Captured: Hitachiin twins
Anyone want some Twin whump? No? well, I did. So here we go!
The twins are just so easy to write whump for. Maybe I just need help. Oh, well. Here’s some angst!
“Please don’t hurt him!” Kaoru cried.
The man paused but refused to loosen his grip on Hikaru’s throat, narrowing his eyes at the other twin.
“Nothing personal, kid,” he said gruffly, sliding the knife in a circle around Hikaru’s face. “Just doing my job.”
“You have the wrong one!” Kaoru yelled without even thinking. He ran forward and fell to his knees in the dirt, reaching his hands into the air. The autumn breeze clipped the back of his neck, sending a shiver down his spine. “You can take me! They want me! Just let him go.”
“Kaoru, don’t!” Hikaru choked, but the man squeezed his fist.
“The wrong one, huh,” he muttered.
Hikaru struggled desperately, but the kidnapper flexed his fingers into a stranglehold and pressed his captive’s back closer to his torso.
“And you didn’t!” Kaoru said, shifting his knees an inch closer. “We’re identical! They won’t even notice the difference. All they care about is having one of us.”
“They asked for this one,” the man said, lifting Hikaru’s chin with his knife. “Why should I risk my reward by compromising?”
Hikaru found the leeway to breathe. “Let us go, you bas--ah!”
The man twisted Hikaru’s arm behind him. Nothing showed under his mask but his eyes, broiling with brute strength and greed. “Be quiet, brat.”
Kaoru shakily stood up, his knees knocking together as he pushed his bangs out of his eyes. Leaves clung to his jeans, but he dared not move too quickly to brush them off. One wrong move could mean Hikaru’s slit throat. “I’m more compliant,” he said, putting his hands back in the air. “They would want the one that’s easier to break, I promise. And it will be easier for you to bring me back because it’s voluntary.”
He stared directly at his brother. Tears began to fall as he noticed the black eye starting to swell on the captive twin’s face, lips downturned. Nostrils flared as he struggled to inhale every precious breath his captor would allow.
So many times they had practiced the “Which one is Hikaru?” game, never knowing it would be the most important game of their lives.
Kaoru stared at Hikaru, watching the light slowly start to fade from his eyes. That wasn’t going to happen. They’d been on the run for so long they barely remembered why they were being hunted. All they knew is that they couldn’t get caught.
Don’t, Hikaru mouthed, shoving against the kidnapper with his shoulders, but with his arm pinned and airflow restricted, he couldn’t unleash the fury pent up in his belly.
I have to. Kaoru didn’t say it, but Hikaru knew that look. Kaoru had been cleaning up his messes for their whole life. He couldn’t let him sacrifice himself again. Not again. Not when he had just gotten him back.
Black dots crowded his vision, siphoning out the late afternoon light, and he groaned. Who was he without his brother?
“Fine,” the kidnapper said after a prolonged pause. He released Hikaru’s neck just to dig his knife into the boy’s side, jabbing the blade in between the lower ribs.
Hikaru gasped. The oxygen hitting his lungs plus the pain of the stab nearly knocked him out again, the burning sensation actually put him on the ground.
Kaoru screamed so loudly he almost tore his vocal chords. Instinct took over as he hopped to his feet, but the kidnapper grabbed him and forced him to his knees, wrenching his hands behind his back and twisting a thin rope around them. Kaoru felt his stomach sink. Tears washed down his face as he watched his twin on the ground struggling to breathe and stem the blood.
“So he can’t follow us,” the captor murmured, finishing the knots.
In saving his brother, did he sentence both of them to death?
Hikaru coughed and pushed himself onto his elbow, clamping his other hand to his side. His skin squelched at the pressure. Through his hazy vision he saw the man lift Kaoru by the shoulders and push him to take a step forward.
Amber eyes met amber eyes. Both filled with pain, but one leaked love. The other reflected loss.
“Hika, run,” Kaoru gasped, tugging on his ropes.
Hikaru finally felt his lungs fill with air. Despite his wound, he scrambled to his feet, bunching his jacket around the blood, and skipped/limped to the treeline, to the denser part of the forest that had so recently served as his sanctuary--now turned into an altar of sacrifice. Leaves crunched under his uneven steps, but he had to escape. Kaoru’s capture would be in vain if he didn’t.
He threw one last look at his twin as the captor dragged him away.
I’ll come back for you, he thought.
Kaoru tried to smile, but the light didn’t quite reach his eyes.
