Liar
by K.A. Cragle
(Un beta'd. Done because it was in my head and I wanted to get it out before it disappeared. Sort of slash. There's a minor screw-up in the plot, but I don't care.)



     Rend was sitting across from Ran on his bed, staring at him with his white, empty eyes. Those eyes were always empty, rimmed with darkened flesh that looked almost dead. Ran hated looking at them.
     Ran sighed, running a hand through his short, blonde hair. Rend had been acting strange all day. The entity had been visible for four years, and he’d never acted this strange before. It was awkward… and he seemed almost embarrassed by something.
     Finally, the entity spoke. His voice was deepening more quickly than Ran’s was. The boy had no idea why; he was seventeen and Rend was the image of a seventeen-year-old. He was like Ran’s twin, but with tweaks to the hair and eyes.
     “I need you to do something for me, Ran.”
     Ran looked over at him, startled by the sincerity her heard in Rend’s voice. What startled him worse was the question. “What? What do you mean, ‘do something for you?’ Don’t I do enough for you?”
     Rend lowered his eyes slightly, looking more than just embarrassed. Now he looked annoyed. “Don’t kid yourself, Ran. You don’t do much of anything for me, except give me things to fix. I help you all the time. Be a sport and do something for me now, okay?”
     The other looked genuinely astonished. “Since when do you even need things done? Aren’t you just some weird manifestation…?”
     Rend stood suddenly, his eyes rimmed with red. “I am not JUST…”
     His fists clenched, and he grated his teeth, trying to calm down. “Never mind that. I’ll forgive that. JUST, for the love of GOD, listen to me for once, and stop thinking about nothing but yourself. I might not be real, as you like to so eloquently put it, but I do have feelings.”
     Ran snorted, unaffected. “Just what kind of feelings do you have?”
     He had to refrain from calling Rend a name, lest the other decide to strangle him. Rend wasn’t good with handling sudden bursts of anger.
     Rend sat back down next to Ran on his bed. He leaned in close to Ran, making the other back away, a disgusted look on his face. “I have these kinds of feelings.”
     He laid a hand on Ran’s thigh, his fingers tightening around the flesh. Ran slapped Rend’s hand away and stood, stumbling backward. “DEAR LORD.”
     Rend stood, following Ran. “It’s only natural, Ran. Ever since you’ve been looking at those girls in school, I’ve been getting the same feelings as you.”
     “Wait… you feel what I feel?” He sputtered, confused and disgusted.
     Rend smiled one of his wide, sinister smiles. “I’m afraid that’s one of the after-affects of being a part of someone else. Tragic, isn’t it? Let me explain. When you developed that crush on that Cindy girl, I felt the same thing toward her as you. I could have blocked that feeling, and probably should have, but I liked it. Just like you did. Now I can’t stop that feeling. It’s getting strange now, appearing whether or not you feel it. I’m developing independent sexual feelings, Ran. This isn’t good for either of us. It means compromise.”
     Ran’s heart dropped. Impending doom seemed to be coming from Rend. “What do you mean… compromise?”
     Ran had come close to his bedroom wall, and now Rend moved toward him and pushed him gently into it, a hand pressed firmly into Ran’s chest. “It means that, since I don’t have any parts of my own, that both of us are going to have to work out a system.”
     “What… what does that mean we’re going to do?”
     Ran dreaded the answer. Rend blinked once, the smile returning to his face. “I can show you.”
     Ran said nothing, knowing that he couldn’t stop Rend. He could try, but in the end, the entity had unlimited energy and could wear Ran down quickly. Unless Ran was to die, the other would always be able to beat him.
     He lowered his face, feeling Rend getting closer to him, his breath brushing across his forehead. “Fine. I don’t want to do this, but because I can’t stop you, then just do it and get it over with. Please.”
     Rend laughed softly, his warm breath now on Ran’s neck. “I intend on making this last, boy.”
     He reached forward and cupped Ran’s groin, making the boy grimace in a mixture of loathing and something like pleasure. His lips pressed against Ran’s neck and he already had his body grinding into Ran.

Ran fell to the floor, sore and feeling far more than violated. He felt like shit, and he started when he realized that he was crying. Tears slid down his cheeks silently and his hands shook. He stuffed them into his pockets to hide the shaking.
     Rend looked over at him, he had moved away and sat on Ran’s bed again, his head tilted to the side. He wasn’t smiling.
     “You didn’t like that more than physically. Why not?”
     Ran laughed, his voice shaking more than his hands had been. “Why do you think, you fuck?”
     Rend cocked an eyebrow, surprised by the other’s reaction. “I can’t imagine, boy. Enlighten me.”
     A shrill laugh tore from Ran’s throat, followed by loud sobs as he finally started weeping. He pulled his knees to his chest and shoved his face between them, his arms wrapped around his legs. His shoulders shook as he wept. Rend only looked on, confused.
     “I… hate you… so much…”
     Rend’s throat went dry and his chest tightened. He stared at Ran, trying to understand what was happening. “You… you can’t mean that… Ran, I—”
     “I DO MEAN IT, YOU FUCK!”
     Ran was suddenly staring directly at the other, his face red and his eyes swollen with injured tears. “I’ve never meant something so much. I fucking HATE you. YOU’VE RUINED MY LIFE!”
     He screamed the last words, picking up a shoe that was next to him and flinging it at Rend’s head. It promptly drifted through, leaving no mark, and shattered a picture frame on his wall.
     Rend was the one crying now, his eyes narrowed and hurt. “I thought… you… I thought we…”
     Ran stood shakily, breathing heavily. He growled, “You mean nothing to me. You’re just something that my fucked up head made because I’m some sort of freak. But you’re a bigger freak than I am, Render. You’re not even real.”
     Rend sobbed loudly once, then quieted. His squeezed his eyes shut and a tear slid out. He lowered his head and said, “You said… you loved me. Once. You said that. I thought you meant it…”
     Ran stopped, shocked. “You never said you loved me back.”
     Rend’s heart ached, and he started to realize what it could have been that had made Ran so upset. He wasn’t familiar with social etiquette just yet, but he was guessing that their encounter had been less than pleasant for Ran because it had been forced upon him. He looked up at Ran and said, “What if I told you that now? What if I told you I love you?”
     Ran scoffed, turning away. “I’d call you a liar.”