gas station he'd been found in, back when Kobra and Poison and Jet were a crew of three and Ghoul'd been even more feral than he is now. The gas station where Ghoul watched his entire family die and he was helpless to do anything about it. He still thinks he hadn't done enough. Kobra knows that. Ghoul always thinks he didn't do enough. That one kid with a blaster and wild eyes could take down a full squad of Dracs and two Crows.

Kobra doesn't know how to tell him that if he'd tried, he would be dead too. Kobra doesn't know how to tell him he's glad he didn't. When it comes down to it most, Kobra finds he can't speak.

"Ghoulie," he says again. "Hey. Hey." He moves closer, pulls off the helmet he'd almost forgotten he still has on. "Ghoul," he tries, one more time, as gently as he knows how even though it's not that gentle. He's never been good at this. Some of the scars scattered across Ghoul's body are from him. But Kobra had stitched up Ghoul's face and he's not going to give up now.

Ghoul finally turns and Kobra breathes a sigh of relief. Just a response. Proof of life even though he's still standing. And then Ghoul steps toward him and suddenly he's right there, shaking but otherwise just as eerily still as this entire place, like he's trapped in frozen time just like the rest of it, and he collides with Kobra's chest in a way that's both surprising and yet entirely expected.

"Oh." Kobra drops his helmet, dangling from one hand, and his arms hover uncertainly in the air for a moment before he carefully closes them around Ghoul. "Oh. Okay. Okay." He says quietly, startled, but not really. He'd felt the way Ghoul was holding onto him as they rode Mirage all the way out here.

Ghoul unfolds his arms from around himself and grabs onto the unzipped sides of Kobra's jacket. He doesn't cry, not out loud at least. He's just shaking, so much, and so, so small. Kobra's not good with words. He's even worse with them under pressure. Anything Jet or Party could say to make it better, that kind of stuff gets stuck on his tongue when Kobra tries to say it. So he doesn't. He just holds on.

"You plan on coming here?" Kobra asks eventually, even though he has a feeling the answer is no. Unless it's an engine or a bomb, Ghoul never really plans on much. Ghoul shakes his head, hair scrubbing against Kobra's shoulder and neck where his head's pressed. "You wanna... y'wanna go inside?" He asks then, against his better judgment. But then again, he's never been known for that, has he.

Ghoul tenses, but it momentarily stops the shaking. "Can we?"

Kobra huffs. "Nobody stoppin' us, and even if there were, we'd do it anyway, wouldn't we?"

Ghoul pries his fingers from their hold on Kobra's jacket and turns back toward the station. "Should we?"

"Dunno." Part of him thinks it might help. Part of him remembers exactly what happened the last time they were here. It's the Killjoy way to call death ghosting. It means some part of you lives on even when you're gone. There's a lot of ghosts in this pavement. "It's your-"

He can't think of what word goes there. Choice. Past. Grief. Place. So he stops talking. He shrugs, bends to pick up his helmet. "I can." He sucks a breath through his teeth. He's going to say it again. "I can... I can go with you. If you," he shrugs one shoulder again. "If you, uh, want to. I'm not- I'm not trying to force you," he adds, like it needs to be said. "It's your... yours."

Because that's all that really can be said. This place, the place that made Fun Ghoul what he is. The journey, however brief, that brought them here. Even, kinda, Kobra himself. It's all for Ghoul, here and now. Kobra drove, but he's just along for the ride. Weird how that happens.

Ghoul steps toward the station. Magnetism, again. And Kobra follows, because how could he not. He feels sick at the though of letting his friend go in that place alone.

The doors are gone. Shot out years ago. It looks to Kobra exactly as it did back then, but Ghoul probably remembers better. There are shelves toppled and glass and plastic broken all over the floor. Whatever hasn't been scavenged is broken and shattered. Ghoul walks toward the back of the store, the corner that's not so much a mess. Kobra stays back a bit, trying to give his friend space.

It's where they found Ghoul. Or, where Pois had found him. Ghoul was half in shock, terrified and scarred and fighting, and Party was the first one of their then three-strong group to notice the dark shape watching them hopelessly trawl the carnage for any survivors. It took Pois physically restraining the much smaller kid to keep Ghoul from going for all of their throats.

Kobra has a lot of bad memories of Ghoul. None are as bad as remembering the way he'd screamed when they first met.

"Y'okay?" Kobra asks after a while.

Ghoul has his moments. They all do. Sometimes, you wake up bad in the night and it's hard to pick yourself up. Sometimes you just gotta hit the bottom before you even can. But Ghoul's a fighter. "Yeah," he says, walking back and forth between fallen shelves once stocked with food and stupid trinkets. He crouches to pick up the shattered remnants of something once made of colorful glass and when he looks back over his shoulder at Kobra, he doesn't seem quite as small.

"'M sorry," Kobra mumbles, not knowing what to say now. Somehow, the shaking and the touch are so much easier than having to talk about it. He's never been the talker. That's Party. And he knows his brother regrets not getting there — here — sooner that day, but there's a sick, selfish part of Kobra that's too glad to have Ghoul to want anything different. But really, it's all he can say. If there's remnants of bones that haven't been carried away by carrion-eaters, he doesn't want to see it.

Ghoul slowly stands up from his spot on the floor, staring intently at the broken knick-knack in his palm. It might have been a glass teddy bear, once, something a parent might grab up for a child waiting at home. It's partially shattered, though. Half of its cartoonish smiling face is gone. The heart shape it once held in its paws is cracked down the middle. Kobra isn't great with metaphors, but this is pretty fucking obvious.

"I didn't save them," Ghoul says quietly, his voice grating through the charged, silent air. "I didn't save her."

Something clicks into place. They all know that the crew he lost was Ghoul's real actual biological family. He's a sandpup. He was born and raised in the Zones. He doesn't talk about it much. Kobra's shocked he even came back here, let alone with anyone else. Ghoul doesn't talk about his family, but they've all figured for a while that he had a sibling. You can see it in how he treats the Girl.

"Your sister," Kobra says. It doesn't sound like so much of a question when he says it out loud, but he knows Ghoul will understand it as one.

Ghoul nods. "Yeah." He steps over some toppled displays, sun-bleached ads that used to be bright colored, and slips the shiny piece of broken glass into one of Kobra's pockets since he doesn't have any of his own. Kobra can already see the sunburn forming on his friend's shoulders and the tops of his knees. "She was like, eight."

That's all the more he says about it, but Kobra slips his hand into the pocket and runs his fingers over the broken glass toy still warm from Ghoul's hands, and hears the years of grief and bitterness in the few words. Ghoul's more talky than he is, but he's cagey, too. Kobra can hear him, though. He gets it. Doesn't mean he knows what to say, though.

"Shit," he spits. He wants to say I'm sorry again, but that feels fuckin cheap. He wants to say stop beating yourself up about it, but that sounds even stupider. "Fuck." Sometimes that's all he can say.

"Yeah," Ghoul replies. "Fuckin shit."

"Exactly," Kobra agrees, fiercely relieved that Ghoul gets all the shit he's trying to say. "Hey, uh. Y'know I'm-" He stumbles over the words, cringes at himself for the inability to get past a stupid two-letter word. "I'm glad I know you." He manages, as selfish as it sounds standing here in the ghosted wreckage where Ghoul's family was killed. But if that hadn't happened, they wouldn't be here now. They wouldn't be friends. And Kobra needs Ghoul to know he's glad that any suicide run to save his family failed. The pain sucks, but he's grateful for the outcome. He hopes Ghoul can understand that.

Ghoul doesn't reply. His acid green eyes bore straight into Kobra's for a few seconds while Kobra's heart hammers in his chest. Then he kicks at some dust and looks at the floor and shrugs. "Let's go, man. I don't wanna stay here."

"M'kay."

Kobra's almost tempted to reach out as they walk back out into the glaring sun, grab onto Ghoul like he's a ghost, too, and the light might evaporate him. But he doesn't. He can't.

He thinks the feeling of Ghoul hanging onto him as he steers Mirage away, back up the ramp to the road they came down in the first place, will make him feel better. It doesn't. Ghoul holds on much looser than he had on the way here, and it makes Kobra nervous. He wonders if he should have made him wear a helmet, and steers more carefully around the turns.

And then Ghoul adjusts his seat and throws one arm up over Kobra's shoulder, loosely hooking around his neck. He leans up forward and shouts, "C'mon, Kobes, let's play with it!" Like he's itching for the risk that a couple hours ago had had him holding on for dear life. Kobra's used to thinking his best friend isn't all there. But he's also familiar with the times he is. Sometimes, he forgets they're not the same age because Ghoul is so larger than life.

He tips his head to the side in acknowledgement, and punches the throttle. He even pulls a couple of tight, quick loops. He can't slide on the pavement the way he would on sand, but he can catch a little air when there's a thermal bump in the highway. Ghoul clutches onto him, but it's not scared. Something's cleared up in the gas station. Maybe it was closure. Hell if Kobra knows.

When they pull Mirage off the highway and the diner finally comes back into view, just a small glint of signage, Kobra slows his pace and can feel Ghoul sigh more than he can hear it. His friend's arms stay firmly around him. "Hey, Kobes?" Ghoul says, just barely loud enough to be heard over the engine.

"Yeah?" Kobra says, a bit louder to be heard past his helmet.

Ghoul hesitates, then says in a rush, "I'm glad I know you too. Like, really glad." And then he squeezes Kobra a little tighter for just a second and Kobra can't even say anything in reply. It's been a long night at the wrong time of day. And they're almost home.