Waiting.

Title: Waiting.
Fandom: .Hack//
Pairing: Sora/Haseo
Notes: For a friend because she told me to. I'm taking a shitload of creative license with this so bare with me.
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Sora grinned, the one that made him look even more insane and sinister looking as he held his captive's wrists to the wall.

"Chit-chit, aa~? And how's my little Key of Twilight today~?" He cooed, bringing his face close towards the figure.

Said figure was glaring heavily, crimson eyes filled with anger as they reflected back from the others gold ones. Silvery bangs were matted to the sides of his face, red tribal markings across his cheeks stood out even brighter than usual because of it. Haseo didn't reply to the other, turning his head away slightly so he didn't have to look at him.

"Not talking again~? That's okay, I don't need you to talk. I just need you to look pretty for me~" Sora murmured, before letting out a childish-like giggle that somehow never actually fit his personality or look, but made him seem all that more mental.

In an instant, the others head snapped back to look straight at him again, lips curled into a snarl.

"I'm not pretty, dammit! I'm not a woman." Haseo hissed.

"Ooh, so I'm graced with a response after all~" The green-haired PKer ignored the other's statement, simply grinning lazily.

Flushed from fury, the other struggled to break the hold they had on his wrists.

"You know, it's better watching you get angry. I like seeing you...with that look in your eye, na?"

"Let go, bastard." Haseo demanded, glaring even more if it were possible.

If anything, it only served to amuse the taller even more.

"Hm-mm...How about...no~?"

Watching his captive's glare intensify made it all the more satisfying for Sora, because the emotions he could work from him never ceased to keep him interested. There was always something more he believed he could work out from the other; if he pushed just right or prodded just a little like that he was sure he could bring out all the more.

Call it narcissistic, but he was enthralled by what his older self was like. They were nothing alike, and yet the flawed connections were there. They were merely on opposite sides of the same coin with Skeith and their player as the link.

"Let go..." The other tried again to break the grip, and failed.

"Not until you say please~" He responded with another grin.

The other looked away again, glaring at the far wall. It was ingenious, really, using one's own reality against them. The World had it's own parameters and limitations, but using the foundations of data to twist the flow of certain things to your own will was entirely plausible. After all, someone made it, some one could edit it.

So really, it was just a matter of twisting the reality to suit his desire. Which happened to be an endless room with no way in, and likewise, no way out. It was like an impenetrable fortress, a locked down safehouse for just the two of them. Sora himself knew how to get out, but his other had not yet figured out how he bent the 'Area' to his liking.

Really, Sora couldn't've been more pleased with his own cunning if he tried.

"There's plenty of time, my lovely Twi-li-ght, I can wait here for as long as it takes for you to crumble, uyryuu~"

Rubbing salt in the open wounds was one of the best ways Sora found to get his other to do what he wanted. It was like a sick puppet show with Haseo as a marionette and him, the puppeteer, twisting and pulling the strings here and there, watching his other squirm and react--fascinating, really.

Haseo's body tensed, and Sora's grin widened even more. Bingo. No matter how much his other tried to hide his weaknesses, he could always spot them so easily. Perhaps that was because every weakness the other had, he didn't. He was the user, not the used. The betrayer, not the betrayed. It was a simple process of finding things like that to him.

"Please," Haseo murmured, head hung in defeat, body slack. "Let go."

Just a little more...

"Well, since you said it so nicely~" He cooed and flipped back, letting go of his others wrists.

It wasn't an instant later that the other sprung, pushing off the wall towards him in a charge.

Sshhitch.

The blades in Haseo's hands stilled from where they'd only been inches away from his other's neck. The sharpness of Sora's wrist blade stung into his neck and shoulder from where he'd flipped over him and pressed it to his neck.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. Chaaa, you really should know by now you can't beat me, mm?" Sora teased, letting his free hand grab Haseo's wrist and wrenched it around, making him drop both blades, moving in close until he had moved around to press the blade he had against the front of his throat and loomed over him.

The others body was tense, he could hear the hitched breath of fear, the quiver of digital muscles as they strained, could feel the slightest twitch in the muscles of his neck where the blade pressed in just so.

"Now then, let's try this again, aa? If I let you go, will you be good?"

"Yes..." The word was barely spoken, like the barest whisper, Sora could feel the fear of being cut if he moved too much there in the way he said it.

Slowly, he retracted the blade away from his neck, but not before leaving a warning nick against the skin that had the other gasping as blood slowly welled up to the surface ot the cut. Their hand shakily went up to the cut when Sora let go. Haseo's fingers were shaking, the result of high strung nerves and spasming muscles.

"...Why?" Haseo finally asked after a long moment of silence as he stared at the blood.

"Why what?" Sora replied nonchalantly, leaning back against the wall with his arms crossed.

"Why did you ever bring me here?"

Sora laughed at that. "I know you're not that stupid," He murmured after a moment as he twisted the end of his bang in an endless circle around his finger.

"I first wanted to be the finder of the Key of Twilight, I thought it was just an object. Thanks to Skeith, I was not destroyed when CC Corp. decided to attach the Phases to PCs. He discarded my character, but I'm just as sentient as you are even without Ryou."

His other stiffened, frowning, but didn't respond.

"And because of that connection, when most of the data was destroyed, mine was not. Thus I was automatically converted into the R:2 with the rest of the remaining core data. I still wanted to find the Key of Twilight. Imagine my surprise when chasing after a rumor that I happened upon you. You, an older version of me; you, a Phase wielder, a link to the Twilight. Did I know you were the Key? Not then, no. Not until I placed together the rest of the Eight. Naturally, if Skeith was first born and first Phase, then it would only be natural that he'd be able to draw in the others powers, nyaa?"

Sora chuckled whimsically, waving his hand, before continuing. "So, when I finally figured this out, I realized that you were the Key. The Key everyone so sought after. It would've been originally just Skeith in R:1 but now that the Phase was connected to you, you could draw upon the power others could not. I could have laughed at all of the irony. Here I was, Datadrained by Skeith, Ryou falling into a Coma while I was left to be controlled by the Phase, and you, to be destined to wield it. Isn't it funny?"

Haseo, however, wasn't laughing. He was just glaring at the ground all the harder.

"So, I had to see what you were like for myself, hmm? And so I decided it just wasn't enough just seeing or discovering the Key of Twilight... No, I wanted to own it, to have it all to myself. So I took you away~"

Haseo slowly lifted his head up and turned the glare onto his green-haired other. "So that's it? You want the Power? Take it, it's not like I need it anymore."

Sora laughed again. "No, no, no. You see, it doesn't work that way. If I could've taken it, I would've. But since Skeith is connected to you and not me now, I have no access to it. I can't simply just take it from you, it's not that easy. I need you for it, don't you see? If it was so simple as taking your Morganna Factor, I would. But it's inside of you, and since I can no longer have that, I can settle with just having you, see? So it's all well and good, bamyon~"

"So all I am to you is a toy to play with whenever you feel the need to raise your ego some more?" Haseo spat, turning away from the other again to glare balefully at the walls again, crossing his arms tightly to himself. If he admitted it, which he didn't, it was more like he was hugging himself than anything.

"You could put it that way if you want," Sora replied lazily. "But don't get so worked up over it. Besides, you could be more...than just a toy if you wanted, I can be nice when I want. You just have to play by my rules~"

Haseo didn't respond at all, he just continued to stand there and stare at the wall, though the glare had died down to just a blank stare.

There was silence for a few moments before Sora shrugged and started humming to entertain himself. It was one of those addictive annoying tunes that would get stuck in your head for days and drive you crazy.

Even then, the other didn't move. It was as if he'd completely withdrawn into himself. Even when Sora went over to him and poked him, he didn't move. His body merely reacted with a few twitches before stilling again. The green-haired male regarded him for a moment with a tilted head.

"Chit-chit...aa, sou ka~ I see now, hm... You're...blocking yourself from feeling and thinking, ne?"

Even then, no response. The other was just simply breathing, and blinking once every once in a long while. Perhaps he'd gone too far.

"If I'm just a toy..." Haseo finally murmured, voice monotone and dead-sounding, making Sora frown. "Then use me and break me already..."

Recoiling a little, shock written across his features, Sora reanalyzed the situation once, twice, and a third time to make sure he heard what he'd heard and to re-take in what all had just gone on.

"Excuse me, ne... I don't believe I heard that right. Say it again?"

There was no response.

He frowned again.

"Well, then," Sora said after a moment, composing his suddenly rocked thoughts. "I can't break you because you're already broken, in a way I hadn't intended. Furthermore, I've no use for something...that's already broken. But then again, I can't just let you go. What to do, mm?"

Haseo finally turned, his crimson eyes were blank and unfeeling as they stared into his. They were dead-like, with no emotion at all in them anymore, and Sora hated it. He wanted to slap him, to say something--anything--to make those sparks of life and anger well up in their depths again.

"Do what you will," Came the emotionless response.

"That's no fun at all when you don't put any feeling into your acting, hmm..."

"Why should I...there's nothing for me in what you want. I'm tired of this. Say what you will for me to do and I'll do, like a perfect doll for you to play with."

"Aa, but dolls never were that fun to play with...because they never spoke back, uyryuu... Chaa... They never felt. What's so fun in something that isn't real enough?"

"...." Haseo's eyes closed and he stilled once more and it angered Sora. Without thinking, his hand struck, and the other's body jerked, stumbling, and a red mark started to form across their cheek.

"You're really starting to piss me off, mm? Keep it up and you'll find yourself re-written entirely."

"Because I'd be more useful to you then?" Came the cold response.

Slam.

Sora glared hatefully down at his other from where he'd shoved him hard into the wall again. His hands were gripping tight against their forearms, most likely to leave bruises like the ones around his wrists, but he didn't care, he was seeing red.

Haseo didn't respond, just stared back with those blank eyes that made him want to tear them out. He really had gone too far.

"I bet you're laughing on the inside, mm? Seeing me so angry? Is this what you wanted?" He hissed.

His others lips curled up into a would-be mocking grin if there were any emotion in it. "No, but I guess it'll do..."

One of Sora's hands left Haseo's arm and latched around his throat in a tight vice-like grip, his expression, frightening.

Weak gasps were his response but they were no longer satisfying, since the other was no longer struggling.

"Then what...do you want?"

The gasping continued and the others eyes swam around at a dizzying pace, but their expression never changed from the blank-look.

"I...want...to be...happy... I'm...tired...of...everything...can't I...have that...at least...?" The words were but breathless whispers between the lessening intakes of air, as the spasming lungs slowly started to cave in from the lack of oxygen--or the equivalent to. Sora stared a moment long, as if transfixed by the darkening of the others eyes and they way they were half-lidded, alerting him of how close they were to passing out.

"Happy, mm?" Without warning, he let go and stepped back, watching as the other crumpled to the floor, gagging and choking, making ragged coughing sounds as he watched their lungs expand and contract heavily in an attempt to bring in as much air as possible. He waited, until the others breathing had returned to semi-normal, and they were now leaning against the wall with a dazed look to their face.

"Happiness is something you find and earn...not something that just comes. People can work all they like and not find any...but that's because they don't look...in the right places. Finding happiness is as simple as breathing. Holding onto it, however, is harder. It's like water, if you can't find something to contain it, then all it will do is slip through your fingers."

Haseo didn't respond, and that was fine to Sora, he wasn't sure he wanted to hear that blank voice right now. So, he simply turned and without putting too much thought into it, conjured a chair and sat down on it.

For now, though, he was content to wait.

TBC.
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End Notes: Holy shit, do you realize how hard this is? xD;; Please bare with me, updates may be slow. I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this. I find it rather ironic and funny that Sora has more of a grasp and concept of life and things than Haseo does. Perhaps Ryou reverted when he fell in his coma? Who knows. Haseo, I've noticed, tends to 'shut down' when something becomes too much for him to handle--he inverts and closes off. Thus, his 'doll' like state he goes into when he doesn't want to deal/handle things. Any comments, suggestions, or flames are acceptable--though I don't promise I won't laugh in your face if you do flame me. I'm merely doing this for my (and my friend's) sick and perverted mind. :D