Straight to the top, kiddo

Jack’s eyes widen, wild emotions flickering across the mismatched irises. Incredulous, angry, hurt.

“...Whaddaya mean, Timmy?” Jack drawls - almost conversationally, but there’s a dangerous edge to his voice. Something sharp and poisonous, prickling with betrayal. “Don’t I give you everything you need, here?”

He advances on his double, gripping him tight by the chin and lifting his head to lock eyes with him. His gaze is intense, staring straight through him. “Don’t I take care of you, Timmy? Protect you, keep you, care for you? Pay you more than any shmuck on Pandora could ever scrape together?”

Fingers grip tighter on Tim’s artificial face, and Jack pauses a moment to admire his freckles. His trembling jaw. Those pretty eyes, all wide and bright.

No, he could never let those precious puppy eyes out of his sight. Timmy was too pretty, too good at what he did, too dear to him. Sweet brave Timmy, who hunted a vault and let Jack take all the credit, who took everything Jack gave without complaint. Tim, who he’d had longer than almost anyone, who’d seen him before he was ruined. Jack loved him, though he’d never told him to his face.

He couldn’t allow anyone else to have Tim - not even Tim himself.

His voice darkens and he crowds him in like he’s liable to swallow him whole.

She makes a noise like a deflated balloon as she’s lifted, all full of giggles up until she sees the look on her dad’s face. Uh oh. That was a bad face, that was an upset dad face.

Angel blinks her big ole blue eyes up at him, smile quickly turning into a frown as she looks between him and the console. What did she do? She was trying to help, trying to do the work for him since he seemed so tired.. But something tells her she did it wrong.

“I.. helped?” She tries, “Mama said you were too sleepy from work, I wanted to help?” 

Tears quickly well up in her eyes, bottom lip trembling. “I wanted to help..”

All the fire leaves Jack immediately at the sight of those big blue eyes welling up with tears, and Jack’s brows knit as he strokes her dark hair. He slowly sighs, privately mourning the few hours of work it’d likely be to undo it, but understanding.

She wanted to help. She probably saw how exhausted he was and thought she could do it for him. It was a sweet thought, really.

Jack laughs, weary but genuine.

“Hey, hey.. It’s okay, princess.” He reaches up to swipe tears from her rosy cheeks, stroking them gently. “You.. You didn’t mean any harm. it’s alright. Papa isn’t mad.”

He pulls her tiny body into a hug, exhaling slowly.

Can’t expect a toddler to understand coding language.

Jack didn’t dream much nowadays. Mostly just dead-dropped straight into dreamless voids when his body blacked out from exhaustion. Working two-thirds of the day only to come home and squeeze in a few extra hours of coding wasn’t exactly great for one’s circadian rhythym. Jack reckoned his bloodstream was probably comprised mostly of espresso at this point.

So he doesn’t realize it when he’s zonked out at his desk. Hardly stirs when little limbs come creeping into his lap. Doesn’t even lift his head until Angel’s typed up almost two pages worth of gibberish onto his console. 

The programmer’s dark-rimmed eyes snap open, lifting Angel’s squirmy toddler body away from his keyboard. “Woah, woah, princess! What are you doing?”

He holds her like a little football in one arm, the other hand scrolling in exasperation to see his data all clusterfucked magnificently. His spare hand rakes his hair harshly, mussing it into his face. “Ohhh, my god. Oh kiddo..” He tries to hit the undo button. Five popup windows obscure it.

@president-rhys

Irritation clings to Jack’s chest as he stares blearily at his inbox. Bad news after bad news tonight, this deal going tits up, that one ending in a shootout, Maliwan assassinating another Hyperion contractor. Jack was beyond frazzled, his nerves alight with annoyance. He swears louder than he realizes, half a mind to chuck the damn contraption against a wall.

And then he feels a warm, familiar weight against his chest. Jack blinks slowly in the dark, light-blind as Rhys’ sweet face slowly comes into view. His eyes soften, chest rising into the grasp of Rhys’ hand. A long, pleased sigh leaves him as Rhys’ fingers work out his stresses, the arm holding the offending device tossing it on the nightstand to wrap instead around Rhys’ waist. He pulls him close, eyes half-lidded and bloodshot, and presses a lazy kiss to his forehead.

“..Sorry, babydoll. I’m gettin’ there. You know how they like to keep me up with their bullshit..”

“Well hey, Timmph-!”

A muffled noise of surprise smothers out between their lips as Tim crushes them together. Papers flutter outwards as the momentum knocks them from Jack’s hands, quickly replaced with fistfuls of Tim’s shirt. They drag him closer, chests flush together. His lashes flutter closed in contentment, swallowing peals of Tim’s laughter as he kisses him back. Grinning, Jack draws back just enough to nip playfully at his doppel’s lip.

@clonelyboy

@vaultiism

A wheezy laugh leaves Jack, followed quickly by a grit of his teeth. Of course the kid would take his joke seriously. It was kind of cute, really.

Rhysie, living in that rose-tinted world of his, Rhysie, Rhysie- “..-sie, ‘course it’s not.” He licks the blood from his teeth lazily, eyes hazily unfocused. “You ever seen blood before, kiddo? ‘Course you have. Don’t be a dumdum.”

A soft, gutted noise leaves him at a throb of pain in his guts. Jack doesn’t wanna think about which organs the bullet probably ripped through. Real ambitious assassin. Shitty shot, though. Bastard left him alive.

“Hm.”

They weren’t particularly delighted by the sound of Jack’s little pet name, their eyes narrowing from behind the helmet. To accent the displeasure, their heel presses down even harder, grinding into his jaw.

Humans were - as they more than likely always would be - irritating with their overly comfortable speech and tendency to look death in the display and laugh. Jack was dreadfully human, more so now than Zer0 was used to anymore. A king without a crown, knocked to the floor by a creature that hardly exists.

“I could kill you now. / It would take little more than / a stomp to your neck.”

The last word is a growl, a final press down of their heel into his face before they step away, sighing.

“You would enjoy that / far too much though I’m afraid. / Can’t have that, can I?”

Zer0 makes a passive, haughty noise in their throat, a magnificent predator regarding it’s prey with detached distaste. Jack shivers bodily as the heel crushes his jaw, eyes fluttering halfway closed. Zer0 was ferocity and grace, a ghostly killer only just passing through, taking lives for his own reasons, or no reason at all. Jack was bewildered by and utterly obsessed with him.

Ragged breathes leave him, half from his windpipe being compressed, half from adrenaline. On the brink of death, he felt marvelously alive. Jack knew enough about Zer0 now to know he was no ordinary vault hunter - but only as much as Zer0 ever allowed him to know.

Jack had once haphazardly commented that he had no interest in mysterious types, but with Zer0 poised to kill him without having ever seen his face, Jack knows that was a goddamned lie and he’d chased the assassin straight to his death and thanked him.

The assassin was right. Jack would enjoy that. He could think of no better way to die, in fact.

Zer0′s voice leaves him in a growl and Jack feels it, knowing he means every last word. He presses his bared throat to the assassin’s bootheel, daring him to crush it.

And then it’s gone, leaving Jack gasping as air rushes cold into his lungs.

Jack stares after him, eyes half-lidded as if he’s watching a lover walk away. He brings one hand to his jaw to trace the bruise tenderly. Licks his bloodied lips.

When he speaks, his hoarse voice is warm, lovestruck.

And there it is, all that false bravado of the king that sits on top of the world. Humans were oh-so loathe to be told what to do, Jack would not be an exception today. The Handsome Jack they had grown used to comes back in an instant, threatened so easily by a simple demand.

Ah, and of course the kitten comment. 

“Neither am I, Jack. / Seems we are at an impasse. / And I have a sword.” They step away from his bed, seeming to look around his room with intrigue. It wasn’t every day a vault hunter made it in here, after all. Might as well enjoy the sights. “Fragile ego, much? / You can deliver orders, / but not take any.”

‘ :) ‘ flashes at Jack condescendingly, mocking him. 

“Do not be stupid. / You will die either way, right? / Why not give it up?”

Zer0 stares at him impassively, the mirror of his mask reflecting utterly no emotion. The assassin throws the gauntlet down almost casually, as if he hadn’t appeared in Handsome Jack’s high-security room on goddamn Helios. As if it was nothing to be here. Jack would be insulted if he wasn’t so damn impressed.

And baffled. Baffled as hell.

Anger flares up at the condescension, Jack’s body straightening out. Even prone, with a sword pointed at him, his eyes glint dangerously. Jack’s angry nature had his hands twitching for his blaster, but he restrains himself.

On one hand, there was something fascinating going on here, and it piqued his curiosity more than it pissed him off. On the other, this was clearly a deadly person. The way he stalked him with feline grace, Jack had no doubt he could reduce him to kibble in a matter of seconds.

And that’s the fuck of it - he didn’t. A vault hunter in his room, and he didn’t take the chance to gut him while he slept.

The assassin was toying with him, batting him between his proverbial claws.

Jack wanted to know why.