#cyx

“Listen here, kid…”

“Kid?” Turning to hide the dark blue flush across his cheeks and most definitely completely ignoring the cool weight of Kaboodle’s arm slung across his shoulder, Cyx bit out a retort. “Aren’t I older than you?”

“When did your game come out?”

“How the fuck would I know that?”

“Case in point. I’ve been doing this for a lotta years, kid. Now then, see here.”

This time Cyx said nothing, didn’t speak another word into the semi-embrace that was Kaboodle pulling him into his side to show him the open circuitboard. Squares and circles lived in harmony, joined by countless waves of light. It was pretty cool, beautiful really, and yet again the symbiosis of shapes felt a little too close to home. Was that jackass so dense or was he doing this on purpose?

“You done a lot of soldering, Cyx?”

Offhand, little more than an addition, but his name sounded nice on Kaboodle’s lips. Almost like something might feel nice on th— “Was kinda busy jumping platforms and fighting off barrages of enemies with a sword.”

“Well, don’t you worry,” Kaboodle leaned impossibly closer, legs still extended, and even with his distinct lack of lungs a warm feeling like a simulacrum of breath fanned Cyx’s cheek thanks to his ventilation, “This is just a holo game board, so if you fuck it up we won’t explode. You’re not scared of a little heat, are you?”

Cyx gave him what he wanted, igniting his palm in a burst of bright flame.

Kaboodle grinned, a surprisingly affectionate expression. “I know, kid, I know.” Patting his shoulder, he finally exhaled in relief, retracting his extended legs back to his original height as Cyx knelt down. “I ain’t afraid of a little heat either, y’know.”

~

Space whirred past the Nimble’s multitude of windows at every turn or lack thereof, abyssal eyes meeting his with unwavering confidence that reminded Cyx of someone else aboard.

"Watch and learn: one quick turn and they'll be out of our hair in no time," Kaboodle insisted, eye fluttered proudly shut as he gripped the Nimble's steering wheel a little harder, barely gentle enough as not to dent it.

"One turn?" Cyx challenged, stepping to the current skipper's side. "No acceleration?"

"You know what I mean. I can get us out of this."

"Can you now?"

Kaboodle's lack of hips swiveled, twitching the back of the pilot's chair just enough to brush Cyx's thigh. Faint pressure poking at his muscle memory encouraged him to place a hand on the risen seat back and lean a bit closer toward the gaze of that challenging eye.

Those cold steel lips Cyx hated his own eyes' magnetism to rose at one corner into a smirk. "You wanna kiss me so bad.”

Cyx instinctively took a step back, boot striking the Nimble’s steel flooring with a faint clunk. He wasn’t one to balk for long, though— oh no. After everything he’d been through, he wasn’t one to back down from a challenge.

“Right back atcha,” he said, gripping the seat tighter and letting the robot perform his oh-so-epic maneuver, leaning his weight further and using inertia to yank Kaboodle closer, their lips falling together. Lips Kaboodle had teased him again and again for not having. You don't know what I've got, Cyx had said before they'd ever kissed. Could've pointed out the same to him, frankly. Dammit, missed opportunity.

Now, though, he had nothing to prove. Cool spread over his surface, which usually ran hot with emotion, exertion. Whether he liked to admit it or not, the push of Kaboodle's lips over his calmed this burn. Grounded him more than white-knuckling a chair ever could.

Kaboodle's lips gave one final slide over Cyx's as the edge of his gripper traced over his shoulder, catching the edge of his scarf and traveling down to give its edge a flick. "Fuck you," he said, giving yet another smirk before swiveling completely away, his tiny form rendered invisible again save a gripper striking a button.

"Maybe later," Cyx said, but this time he didn't wait for another turn or reply, simply striding out of the room with a satisfied smile of his own.

~

Rustling was the only clue Cyx had before a huge chain of jagged-edged paper extended his way, catching his cheek with a sting harsh enough to narrow his eyes in a sudden wince. Rolling to the side narrowly availed him of getting body-slammed this time by Fold, who called out, "What's wrong, Neonide? Scared?"

"Not even," Cyx shot back, "Scissors beats paper." Unsheathing his katana from his back, he took a broad swing, grunting in frustration at Fold's equally agile dodge.

"Really? You could die at any moment and you go with that?" The rush of battle had clearly overtaken Kaboodle, whose expression lacked its typical sardonic affect and instead was a grin of pure adrenaline and amusement.

"Yeah," Cyx agreed, his own face melting in a sudden rush of affection as if he wasn't actively butting Fold in the head with the small pommel of his katana.

Kaboodle didn't have time for a witty response for once, not when Miss Information literally punted him across the room, knocking the ventilated wind out of his groaning steel form when he struck a wall. Shouting his name, Cyx ran to his side; any other time he might've laughed seeing his boyfriend getting kicked like a ball, but not like this. This was malicious. This was bad. Rage boiled beneath cyan skin as he gently caressed the top of Kaboodle’s head. One red gripper reached up to hold his boyfriend’s wrist, only for panels to slowly unfold from Kaboodle’s arm.

“What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Kaboodle shot back as his legs extended and encircled, first wrapping around Cyx’s waist then enveloping him completely. Cooling waves washed over his battle-heated body and pain ebbed from his cheek and strained muscles, even the faint bruise on his leg from where he’d tumbled to the floor. Even Kaboodle whooped with a new rush as Cyx flew up to his feet, suddenly acutely aware of a new weight on his back fighting the ascent. Kaboodle.

The breadth of his hands had suddenly increased, somehow dwarfing his katana handle and glowing cyan, but not with the flames he’d come to expect in rage or battle. Pure light, almost like...a laser!

“Got any combo names in mind?” Kaboodle’s voice rang out at Cyx’s back. No, now that he was suited in steel—in Cyx’s back.

“Hm, you’re round, I’m the Beats Quest protag…how about ‘Rock and Roll?’” Cyx suggested.

“I mean, I was gonna go with ‘Beat Down’, but that works too.”

"Guess we'll have to come up with another combo, then," replied Cyx as he slammed his hands together with a faint metallic crunch, only for a wavy, almost flickering cyan laser to ignite from their newly-gloved palms. Like he'd seen Kit do, he released a powerful blast, a high-pitched train of energy that sent Fold and Miss Information flying to a beat Cyx's adrenaline comedown allowed him to recognize as their shared heartbeat.

Whattaya know? The same beat worked perfectly for a hail of steel-encrusted punches and a dodge-uppercut that very well constituted a beatdown.

“We make a good team.”

“Shut your ass, that’s so corny.”

“Why are you smiling, then?” Kaboodle panted.

“Maybe it’s the adrenaline talking, but I think I have a crush on you.”

“Shut up,” it was Kaboodle’s turn to say, shaking his, well, his whole body, but it was meant to be his head.

“Why,” Cux didn’t miss a beat, “Are you smiling, then?”

~

Scrape, scrape, scrape. Drawn-out swipes of Cyx’s newly acquired knife over the roughness of fallen wood from the latest world they’d saved. Half-folding himself over the edge of the long chair the hero had lain upon, Gobbles watched, eyes sliding up and down with each sliver of wood drifting to the floor. Each piece in tune with the music blaring on all sides from Cyx’s wraparound headphones.

Gobbles’s lips moved, clearly addressing him. Dropping the knife at his side, Cyx lowered his headphones.

“What are you making?”

“Guess,” Cyx told him.

“Uhhhh…a dog! No, a cat!”

Cyx hadn’t the foggiest beyond making a little something for him; he’d been waiting for the dinosaur’s word to whittle any more than the general figure of an animal sitting. To prove his point, he shifted the knife upward to the top of the figure, hastily shaping a rough triangle at the top. A pointy ear.

“Right as always, Learn-O-Saurus,” Cyx answered with a small smile.

Gobbles said nothing more, just watched a second ear take shape with further awe and a new shine of gratitude.

“That’s nice of you,” a voice murmured at Cyx’s back. A voice he’d recognize from in front or behind, hell, blindfolded at this point.

“Yeah?” He simply blinked white eyes down at that charming fucking sphere he called the love of his life, waiting for the other verbal shoe to drop with bated sass.

It didn’t come, though. Not this time. “Yeah,” Kaboodle repeated, maroon eye soft upon his boyfriend’s meticulous handiwork, “It is. Real nice. I— I wasn’t that nice to him when he first came around.”

“No.” Cyx still couldn’t resist the sarcasm even as he felt his own gaze melt to match the stare upon him.

“‘S true. I wasn’t so nice to him. Thought he was dead weight. But look at you making stuff for him. Not because he needs it, just because you’re good at knowing how people feel.”

“I…” Kaboodle’s words truly took Cyx aback, his head leaning a bit away from his work and square jawline tilting further the robot’s way. “…I am?” ‘Empathetic’ wasn’t exactly the vibe Cyx was trying to project. Part of him wanted to remind his boyfriend that he ended up destroying an entire world… but then again he’d invented a whole no mercy run of a game he didn’t even know was a game. Maybe Kaboodle was right. Maybe he really did see him.

“Yeah,” Kaboodle said easily, almost airily, as if Cyx had questioned whether fire was hot, “You are. That’s not easy, but you’ve got a way. That’s part of why I love you.”

The snark had fully drained from Cyx’s expression, his tongue suddenly swelling beyond words in time with the soaring of his chest. There was no beating around the bush, not this time. “…I love you, too,” was all he managed, voice barely above a whisper.

“Awwww,” Gobbles crooned at Cyx’s feet, prompting the couple’s heads to whip his way. They’d forgotten. Of course they had. Flushing, Kaboodle and Cyx quickly waved him off despite the smiles they shared.