Anybodys had been prepared to give everything he had for the Jets, but not for it all to be thrown back in his face right out the gate.
"Who's the broad, Tony, and what's she doin' around here for?"
That was Action who had been the first of the Jets to react to Anybodys and Tony emerging from an alley into their most frequent and favored meeting space outside of Doc's shop beyond some curious glances, which is about what Anybodys would have expected if he hadn't had a million other things to think about; he was definitely one of the more aggressive of the Jets.
He had probably been the member of the gang Anybodys had developed the most mixed feelings on when he had just been using his skills at slipping in and out of the shadows to spy on them while wishing he could achieve the goal he had thought to be impossible at the time of joining them, what with him agreeing with him about romantic relationships being stupid but also being one of the more difficult Jets to imagine getting along with because Anybodys' fire meeting his smaller but still formidable one was very likely to just create an uncontrollable blaze.
Now that he had insulted his honor, those feelings were quickly becoming much less mixed in a way that wasn't favorable to him, and Anybodys was ready to open fire on him.
"I ain't no goddamn broad, I'm the latest member a the Jets and your new best fighter!"
This probably true or at least close to being true proclamation of his was met with laughter that even without that edge of genuine hostility to it would have gotten his literal and metaphorical hackles raising.
"How're ya gonna fight for us, tranny, by drivin' our foes away?"
As the jeering laughter of the others increased and Baby John added on to this not even clever insult of A-Rab's, more hesitant but matching a not insignificant portion of his taunting zeal, Anybodys warningly rolled up his sleeves, fully prepared to show them the everything he was gonna give for them whether they liked it or not by directing the full force of it at them.
"Hey, that might actually work!"
Someone piled on... Tiger? he couldn't really tell with how blinding his rage was getting... oh no, Anybodys had been able to keep the storm of emotions that perpetually brewed in him way more in check than this when he had had the well weathered wall in his mind that Tony had just inadvertently brought down an hour that felt more like a month ago by being the first person to ever ask him if he was okay and doing so after a lot of other traumatic stuff had happened... if it was just anger that was now gonna be in full force at the front of his mind and in his actions if he couldn't get the wall back up, that would be fine, that wouldn't lead to him doing anything not properly macho, but what if it worked the same way for other emotions?
What if he not only had to deal with the full force of what he had just failed to prevent from happening to Antonia and Toby... how they had been taken by the goddamn worse than useless social workers because he had gotten too wrapped up in spying on the Jets to recover from those... sessions with clients he'd had to do to make ends meet and make it easier to shove the memories and residual sensations from them behind the wall in his mind that now lay in ruins, and then how his mom had apparently thought that right after he found out about how that happened would be a great time to tell him that she had lied about her lazy piece of shit husband not being his genetic father... but it made him look weak and emotional in a bad and effeminate way in front of these guys?
He couldn't get the wall back up fast enough.
"Too bad she wasn't here earlier, we could've taken out the Hawks way faster!"
Okay, so Anybodys would make Action eat his words first because he had been the first one to insult him, and then if A-Rab and Baby John and Tiger still felt brave enough to mess with him after that somehow then he would take care of them in that order.
Before he could lunge at Action, though, he felt a hand being placed on his shoulder and realized it was Tony's.
"C'mon, guys, knock it off. We could use another man for the gang in case the Hawks start causin' trouble again, and Anybodys here is top notch at spyin'."
Riff stood up from the position at the front of the group he was often in... he had shifted to be at the front again when they had turned to look at Anybodys and Tony, he realized... and sauntered up at him, casting Anybodys a brief, dismissive, almost amused glance that made it really hard to resist the urge to clobber him before directing his focus entirely to Tony.
"And uh, where exactly is this man, Tony?"
Neither of them saw Anybodys skillfully barreling into him with all the virile strength in his body, knocking him down to the ground almost the full distance he had just moved from the other Jets to Tony coming.
"Right here!"
He punched him in the face hard, reveling in the shock and maybe even a little fear in his expression and not having to hold back his emotions or acting on them anymore.
Maybe this new status quo of the wall being gone and destroyed wouldn't be such a bad thing, as long as he could keep stuff like what had just happened with Antonia and Toby and his dad at bay.
He didn't even care as someone pulled him off of him, he had gotten some super good hits in on the co-leader of the Jets and made him pay for insulting him like that, the others would think twice before messing with him again... oh it was Ice who had done it, that tracked with what he knew about him and how he had seen him usually be the one to end fights between the Jets.
That was less anger inducing than it would have been if most of the Jets had been the one to do it; Ice seemed cool to him with his calm collected machoness and skill at everything involved in gang life.
"If you're gonna be a Jet, 'knock it off' includes you. We get enough shit from everyone around us, we don't need to give it to each other too."
Anybodys thought about protesting this, something about how Riff had been the one to start it and anyway he was just defending his honor, but the satisfying sight of him angrily and ashamedly scrambling back up and obviously trying and failing to play off the epic decking he had just received was enough to tide him over.
"Fine."
Ice held his gaze for a long moment, seeming to look him over contemplatively even as he wasn't moving his eyes, before nodding a little, apparently satisfied with whatever evaluations he had just done.
"Okay, good. Now, he's gonna need a cigarette to make it official that he's one of us now. Who has some on them?"
Yay Ice was calling him he this was great, he knew he would be one of the cool ones, but what did he mean when he said that he needed a cigarette to be a Jet?
Not that Anybodys would say no to anything that would help him beat back the highly unpleasant memories and emotions that he was now having to deal with without the usual assistance of the wall, obviously.
Ohhhh this must have something to do with that saying he had heard from mostly Tony and Riff... when you're a Jet you're a Jet all the way from your first cigarette to your last dying day... the ritual for becoming a Jet must be to smoke a cigarette!
"No way you're in on this too. C'mon, Ice, if we needed ta keep trannies around I would just ask my mustache wearin' sister and dress wearin' brother!"
How was Riff still daring to insult him and... two other people who also didn't identify with the gender they were 'supposed' to from the sounds of it... after he had just clobbered him so good?!
"You wanna fuckin' go again?! I'll make last time look like some harmless tea party!"
Riff scoffed angrily at him.
"I was just holdin' back on ya cause I didn't wanna hurt a chick!"
Anybodys was gonna rebel against Ice's instructions if Riff got any more annoying and infuriating.
"Neither do I, maybe I shouldn't fight ya then!"
Tony stepped in between them, blocking his view of the guy he wanted to clobber and most of the other guys behind him who were either rallying him to fight him or jeering at Anybodys.
"Enough! Anybodys, here's your cigarette."
He held it and a lighter out to him without tearing his confrontational but somehow still appealing gaze away from Riff, and Anybodys took them, glad to have something to take some of the edge off of this situation that was seemingly nothing but edge directed at him from all sides... most sides, Ice and Tony were cool...
"Riff, I'll owe you a favor if ya stop tryna stop this from happening."
The tension in the air between Tony and Riff was now to the point that Anybodys was almost worried his now lit cigarette would set it ablaze, but taking a drag from it and having that smooth, silky smoke that signified his new membership in a gang, a brotherhood he had wanted to be a part of for so long even before he had known about them soothingly blanket his mouth and throat and lungs eased that worry and the multitude of others at the forefront of his mind a little.
He had only smoked a few times before, when the tension and stress in his life had been too much for even the wall to help him with adequately and he had decided to get one over on his dad as revenge for all the stuff that they all deserved to get revenge against him for by stealing one of the cigarettes he wasted so much of their already tight money on... he was especially glad he had done that now, because he probably would have had to fight against the urge to cough in front of the other Jets if he hadn't and they were apparently primed to pounce on anything that could potentially be misconstrued as a sign of weakness form him.
This cigarette, with its added significance of bringing him into a brotherhood of guys who would hopefully be way more open to the idea of giving him some admittedly much needed support soon after he had done whatever he needed to do to prove to them that he really was capable of giving them everything he had and that said everything was far more substantial and impressive than the baseline standard that they held each other to, guys who he would support in turn with said everything, blew all of those out of the water.
Plus he'd definitely be blowing some smoke into Riff's face once this confrontation between him and Tony was done, that would also be nice.
"Why do ya want this ta happen so bad, are ya inta her or some shit?"
Shit, he could barely resist the urge to blow smoke in his face right now.
"He knows I'm a way better fighter n' spy than any a ya, that's why."
Riff seemed more puzzled by this probably true proclamation than anything, even as his anger and... jealousy? still bubbled barely beneath the surface.
Interesting... Anybodys had picked up on that particular undercurrent between the two leader of the Jets before, but it was usually Tony feeling it for Riff whenever someone that wasn't him caught his eye or he wasn't digging something that he had said.
He would never get with Tony like Riff was implying, though, no matter how fun and satisfying it would be to drive that anger and jealousy of Riff's through the roof; Tony wasn't a girl and even if he was a girl romance was a scam, a chocolate and diamond studded road that led straight to hell.
"Has she been- spyin' on us or somethin'... wait, I don't wanna know. Tony, you've always been more of a brother to me than the freakshow in a dress I'm cursed ta share blood with, so I'll do this for ya. I wouldn't do the new freakshow in jeans if I were you, though."
Anybodys took another drag of his cigarette, wondering why the other Jets besides Tony and Ice seemed to find that not even clever insult hilarious even through his righteous anger.
"Yeah right, like I'd ever go for that."
Tony was a little more relaxed now, matching the lessened tension in the air between him and his... were they just friends, or were they also driving down that doomed road without knowing it?
"I won't, that's not what this is about. Womb to tomb?"
Riff had also relaxed, but not as much as him, and he moved towards him in a tense approximation of his earlier saunter.
"Sperm to worm."
They did that firm, tension laden in multiple ways hand clasp that Anybodys had seen them do many a time in moments where the strength and resilience of their bond was even a little in question, and then Anybodys turned around after feeling a gentle tap on his shoulder and realized that it had been Ice who had done it.
"Hey, you wanna go n' talk about this?"
...That sounded nice, actually, getting a break from this bombardment shit that the other Jets had decided to pull on him for some reason even though they had no reason to think that their belief that he wouldn't be a good and loyal and skilled member of the gang and fighter was true... they had evidence to the contrary, actually, now that he had beaten their co-leader's ass and handed it to him... and getting some help from apparently one of the only cool ones of them with figuring out how to get them to stop doing that shit sooner rather than later.
He would be able to figure that stuff out himself, of course, but one of the cool things about being a Jet besides the badass fighting and the security of a territory was that he didn't have to any more; he had brothers to support him now.
"Sure, in Doc's shop?"
Ice briefly cast a glance at the adjacent building before looking back at him.
"I was thinkin' of pickin' us up some comics first, to make your welcome to the gang a little warmer."
...So far it had been warm in the same way that a boiling pot of water was, so... yeah that would be nice...
Anybodys stood up, turning with Ice in the direction away from the others who would hopefully see him as one of them soon through his efforts and Ice's help that he had indicated with one of those Jet held tilts and taking another drag from his cigarette before answering him.
"I'd like that. Thanks, daddy-o."
Ice nodded a little as they started walking, still looking at him in that contemplative but not disapproving way.
"Not a problem, buddy boy."
Yay he had called him buddy boy, just like Tony had!
...Maybe they were the only Jets who were cool, at least so far, but at least they were.
Author's Note: Anybodys at Tony and Riff: https/search?sca_esv=9b83d23fcadc5394 =1C5CHFA_enUS967US967 =homophobicdogiknowwhatyouare =2 =ABzOT_CWdhQLP1FcmU5B0fn3xuWpA-dk4wpBWOGsoR7DG5zJBkzPWUS0OtApxR2914vrjk4ZqZZ4I2IkJifuoUeV0iQtssIkyxoE9ZDUKx5hhtTj_ThiexGVntUHC7nriqOrQgau2aAKkS4LB6msmfP4zzxFaB8yz5C-A_0G9zFMO-8RMw8q_3GnbnAGcwVsiAja15YY0kudxMjMQZSRokfb8il5IhuXGQ =X =2ahUKEwid5KKLpOCMAxWF3skDHVdkEJUQtKgLegQIGRAB =1470 =772 =2#vhid=34ElS2NVcC7osM =mosaic