Chapter Text
“.. Noodle Boy?” Red Son glanced from side to side, wondering where the rest of the usual entourage was, and why MK would be stupid enough to walk up to him in the middle of a mediocre café. “The hell are you doing here?”
He watched as MK snickered, rubbing his hands together before pulling out a strip of crumpled paper and writing a string of numbers on it. Seemingly to himself, MK murmured quietly, “ I am going to be so mad at me when I find out about this. ” Red Son could feel his hair sparking, small embers fizzling against the shop’s linoleum floors, but MK looked up at him before Red Son could really lose it. “Here you go!”
Red Son looked down at the paper that had been thrust into his hands. It read:
‘ MK’s Contact Info!
XXX-XXX-XXXX
In case you want to talk :D ’
Red Son decided, as he felt his hair fully ignite, that MK was an idiot.
An idiot who at least was a clone and not actually physically present in front of an enemy who wanted him dead, as evidenced by the eruption of hair when Red Son attempted to cremate him, but an irredeemable idiot nonetheless.
He chose not to think about the fact that his hands stayed notably absent from fire and the paper remained unburnt.
------
To be clear, Red Son never actually intended on using the number.
He kept it, obviously, and hid it from his parents for reasons he could not even explain to himself, but he never really thought he would use it.
Then, a week or so later, walking down the street, he saw a TV in a store window playing the news, and MK was being thrown into a wall by some demon or other, falling ass over teakettle, and Red Son laughed so hard he found himself pulling out his phone to take a picture of the TV screen. Then, as he closed out of the camera app, his eyes strayed to his messages, followed by his thumbs as they tapped on the app icon.
[Idiot Noodle Boy]
Me: This you? (image)
Me: HAHAHAAH
Me: HAHAHAHAHAHA
Me: Fucking wipeout
He watched on the TV as MK pulled out his phone, still in the rubble, that idiot, and turned an angry red, yelling inaudibly down at it.
Through his own laughter, Red Son barely caught the way he fumbled with the device, tossing it to the side to catch his staff just before the demon attacked again.
A few hours later, when Red Son was sat in his room scheming, his phone buzzed, startling him enough that his hair sparked angrily.
[Idiot Noodle Boy]
Idiot Noodle Boy: SHUT UP
Idiot Noodle Boy: WHO EVEN ARE U??
He snorted.
Me: Don’t you remember giving me your number?
Idiot Noodle Boy: ?????????
Me: … It’s Red Son, you idiot. Your idiot clone gave me ur number.
Idiot Noodle Boy: .. What. . THE HELL ????
Me: Ur fault AHAHA
Idiot Noodle Boy: FUCK OFF
Idiot Noodle Boy: I’MGOING TO BLOCK U
Me: oh , lord forbid
Idiot Noodle Boy: :((
Me: Laugh Out Loud
------
They didn’t text for a few days, after that—not until his little friend Mei suddenly came into possession of an ancient sword that with immense powers and something or other that Princess Iron Fan wanted, and she wouldn’t stop making passive aggressive comments about it whenever Red Son walked into the room, as if he was the one she assigned to retrieve it.
[Idiot Noodle Boy]
Me: Give me your sword.
Idiot Noodle Boy: ??????
Me: the green one. Give it to me.
Idiot Noodle Boy: It’s not mine???
Me: JUST FUKCIGN GIVE IT TO ME
Idiot Noodle Boy: ???? ITS NOT MINE??????
Me: Fine.
Me: meet me at the gas station near that one actually decent not-super-rigged arcade R! N!
Red Son swept out of his father’s lair, for once moving pretty quietly, no grand exit, and rushed to hide in a shadow before MK would show up, not even bothering to check his texts to see if MK would show up .
No matter what anyone may have thought, Red Son was not just using it as an excuse to leave the lair.
It didn’t matter anyway. MK did show up, of course, and it was very funny to watch the idiot glancing about, looking for Red Son like he’d been stood up.
MK kicked at a rock on the ground, the neon lights of the gas station the only thing illuminating the area in the dark of the night. He scowled down at the pebbled dirt. “Where on earth is that annoying guy?”
Red Son emerged from his little hiding spot, hands stuck into his pockets as he walked forward with a shit-eating grin. “Annoying, am I?”
“ Holy–! ” MK leapt up, staff flipping into existence in his hand, and turned to face him. Eyes wide, a hand pressed to his heaving chest, MK glared up at Red Son. “What is wrong with you? You can’t just sneak up on a guy like that!”
Red Son snickered. “I just did, Noodle Boy.” Stretching his hands above his head, eyes closing on a yawn, Red Son listened as MK growled at the blatant disregard.
“Why did you even want to talk to me?”
“Boredom?” Red Son hummed. “Maybe I thought I’d try my luck with a fight, now that I can just text you a location instead of having to scheme ways to get you places.” He pointed at MK and laughed. “And you just showed up! Idiot.”
MK’s hand clenched tighter around his staff, one foot shifting back slightly into a more ready stance. “I, uh… I’m really banking on that maybe, right now.”
Red Son sighed, letting his hand drop back into his pockets. “Yeah.” He shook his head. “I’m bored and you just make it so easy.”
MK scowled, but couldn’t seem to think of a response, so Red Son just waved a hand in the vague direction of the gas station and started walking.
“Come along, now, idiot.”
“Fuck off.” Despite that, like an idiot, MK followed, still grumbling. “You’re an asshole.”
—------
They bought slushies, both red because they had taste, and ended up huddled in the shadows at the back door of the arcade, hidden away in the alley, only the flickering red light above the back door letting them see one another. Red Son figured he could have lit a fire, but also figured MK would prefer he didn’t cause property damage, and he wasn’t actually trying to pick a fight.
They sat together in near silence, uncomfortably close for two bitter enemies, shoulders and knees brushing together, elbows bumping whenever they sipped at their slushies. The quiet was thick, tension nearly overbearing. The low buzz of the red light at the backdoor seemed to grow louder, gradually, until it was nearly deafening, swallowed only momentarily by the grating sound of them drinking their slushies.
MK fidgeted next to him, setting down his drink and cracking his knuckles. Red Son glanced sideways at the Monkie Kid.
“What the hell are you doing, idiot?” He punctuated his question with a deafening sip of his slushy. MK grunted in response, very intelligently, and Red Son rolled his eyes. “What’s your deal, Noodle Boy?”
MK grunted, again, somehow less intelligently, and said, “Shut up, will you?”
Oh?
He said it out loud, too.
“Oh?”
Slowly, Red Son set his own drink down, turning to look at MK. “What could I possibly have done to piss you off? Actually, what?”
MK raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean, aside from constantly calling me stupid?”
“Not exactly an insult if it’s the truth.” Red Son snorted.
MK growled, pushing away from him enough to stand. “You’re such an asshole.”
“I’m the son of the Demon Bull King. It’s my birthright.”
Drawing his staff from his ear with a snarl, MK lunged at Red Son, knocking him flat on his back. Red Son hit the ground with a thud—wheezing at the sudden impact—and ignited his hair, sending MK reeling backwards with a burn on his cheek.
“What is your deal , Noodle Boy?” Red Son felt at his chest, glaring down at MK, who was gingerly tapping the shiny pink skin on his face. “Fucking…”
“What’s my deal?” MK shouted, shoving to his feet and leaning against the opposite wall. “You burned my face !”
“Yeah, because you attacked me !”
“Only because you only called me out here to make fun of me!”
“What, did you think we were going to sing kum-bay-fucking-ah?” Red Son glared down at his rival. “Come on ! We’re enemies, Noodle Boy. Don’t fucking forget it.”
He blew fire in MK’s face, heard him let out a pained grunt, and was promptly punched in the face. Red Son grabbed MK’s wrist as he tried to draw it back, unbalancing the both of them and sending them to the ground.
The ground, where the half-finished slushies were.
They teetered, nearly tipping over, and settled.
MK and Red Son froze in place, staring at each other with wide eyes, and then at their drinks.
“Truce?” MK whispered, as though speaking at a normal volume would be the end and the slushies would fall over.
Red Son agreed. “Truce.”
They picked up their drinks, got to their feet, stared at one another uncomfortably.
“I’m going to go home.”
“I must return to the lair.”
A moment of silence.
“Good night.”
“Die in your sleep.”
They parted with that heartfelt goodbye, or would have, if not for a small detail they had failed to consider.
They ended up having a very awkward walk home after they were all covered in burns and bruises, MK’s apartment in the same direction as the lair.
It did not become a pattern.
------
Three times was not a pattern.