Work Text:
“What are those?” Rudo asked, pointing a gloved finger towards Zanka’s dish.
Zanka lifted the item off his plate. “These? They’re dumplings. They're delicacies on the Ground, but-”
“No, no, not that.” His finger shifted, aiming a little higher. “Those! The things you're holding. What are they?”
Zanka blinked. He looked down at his hands. Then back at Rudo. Then to his hands again, and blinked once more. “My chopsticks?” He waved them a little to make it clear. Then, suddenly remembering the dumpling he was holding, popped it in his mouth.
“Yeah. Those. Why are you using them?”
“Why am I- “ Zanka started. He then remembered he was raised with a modicum of manners and swallowed before continuing. “What does it look like I'm using them for?”
A scowl made its way on Rudo’s face in a feeble attempt to cover up the growing redness. “I don't know! I just saw you eating with them-”
“Oh, so your eyes do work- “
“-and I'd never seen them before! Everyone else on the ground uses forks, so I was curious!”
Zanka snicked a little. He couldn't help it; Rudo was so easy to rile up. After he'd settled, he beckoned Rudo over. “C’mere.”
“What?” Rudo eyed him suspiciously, his face still a little red.
“I'm supposed to be your teacher, right?” Zanka reached to the side of the table to grab a spare pair of chopsticks. “I'd be worse than a mediocrity if I let your curiosity go to waste.”
Rudo pulled out the chair next to Zanka, watching as his teacher pushed the plate in front of him. “Aren't these a delicacy or something?”
Zanka's eye twitched. Or something? They sent him as the head of three missions to No Man’s Lands before they even considered placing his order for these. Zanka took a deep breath. Then, swiped Rudo on the back of the head with his Lovely Asisstaff. He felt much better. “You'll owe me one later,” he ominously said. He slid the metal chopsticks into Rudo’s hand.
“How am I supposed to use these?”
“I want to see how you think you should use them. I'll correct you afterwards.”
Rudo quietly grumbled in response. He looked down at the open palm of his gloves with the two wooden sticks lying there. He stared at them for a moment. Rudo slowly closed around both chopsticks. He raised them, turning them vertically. Then, with all the grace of a two-year-old taking a pencil to a priceless painting, Rudo stabbed both chopsticks into a dumpling.
“Like this?”
“What?!”
“What?”
Think happy thoughts, Zanka. Polishing Lovely Asisstaff. Spinning her, her weight resting solidly in his hands, the feel of each divot and crevice in her wood. Not Rudo desecrating his expensive lunch by stabbing it open like a barbarian. Happy. Thoughts.
He swiped Rudo again.
“Hey!” Rudo shouted. He rubbed the back of his head, trying to soothe the pain. “How was I supposed to know? I've never used them before!”
Zanka poked a finger right at the center of Rudo’s forehead. “Use your head! You saw me using them earlier, didn't you? How was I holding them then?”
“... Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.”
Again, Rudo flushed and scowled, knocking Zanka’s hand away from his head. Rudo snatched the chopsticks from the dumpling. Zanka watched the gears turn in his head. After a moment, Rudo moved the chopsticks from his palm to the groove between his thumb and pointer finger.
“But how do I…” He trailed off. He tried sliding his gloved finger underneath the one on top, but the chopstick instead slipped out of his hand.
Zanka grabbed the chopstick off the table and handed it to Rudo. “You're pretty close.” He picked up his own chopsticks to use as a demonstration. “See?”
Rudo stared at Zanka's hands. “Oh! I have to put them…” He shifted, trying to correct his position. He balanced the lower one on his ring, and tried to balance the higher one on his middle finger. “... Here?”
“Yes!” He exclaimed with a smile, before schooling his expression. Okay, maybe Zanka was getting a little too excited. Could you blame him? He had tried to teach Enjin one time, and there's a reason he only tried it once. The man followed his instructions like he was being willfully obtuse, and knowing Enjin, that was likely. It was nice to have a protege that tried, even if he was also a little obtuse. “Yes,” he repeated, calmer this time, “but you need to control it with your pointer finger.”
Rudo furrowed his brows. “Like a pencil?”
“Yeah. Like a pencil.” Zanka watched as Rudo made his first true attempt. The dumpling slid from between Rudo's chopsticks before the utensils themselves slipped out of his gloved hands. He tried again, but the same thing happened. Eventually, he'd lost enough pride that he turned to Zanka for help. Zanka used his empty hand to motion upwards as he said, “You need to move your hand higher on the chopsticks.”
Rudo furrowed his brows further. Anymore furrowing and he'd end up as pruney as a raisin before he even hit adulthood. “That would make it harder to control.”
“Try it, then.”
Stubbornly, Rudo brought his hand up a little higher. On his next attempt, he was able to actually grip the dumpling. Rudo's (and Zanka's, though he'd never say it) joy was short-lived. The chopsticks again slid from right between Rudo's fingers as he lifted the dumpling to his mouth.
Again, and again, and again.
Zanka gave advice, small adjustments to grip and positioning, but it didn't help. Rudo held onto the chopsticks for shorter and shorter amounts of time, while his anger only grew greater.
Dejected, Rudo slumped in his chair, looking at his hands. “It's 3R.” Under the frustration, a hint of sadness could be heard in his words. “They're too big. The chopsticks keep falling right out of my hands,” he gripped them tightly as he spoke. Zanka didn't reply.
Rudo moved as though he'd slam them on the table, but right before he did, he stopped. Gently, he placed them down. The table rattled as he pushed it to stand and made his way towards the door. He stood right in front of the door, his gloved hand resting on the handle.
He gave Zanka a glance. “Thanks,” Rudo turned to face the door. “... For teaching me something.” With that, he left.
Zanka sat there. Next to him, an empty seat with a plate of dumplings and a pair of chopsticks.
They're too big, Rudo had said. 3R was rather large, larger than Zanka’s own hands. It was easy to forget about them sometimes; spend enough time with anyone and their differences become hardly a second thought. But, yes, 3R limited Rudo’s dexterity. Zanka, for the first time since Rudo had left, glanced at the empty seat next to him. That's not what he was looking for. He shifted his eyes to the table.
Zanka’s own chopsticks were wooden, a deep brown. Expensive to procure, but the closest to the ones he used when he lived with his family. Rudo’s, in comparison, were a sleek metal. Nice looking, yes, but difficult for cloth to cling to.
It was no wonder Rudo was having difficulty.
He couldn't sit here brooding about Rudo’s departure. He wouldn't. He was Rudo’s teacher, and what good teacher let a lesson go unfinished? He'd be less than a mediocrity if he did, and Zanka certainly wasn't less than a mediocrity.
So, of course, he came up with a solution.
○○°○○
Enjin had given him a chocolate bar. That was pretty nice. He had been hoping for a little more.
Of course, seeing as he had cleaned out their entire stock, maybe he was asking for a lot. Could you blame him? He'd never had it before. How was he to know how delicious it would be? He was sure this one would be delicious too; it was dark chocolate. All the chocolates he binged were milk chocolates, but this was supposedly the real deal. According to Enjin, that is.
Enjin told him to wait until he got to his room, in case someone like Dear saw him with it. He was going to but… Well, he was almost there, wasn't he? Standing where he was in the corridor, it was probably two or three turns away. That's close enough to be considered his room, right? He glanced around. There wasn't anyone nearby. He'd take one bite, that's it.
Carefully, he peeled the plastic wrapper off his treat, raised it to his lips, bit down-
-on absolutely nothing?
He patted himself down in a frenzy. He was sure he had taken it out. He took another look around, to make sure he was truly alone and-
“Looking for something?”
He whipped around and pointed at the culprit. There was his chocolate, balanced precariously in between the prongs of Lovely Asisstaff. Of course, holding her was Zanka, the Chocolate Thief.
“You!” Rudo threw himself at Zanka. “Give it back!”
He made quick grabs at his chocolate, but each was avoided with ease by Zanka. Not only that, he managed to do it without dropping the chocolate. Begrudgingly, Rudo admitted it was pretty cool.
Zanka leaned against Lovely Asisstaff and plucked the chocolate from her grasp. Wagging it in Rudo's face, Zanka had a smug smile on his. “Didn't I tell you that you'd owe me?”
“Huh?” Owe him? That was... For the dump-lingy thing, right? “But I never ate your… thing.” Not to mention that the whole chopstick thing was a bust, but thinking about it made him angry.
Zanka sighed. “You've gotta stop furrowing your brows. You'll end up looking like Delmon before you're twenty.”
It was then that Rudo noticed something. Zanka hadn't moved his left hand. Not once. Even when he took the chocolate from Lovely Asisstaff, he did it with the same hand he had used to lean on her: his right. He watched as Zanka pulled something from behind himself.
“I hope you know, getting these was a pain in the ass.”
Rudo’s eyes widened.
Extended towards him was the plate – Zanka's plate from those chopstick lessons. There were the dumplings, of course, but something else. A long, red box with a blue bow. So long, it poked past the boundaries of the plate, the ends sticking out a bit.
Carefully, Rudo took the box off the plate. He untied the bow, and opened it and pulled out its contents.
A pair of long, almost golden brown chopsticks. “Golden” may not be the correct way to describe them. You could see it if you looked closely, the combination of different woods of different shades organized in almost a swirling pattern.
“Wood can be a rare thing on the Ground, and I thought you'd appreciate them more if they came from recycled wood.” Zanka looked away as he gave his explanation. “Wooden chopsticks have more friction, so you should be able to hold them better. They're also bigger than mine so-”
Rudo wrapped his arms tight around Zanka’s torso and gave it a squeeze. Rudo could feel him stiffen in surprise, but he relaxed after a moment. His right hand came from around Lovely Asisstaff to ruffle Rudo’s hair a little.
After a moment, Rudo let go with a loud sniffle.
“Well? Are you gonna try them out?”
Quickly, Rudo rubbed the tears beading up at his eyes. Delicately, he picked them up and settled them in his hands. “Like a pencil…” he muttered under his breath. He heard Zanka snort, but he ignored it.
Chopsticks in hand, he shifted over to a dumpling – one with a messy hole in the center – and carefully picked it up. It was shaky, unpracticed, and Zanka might call it unrefined, but it didn't matter. He brought the dumpling to his lips, and bit down.
He could’ve cried. Again.
Steadying himself with Lovely Asisstaff, Zanka leaned over towards Rudo. “So? How's it taste?”
Rudo sniffed, bringing a hand to his eye to hastily wipe away a tear before answering.
“Cold.”
Zanka snorted once. Then twice. Then he burst out laughing before he could stop it. Rudo couldn't help it, he started laughing too. When they had calmed, the two of them, Rudo and Zanka, looked at each other and smiled.
“You're a little shit, you know that?”