-See No Evil-

A multi-chaptered twin centric story

Pairing: Later HikaHaru, possibly KaoMei hints

Rated for mildly bad language

A/N: And a new story starts. :) All of my exams are now over (yey!) so as well as working on updates for I don't believe in love at first sight, I've started a new OHSHC story, because I'm nerdy like that. It's much more serious than my others, but I really like it so far so I hope you enjoy it too :D

Info: Based in an AU where the twins are in their first year but never joined the Host Club. The HC is otherwise running as normal. A character called Kimiko is in this chapter; in canon she's the twins' and Haruhi's fan and classmate with short hair and though her name and bio was in the manga, there wasn't much to go on, so you could say she's essentially an OC. She isn't in it much.

Also many thanks to Grimdreamer for being a wonderful beta-reader. She deserves many Snickers bars!

Enjoy :3

-Prologue-

He was terrified.

His heart was pounding in his skull like the clatter of steel drums. As he lifted a trembling hand, he became acutely aware of how helpless he really was. There was nothing above him and nothing below, nothing but the crumbling surface on which he was clinging.

"Move."

He couldn't, he couldn't. Despite the fact his muscles were beginning to strain, threatening to uncoil and let him fall to his death, he just couldn't force himself to shift his hand.

He'd never been more scared in his life.

"On your right, Hikaru."

Because the only thing keeping him alive was the words of someone he'd never even seen.

-1-

Her boyfriend took so long to appear that Kimiko Sakurazuka eventually resorted to counting desks, which wasn't the most interesting pastime. She concluded that there were twenty-eight, seven down and four across, all perfectly spaced in a classroom so luxurious that it put the top public schools to shame.

Not that Kimiko had any idea what a public school looked like; she had never attended anywhere outside Ouran Academy's prestigious halls.

"There's only ten minutes of lunch left," she noted to herself, staring vacantly at a silver wall clock and trying not to let the disappointment leak into her tone.

He was probably with his brother. Scratch that, he was definitely with his brother, talking about who-knows-what and letting the time run away from them like water through their fingers, though he did promise he'd meet her at the start of lunch so they could eat together…

No, she quickly thought to herself, shaking her head. Stop that. She shouldn't complain; after all, when he first accepted her love letter, she had promised not to come between the two brothers. Giddy and infatuated, she'd sworn to herself to be the most understanding and caring girlfriend ever. She'd be everything he wanted, so he'd never be lonely. And what had he said? That he would always treasure her. It was just like a shojo manga.

Apart from… it wasn't. They went on dates but he was always late. They had every lesson together but it was his brother he snuck notes to. They walked through the halls together but he never held her hand. It made none of it seem-

Stop it, she reprimanded herself once again, refusing to let those doubts creep in. He smiles at me, doesn't he? He smiles and sends me gifts and kisses me. He's just getting used to it. She smiled fondly and shook her head again, short hair bobbing around her ears.

"What are you shaking your head at?" a soft, teasing voice suddenly said from the doorway, and she instantly looked up, a beam gracing her lips before she even caught sight of him.

Kaoru Hitachiin.

He was leaning against the doorframe, with a cat-like expression of detached amusement on his face that made her giggle. He had a lean build and, as he wandered over to her, he lifted a hand to rustle his shock of red hair.

"Sorry I'm late," he said, smiling. "I hope you weren't waiting too long."

"Oh… that's okay, Kaoru. Were you talking to Hikaru?"

"Mm." He winked and added grandly, "He got us tickets for the theatre this weekend, for that new opera."

"Oh! That's wonderful!"

"You want to go?"

"Of course!"

"Good."

Without another word, he stood close to her and began to trace a finger up and down her arm, causing her to blush happily. He caught her gaze and smiled softly at her before quickly looking back down to her hand. Finding this absolutely adorable, Kimiko resisted the urge to dissolve into a fan-girlish squeal and went to ask about the tickets, but he interrupted her.

"Hey, Kimi?"

A nickname! "Yes, Kaoru?"

"I was wondering…" And suddenly his arms were looped lovingly around her waist and she blushed even deeper. "You can tell me and Hikaru apart, can't you?"

She blinked. "I- w-well yes, I think so… I mean, it's hard sometimes as you do look so similar…" She suddenly smiled shyly and added, "But I feel so close to you. I can always tell which one is my Kaoru."

"I see," he said, his voice suddenly sounding strange. She looked up at him uncertainly but his stoic face didn't return the gesture and after a second he asked, "How can you do that?"

"Well… Your eyes," she explained, before bravely reaching up and brushing a strand of red hair away so she could see their golden-brown depths. They glanced at her and she found her lips twitching into a shy smile. "They're softer than Hikaru's. Kinder. I've always loved your eyes."

"Right."

Was that regret she heard in his voice then? No, something wearier, more travel-worn, like familiar disappointment. Her hand faltered and fell, uncertainty rolling around in her stomach like a small animal. Before she could worriedly question him however, his eyes had flickered to something and then all at once his hand was at her chin and his lips were crushed against hers. Bewildered, she briefly considered pulling away, but as he pressed closer her heart and her resistance melted away; she kissed back, delighting in the feeling of his hot breath, resting her hands on his chest-

"Oi!"

Kimiko jumped out of her skin at the voice and pulled away so fast it was a surprise she didn't get whiplash. As Kaoru watched her darkly, she stared over to the door, fearing the worst - a teacher, the chairman, her father- but instead was faced with Hikaru, Kaoru's twin, identical in everything but the way his hair fell on his head. She wanted to be relived, but the expression on his face scared her; intense and furious.

"Hikaru-" she started, glancing over to Kaoru for reassurance. His arms had fallen away and he was now staring firmly away from her. "I'm sorry-?"

"What do you think you're doing?" the twin at the door hissed, now letting a degree of hurt show in his face that made her feel immensely guilty, though she didn't know why. "Kimiko? I thought you were meeting me here. Me?"

"I-What? Hikaru, I don't understand…"

"Don't you?"

The brother next to her had spoken then, though he didn't face her. Bewildered, she whipped her head round to him and instinctively tried to grab onto his arm; he moved it away. "Kaoru-?"

The one by the door spoke up, as if in response. "I can't believe you'd do this, Kimi. Do you hate me? Or wasn't one brother enough for you?"

Horror overcame her as the implication of his words clocked in her mind. Both disgust and embarrassment crawled up her spine like a parade of spiders and her head accusingly turned back to the closest twin, as if she was watching a tennis match. But any words clogged and broke in her throat as he found him - Hikaru? - gazing back at her already, an unrecognisable yet horrible expression in his eyes.

"Some girlfriend you have here, Kaoru," he said. Then, "I told her who I was."

"What?" She stared at him in horror as he slowly backed away, blood rushing from her face and making her feel light-headed. "N-no, you… You didn't! I thought-!"

"Are you calling my twin a liar?" the one at the door suddenly accused and though she opened her mouth, she couldn't force any words out. At length, he spoke again.

"Though you know, I shouldn't really be surprised by all this. I mean…"

And then, his face changed. All the hurt and anger, all the emotions that showed she actually mattered to him, dropped away as smoothly as taking off a mask. What was left was a cold, wicked grin. He lent his elbow on his twin's shoulder and together they leered at her as if she was some sort of meaningless prey. Kimiko felt her heart stop beating even before he spoke.

"We've been swapping the name 'Kaoru' every day for weeks."

She stared at them, stunned. "You… You, what…?" Then she shook her head slowly, confused. "No, you… No. I mean- We-"

But her words her cut short by their widening grins, mocking and cruel. Realisation overcame her like an icy wave and as it crashed through her body, piercing every pore, it seemed to sweep half of her away. She couldn't believe it. They couldn't have- On purpose- He was so romantic, every day, she thought with Kaoru she- she might have been in-

"You didn't even notice, did you?" they snorted, disgusted, and the first tears broke free and began to roll down her face. One of them - she didn't know which one, she didn't care, they were just the same, horrible, horrible - leaned in closer to her and wiggled his eyebrows mockingly as he said, "I wonder which one of us you kissed more? I mean, you should know. You always know which twin is 'your Kaoru', after all."

She cracked then - as she watched the face she had once seen looking at her so kindly twist into a cruel sneer, a sob burst from her throat and a humiliated flush stained her face. His words broke her heart.

"H-how could- Why would you do that?"

"Why not?" the other drawled, his eyes loftily amused as if she was just some mildly entertaining peasant. He cocked his head and gave her trembling form a hard, disgusted look for several seconds before finally saying, "You go out with one of us and you don't even bother to learn to tell us apart. Softer eyes… God, who do you think you are? You're a liar and you don't deserve to go out with us."

His words had morphed into a cruel spit and Kimiko could feel her hands trembling with humiliation. But the worst thing about it was the sense of self-loathing that their words had lulled her into; suddenly, the horrible betrayal seemed to be just as much her fault as it was theirs. She felt dirty and disgusted, used and a user, and she didn't think her heart could break anymore. With a last gasping sob, she span round and fled towards the door, almost stumbling in her haste.

But then, before she could leave, "One more thing."

The twins' identical grins widened as she stopped, stumbled and glanced back at them, hoping desperately that the last five minutes didn't really happen. But they did, and it was stupid to hope otherwise as the devilish brothers lent towards each other and leered at her, two sets of golden eyes glinting tauntingly beneath hellish flames of red hair.

The one who'd called her spoke then, smirking as though he was having the time of his life. "You're a terrible kisser," he informed her.

A harsh flush stained her face and she ran from the room without another word, shaking so violently she doubted she would ever be able to stop. Their mocking laughter chased her down the hallway like the echoing booms of church bells, rebounding off the walls, biting at her heels. It would be a long time before she would get their lingering cackles to stop haunting her mind.

Hikaru and Kaoru continued to laugh. They laughed when the girl started to run and they laughed harder when they heard her sobs. Hikaru had to clutch onto Kaoru's shoulder he was laughing so hard. As an audience of two, they continued to have complete hysterics even after the girl's footfalls left them, even though neither found it funny, not at all.

They just continued to laugh, because what else could they do?

"Have you heard? The club will be dressing as the Tokugawa Shogunate today!"

"Uwah, I know! Haruhi will look gorgeous as Soji Okita… I'd like him to protect me…"

Hikaru rolled his eyes and tried to speed up his walk to pass the two hyperactive girls in front of him. They were giggling behind their hands and walking fast in their excitement, the yellow folds of their dresses flapping around their ankles.

"Mori so fits the role of a noble warrior… He should be Soma, the dark horse!"

"Ooh, no, he should be the brave Yama… Yamazaki…"

Hikaru smirked as they finally noticed him and the sight of him walking solo seemed to be enough to surprise them into silence. Their stride finally slowed, so he could brush past them and walk down the corridor ahead of them, which he did so with an uncaring swagger. After a moment, he glanced back at the pair but they hadn't returned to their loud discussion about their dear Host Club. Instead, they were whispering quietly behind their hands, glancing about them worriedly, as though they expected the missing twin to jump out at them.

Though he snorted at their reaction, the sight of him without Kaoru was very rare indeed, especially at school. He barely spent five minutes away from him and at the academy they accompanied each other absolutely everywhere, even the bathroom. The longest they spent away from each other was those times when they were pretending to go out with a girl, getting her hopes up, but even then, they switched every ten minutes.

Right now however, Hikaru was slowly walking to their car alone while Kaoru had run back to the classroom to fetch his project. Hikaru could have offered to accompany him, which he usually would have, but today he was in too much of a mood to.

Though he was aware there was no rational reason for it, he was really irritated at his twin.

When class had rejoined for literature after lunch, Kimiko hadn't said anything about what had happened - they never did. Classmates were told 'it didn't work out' and they were too polite to pry further. Whenever someone had asked the twins what had happened to cause the split, Hikaru noticed they never looked at one Hitachiin specifically. No one was quite sure which one she had been going out with in the first place.

For some reason, this had angered him. Whenever the twins messed with a love-letter sender, it usually made him evilly amused, or at least filled him with a sense of twisted justice. But this time, he was just getting more and more wound up. He was angry at Kimiko, angry at their classmates, angry at the fact no one said their names in fear of getting it wrong. Frustrated, he irrationally blamed Kaoru for the fact they shared the same face, for the fact no one could tell them apart, for the fact no one cared who he was. Was he Hikaru or was he just a Hitachiin twin?

He'd finally reached outside and, through the sudden sunlight overwhelmed his eyes, he powered blindly across the courtyard, furious thoughts buzzing inside his skull like wasps.

As Hikaru had gotten angrier and angrier that day, Kaoru had become quieter and moodier, as though he was blaming himself too. If he was honest, Hikaru knew it was ridiculous to think that it was Kaoru's fault and he should be ashamed of himself for even becoming snappish with him. He loved Kaoru more than anything and wouldn't swap their intimate bond, their cosy little world, for anything on earth.

And yet, sometimes… Sometimes he felt the complete opposite. Whenever they tested people, whenever they sneered that no one could tell, there always that hope.

Please, please, just look at me. I'm different from him, if you can just be arsed to look. Why aren't I worth the bother?

No one could ever tell though, not really. It was the story of his life, the exact same, again and again and again, and it was driving him mad. And yet they relentlessly continued to test people, setting themselves up for that self-destroying disappointment, like bombs initiating their own countdown.

3, 2, 1...

Blinded by his anger, Hikaru continued to walk.

What was the point, really? Of anything? His life was so claustrophobic, just him and Kaoru against those who were blind to them, every week, every day, every second, for so bloody long. He was running a tightly coiled cycle and if nothing snapped, he would.

He could hear hurried footsteps jogging up behind him now, trying to catch up, a rhythmic pat-pat-pat against the concrete. They were just loud enough to hear, like a reminder at the back of his mind. Kaoru catching up to him, perhaps. Hikaru honestly didn't know whether he wanted to run away or turn around and embrace him. He settled for a compromise and just sped up his walk, scrunching his eyes closed as if to blind himself from the fire of his contradicting conflict.

Hikaru's last thought before he stepped onto the road was one he would always regret.

Fuck everything. I… I hate being a twin.

And then he stepped and there was no time for thinking.

He was so preoccupied with that last harsh thought, that at first he didn't even notice. Then a horn blasted its way through his eardrums and he whipped his head round and, just for a moment, time froze. A flash of metal, rearing towards him like a barely-concealed monster; its screams were the squeal of tires. He couldn't see the drivers face. The sunlight caught onto the windshield and now it glared like a sun and burned his eyes. It was moving too fast to stop; he'd walked too far to turn around.

Then everything began moving, very fast.

There was a bang and a scream and suddenly he was very hot, burning in his skin, organs blistering with the pure heat of it-

And then it was so cold he couldn't breathe-

And then there was nothing.

Please review!

Constructive criticism would be very much appreciated! :D