You said evil Jimmy, bad boys, and only nice to Tango and my mind went crazy lol. And of course I had to make it Gt. So, what if, the bad boys run this underground black market thing where they capture and sell borrowers. But each bad boy has a borrower they keep with them. And Tango is Jimmy’s but he doesn’t know how to feel because Jimmy is genuinely nice to him and treats him like a person. But with every other borrower, Jimmy treats them the exact opposite.
They pulled into the drive-thru of the McDonald’s and Jimmy tilted his head down to glance at Tango, flicking his sunglasses up, “You want your usual, Rancher? Chicken nuggets with nether sauce?”
Tango grinned, his tail flicking “Yes, sir, Rancher buddy!”
Jimmy nodded and turned down the music as they reached the ordering screen. He ordered three Mcdouble combos, a twenty piece chicken nugget with ranch, barbeque and nether sauce.
On the way home Jimmy tapped the steering wheel along with the music and when one of Tango’s favorites came on he turned it up and they both sang along rather poorly. Tango loved these moments alone with Jimmy—it felt like an honest friendship.
And then they pulled into the driveway of the “Bad Boy Mansion”.
It was a small rancher home with two bedrooms the size of closets and the attic they diy-ed to be a third. Tango had lived in it’s walls for years, going through a few families before Jimmy, Grian, and Joel moved in. He was lucky to still be able to call the house home.
Joel’s voice pitched from the porch, just as irritated as he usually was, “What took you so long?”
“The line went around the building, ain’t nothing I could do!” Jimmy shouted back as he gathered the fast food and drinks into his arms. Then he looked down at Tango and at his full arms and sighed, “Shoot. Tango, climb up, would you?”
Tango bit the inside of his cheek to keep from whining as he climbed out of the cupholder and onto Jimmy’s lowered sleeve. From there he hoisted himself up to Jimmy’s shoulder and held onto the collar. Jimmy kicked the car door closed and headed for the house.
Tango looked towards the house to see Joel stood on the porch, eyes narrowed in their direction. “Would you stop letting him do that?”—he jabbed a finger in Tango’s direction—“Someone’s going to see him one of these days.”
“You’re just jealous because Etho would rather fling himself to the floor than ride your shoulder,” Jimmy replied, holding out the drink carrier for him to take, “Now help out, would you?”
Joel reluctantly took the drinks, if only to make sure Jimmy didn’t drop them. Inside the house they dropped the food on the kitchen table and started unpacking the bags.
Grian joined them, looking through the food, “Did you get your borrower an entire twenty piece chicken nugget?”
“No! The chicken nuggets are for all the borrowers,” Jimmy snapped. He scooped Tango off his shoulder and set him on the table.
Tango stumbled on his feet and backed up a few steps to give the humans plenty of room to unpack and set up their meals. Jimmy grabbed a single chicken nugget, cut it into chunks with a plastic knife and set it on a napkin with the opened nether sauce in front of Tango.
“We got a couple now, thought I’d get them some too,” Jimmy continued, setting the rest of the nuggets aside. “Also we ran out of bread.”
“You spoil them,” Grian teased, elbowing Jimmy.
“You spoil Tango,” Joel added, dropping down into a chair, “I mean no wonder he doesn’t try and run like ours. Jimmy’s gone and cut his food for him too, like he’s the blooming prince of fairies.”
Tango bit his tongue, knowing that if he said anything at all it would mean trouble.
“You think if I do that for Effo he’ll actually stop making escape attempts?” Joel asked.
Grian snorted, “Definitely not. Etho’s practically feral. Never seen a borrower throw themselves off a dresser until him.”
“I’m going to sell him,” Joel declared, taking a giant bite into his burger. Tango froze, not daring to look up at Joel.
“You don’t mean that,” Jimmy said.
“I do!” he replied around a full mouth, “His cool factor has worn off. Someone would pay loads for an albino borrower, I bet. I would have.”
Tango felt his heart drop into his stomach, nausea hitting him like a train. Joel wouldn’t– He couldn’t. Etho was Tango's friend. Etho was one of the last things he had connecting him to being a borrower. The next time he spoke to Etho he was going to have to beg him to start listening to Joel, as much as it killed them both, he couldn’t lose another friend.
“Well, you got a big pool to pick from right now if you want to switch him out for another,” Grian said, shrugging and picking at his own fries.
(That is, if Tango even had a chance to talk to him again at all.)
The Bad Boys finished their meals, Tango barely picking at his nugget, appetite long lost.
Jimmy was the one to gather the trash and shove it down into the trash can. He grabbed up the remaining chicken nuggets (Joel and Grian had nabbed a few themselves) and held out a hand for Tango, “Coming bud?”
Tango hesitated– he really didn’t want to, but staying in the kitchen meant Grian and Joel could get grabby. They wouldn’t hurt him, sure, but they made it abundantly clear they thought Jimmy was too soft with him. He’s been poked and prodded plenty of times between the two of them, tossed in the air more then once, and Joel once tried to hide him from Jimmy by shoving him in his own sock drawer. He didn’t want a repeat of any of that if he could manage it.
He stepped onto Jimmy’s hand and was promptly slipped into his jean-jacket pocket. He sat, grabbing a bit of pocket lint and pulling it apart bit by bit, unable to keep his hands still for the short ride.
Tango swayed and bounced as Jimmy turned out of the house, and he recognized the familiar creaking of the screen door and it slamming itself shut. His feet crunched in the unkempt backyard and Tango’s tail flicked as he heard the shed door open. He hated this fucking shed.
Jimmy’s hand reached for him, fingers wrapping around his middle. His stomach swooped as he was lifted and set down once again. Jimmy was already tearing the chicken nuggets into pieces as he steadied himself, humming a song that had gotten stuck in his head from the ride home and barely acknowledging the big fat elephant that sat in front of him.
The tank of borrowers.
It was set on a shelf, the wire top clamped down several times over. A heat lamp hung over it and one of those plastic hamster hides was pushed into a corner. It was lined with a towel that hadn’t been washed since it was set and the dirt stains from many little shoes were prominent. There were only two borrowers in sight, but Tango knew for a fact there were six in the tank. The Bad Boys’ latest haul. They got lucky catching the group crossing between backyards (and the Bad Boys weren’t above trespassing to get their hands on more borrowers. No one would notice a few mouse sized people missing).
Tango had been set down on the shelf, right next to the tank. One of the borrowers was staring at him and he gave a small wave— the stare immediately dropped into a glare and the borrower turned swiftly away from his direction. Tango’s tail tucked itself between his legs.
“Alright fellas,” Jimmy chirped, undoing the clamps and pushing the tank open with a clang. He set the box of torn up chicken inside, along with two open sauce packets, “Got some food for ya’s.”
“How long do you plan to keep us here?”
Tango’s head snapped back to the borrower. He was practically a half inch taller then Tango was, muscular and what looked to be old chemical burn scars all up his arm and over his face. Tango had seen some of the things he was carrying before Grian had tore them off his person and he had some pretty advanced borrower tech. He hasn’t heard a name from him yet and a part of him hopes he won’t.
Jimmy barely blinked at the question, already fitting the top back on, “Oh, just until we can secure a buyer, not long for some of your friends but you… Well, hard to find someone that wants pre-damaged goods.”
Tango hated the shed. Jimmy was different in here. Jimmy was cruel in here.
(Tango knew it wasn’t just the shed, as much as he wanted to pretend it was. He knew that Jimmy would and did act just the same to any borrower no matter where he was. He knew this was as much the real Jimmy as the one that sang songs and taught him how to read more than a few simple sentences and let him play with loose circuits boards. He was just always this Jimmy in the shed, and the shed had become his association with the worst of him.)
“You plan to turn us into pets?” The borrower growled. His voice was gruff, with some kind of thick accent. He wondered where he could have gotten it, or if he was somehow foreign—Most likely he grew up in a house with a bean with an accent, but it wasn’t impossible for borrowers to travel to other countries. That was dangerous, sure, but the guy looks like he’s gone through his fair share of danger.
“Uh, yeah,” Jimmy replied, a smirk creeping over his lips, “People pay a lot for a pet that can talk. Isn’t that nice? Usually something as insignificant as you would be considered a proper pest.”
“You’re not making a dime from us. We’ll get out. You don’t scare me,” The borrower said, his tail thrashing behind him.
“You’re able to escape this? Wow! Color me impressed!” Jimmy punctuated his statement by snapping the clamps back in place. Then he casually grabbed a brick off the ground and dropped it right on top of the lid. “Man, when we come back and you’ll be gone–? Just, know, I’ll be making this face–” He clapped his hands to his face, jaw dropped exaggeratedly.
“Fuck you, man! Fuck you!” The borrower shouted, kicking at the glass of the tank.
Jimmy laughed, retaliating by knocking repeatedly on the tank until one of the other borrowers, still tucked away in the hide, poked their head out to beg for him to stop. He did, grinning brightly, “Enjoy dinner! Come on, Tango.”
Tango was quick to scramble onto the hand that was offered to him, his tail wrapping around Jimmy’s pinkie.
“Ay, Tango, was it?” The borrower called. He flinched away from the angry tone but glanced back, giving the borrower his attention. The borrower was sneering, lips curled, “Fuck you too, traitor! You let this bean turn you into a pet. You’re no better than a hamster–”
Jimmy beat his fist into the glass, “Shut it! Tango is my friend. You’re not going to speak to him that way.”
He pulled Tango to his chest, cupping him close and stomping right out and back to the house. The screen door once again slammed as he pushed his way inside, not bothering to stop in the living room where Grian and Joel were watching some trash show and throwing snacks at each other.
They were up the ladder into the low ceiling attic and he dropped himself onto his bed. Tango bounced on his chest, hands grabbing at Jimmy’s shirt to ground himself.
“Sorry about that,” Jimmy sighed, his hand pressing against his back, “That guy was way out of line.”
Tango sighed, “It’s… fine, Jimmy. He was just mad.”
“More like he’s got an attitude problem,” Jimmy grumbled, and his hand shifted so his thumb was rubbing up and down Tango’s back. The action calmed them both, each taking slow breaths, “You’re not my pet, Tango. You’re my Rancher buddy, always will be. Don’t let them get in your head. You’re better than that lot.”
“Right,” Tango replied, “Thanks, Rancher.”
“It’s no problem,” Jimmy chuckled. He pulled his phone out, opening up Youtube and scrolling through until he found a Minecraft video, “This look good, bud?”
Tango turned to look, laying back on Jimmy’s chest, “Yeah. I like this guy.”
Jimmy pressed play, and Tango tried to push his thoughts to the back of his mind.
Don’t think about the shed. Don’t think about the borrowers. Focus on the video. Focus on the sound of the non-copyright music and Jimmy’s breath. Focus on the rising and lowering chest under him. Focus on this moment, and try to forget about the rest of it.
Tango wasn’t very good at controlling his thoughts. The video played and Tango’s head was elsewhere.