He should have taken the crown and run when he had the chance.

When she gave it to him on the boat- he should have dragged her back to the tower and then he should have run. As fast as he could, too; top speed in those boots, just like he did when the fathers of those daughters learned what he had done. But no, he didn't. And why the hell not? He desperately tries to remember, but all that comes back is the gentle glow of the lanterns- and how many of them there were- and Rapunzel, damn her, Rapunzel, with her hair braided with flowers and her face flushed with fear and delight.

Because Flynn could have run. Hell, Flynn could have run all the way, anywhere; Flynn could have gotten whatever he wanted out of that girl. But it hadn't been Flynn in that boat.

It had been Eugene.

Stupid, orphan boy Eugene, with his big book of adventure tales and a heart that longed for action and romance and something else. And Eugene was smitten by Rapunzel. So much. So much that he sang. And held a girl's hand in a situation other than pulling her into a linen closet.

His mouth twitches.

But who had seen that green lantern glinting in the forest? Who had rowed the boat to shore, leaving Rapunzel alone on that dark patch of land, like a flower among weeds? Who had walked to the Stabbington brothers, who had spoken those words-

Flynn had. Of course.

The man in the cell was having a tough time deciding who was more idiotic- Flynn Rider or Eugene Fitzherbert. But he knew they were both pretty fucked up to have done any of those things. Singing. Stealing. Making a ludicrous deal for the crown and then dying for a girl he had only known for two days. Damn. He had died. Death. It was possibly the only thing that Flynn feared. But then, again, didn't Eugene fear death, too? - Dying alone, dying poor, dying the orphan he had been since he was born.

But he'd done it. For her.

Wait. What the hell? Who had? Flynn or Eugene?

"Argh," he groans, slamming his head against the stone wall behind the bars. Cold. Hard. And it hurt his head. And his brain already hurt. Now he was going crazy. "Shit."

"Quiet, Rider," snaps a voice. And whose voice is that?

A better question is is that a real voice? Because he, whoever the fuck he is, cannot for his own worthless life tell if it's real or fake. And isn't that to be expected? He's going crazy, right? Multiple-personality disorder? Something along those lines.

He opens his eyes. The light stings- not the kind of irritable, shut-the-curtains pain of a hangover, but the pain of a miserable man curled helplessly on the floor of a cell, the pain of a man of constant sorrow, the kind of person who doesn't care for the watery white light through cell bars because he's seen the light and this is nothing, nothing like that. Through the bars there's no one- not a single guard. And he knows why; through the thick stone walls comes the faint trickle of music. Cheerful voices. They're celebrating the return of their lost princess, and somehow, it makes him feel worse that he's alone. They've forgotten about him. They've forgotten about Flynn Rider, the man they've been chasing since the dawn of time.

He rolls onto his back and stares at the ceiling. There's a sickly moss starting to grow there, the color of pea soup. "Fuck this," he says to no one in particular.

"Wow. Real mature. You sound like you're thirteen."

What the hell? Who is that?

"You should shut up. You got yourself into this mess."

He opens his eyes quickly and this time there's someone there. Someone familiar. Someone he hasn't seen in a long time. Someone who looks oddly like him. But his clothes are dirtier, stained and patched, hand-me-downs that don't seem to fit, and he's thinner, wiry, with prominent cheekbones and short hair that's actually combed.

He's holding a book.

The man on the ground realizes with a pang of horror that this is the very person he's been running for years to avoid. The very person who skirts along his dreams, watching his escapades with unreadable eyes. The very person who's on his tail even when the guards aren't, always one step behind him, omnipresent. It's Eugene Fitzherbert, back from the dead, except he was never really dead, was he? He's just been quiet. Until yesterday. Until now.

So if that's Eugene, then he's-

"Flynn Rider." Eugene leans against the wall with the heavily bound brown-leather book under one arm. It's like looking into a fractured mirror; he knew that it was really himself standing there, a reflection of him, but it felt like someone else. Eugene swims in front of him and he can hardly see straight and his head throbs uncomfortably. He wants to wish this nightmarish vision away, to make him disappear, but a tiny bit of him is horrified and fascinated at the same time- because it's Eugene, Eugene from so long ago, and he's here...

"Eugene Fitzherbert." Flynn pulls himself to his feet, and the warm bite of his boots is a little reassuring. He mimics Eugene, leaning lazily against the wall, speaking in the self-confident drawl that's reserved for half-sober women in bars- women that might not be drunk, but will soon be drunk on him, crave him. Flynn Rider. Ah. It feels better, knowing who he is for the first time in days. "What brings you here?"

Eugene narrows his eyes. "You know why I'm here."

"I don't, actually. Care to explain?"

Eugene glares at him.

"You let her get away."

He speaks slowly, controlled, but Flynn can hear the anger that's bubbling behind his drawn face, kept barely under control. It excites him. Eugene never gets angry- he's a quiet boy who does as he's told, who tries to stay out of trouble, who takes beatings without a single cry of pain. Eugene is a good boy. A very, very good boy. And Flynn Rider despises good boys.

"Pardon?" Flynn meets Eugene's blazing brown eyes.

Eugene exhales sharply. "You let her go. You- you let them take her away."

"Who are you talking about?" Flynn examines his nails, which are surprisingly clean and well cut for a man who's been in prison for so long.

"You know perfectly well who I'm talking about," Eugene whispers. "I'm talking about the girl who you've wronged from the beginning. For eighteen years, they've been mourning their daughter, and then you went and stole the only piece of her they had left to cling to- the crown. On her birthday. Do you fucking realize how much... how you... what you did to them? Can you, Rider- can you comprehend that? Losing your daughter?" The words are an angry hiss.

"I-" For once in his life, Flynn doesn't know what he can say, but his mouth moves faster than his mind.

"No," Eugene says, his voice growing louder, stepping closer to Flynn. "Shut up and listen for once. I don't think you understand- have you ever understood? Have you ever come close? But no!" Eugene shakes his head disgustedly. "I've been watching you for too long, Rider, and I've had enough."

"You broke in and made a deal with her- a deal you knew you were going to break. You obviously weren't going to take her to see them- and even if by some radical stroke of luck on her part, if you did, you certainly wouldn't return her safely. I saw your eyes when she threw you that satchel- you were almost going to take it and row the boat back to shore. You would have left her in a heartbeat if it hadn't been for them- those- those fucking goons, those evil... things- that you worked with- I can't believe you'd sink that low, but you betrayed them, too, and I know you got what you deserved- and fuck!- how could you leave her there? God, you're so... I can't even... You should have at least taken her back to Maximus, you stupid bastard... "

Eugene's eyes are clouded with rage.

"I-" Flynn tries again, desperately trying to think of something to say, because he's never seen a man like this, never heard those notes of misery, never felt as twisted and strange and terrible as he does now, hearing Eugene-

"And then you took her back," he whispers hoarsely, ignoring Flynn; "You went back to get her. But that wasn't really you- it was me. She just thinks it's you." He turns to Flynn with eyes that aren't angry anymore, but despairing, helpless: "She thinks you love her. She thinks it's you that cares for her, that you died for her."

And the truth of this makes his eyes seem to harden, like stones. Swords. "You don't love her. You don't love anyone- not all of those business partners you tricked, not any of those women you lied to and left, not the poor girls who you promised the world to and only stole from- you don't love anyone, and you never have, so why would you love her?"

A perfect deadly silence hangs in the room.

The light falls over him in a milky curtain and now Flynn can see him as he is- and he looks like something else; not human, but ethereal- someone that couldn't possibly be from that world. Bloodshot, red-eyed, a man who'd been forced to live in the shadows and watch someone else do wrong for all of his life, a man too weak, too afraid, to do anything; breathing heavily, chest heaving- someone who'd been through too much- too much trouble, someone who'd seen nothing but indecency and pain and suffering come under the hands of someone else- someone disgusting, someone with no sense or sanity or morality, without a conscience; he was glowing- positively gleaming!- with something white-hot.

There was a man who'd been cheated out of the only thing he'd ever wanted.

He steps closer to Flynn- so close that he can nearly feel his breath on his lips, so he can smell the deep, bookish scent of Eugene the orphan, see the staccato stubble that creeps across his gleaming face. He can see how ragged he is- sleepless, red-eyed, and furious, so angry that he couldn't find the right words to describe it.

"I- I've..." His voice falters. Spots of fear dance in Flynn's vision.

Wait? What the fuck? This is Eugene. Eugene can't do anything to him. Eugene's not even real, dammit.

Flynn clears his throat and looks at his own handsome reflection in Eugene's eyes. "I've changed, Eugene. This whole thing... the last few days... this is real." He swallows nervously. Why does it sound so fake? God, he sounds like he's lying. The words are little blocks of wood, meaningless. And a tiny nagging doubt whispers to him- you are lying, Flynn. Liar, liar, liar...

"I do love Rapunzel," he says. There.

And then what happened? Flynn doesn't know, but suddenly he hears a bang and a thud and dust rises in thick, dusty layers from the floor and he's so much closer to the ground and his face hurts like hell and there's something warm and wet trickling down his lip and ow his face hurts and his back's pressed strangely against the ground and something else and God something's on his face, and it hurts, hurts like fuck, and he can hardly see...

Bang. "How... can you... even... even speak... her name?" It's Eugene's voice. Bang.

A sharp pang of pain rips through Flynn's face as Eugene strikes him again. And again. He can feel his nose break under the orphan's fingers, and then his left eye goes black, and- fuck!- is that-

He doesn't know what he's doing until his hands seize the dusty book that's splayed open on the ground. Flynn's nails dig into the thick, leathery cover and he raises it into the air... and then- bang! Eugene skids falls away from him, crumpling like a dead man into the corner of the cell. Flynn pinches his crooked nose back into place.

"Still worried they can't get your nose right?" Eugene screams from against the bars, his hair falling across his face, blood streaming from his mouth. He's hysterical- Eugene's hysterical! - but that can't be right, because how can Eugene even sit there, in the corner of the cell? Eugene's not real! He's part of Flynn, a dead part of him, and that just means that Flynn's going crazy. And what the hell? Why is he bleeding then, if this is only a figment of his imagination?

There's only one way to get rid of Eugene.

Flynn approaches him with The Tales of Flynnigan Rider, lifts them into the air, and brings them back down. Bang. Again. Bang. And again. Bang. Adrenaline streams through his body, blinding him, deafening him. The only thing he knows is that Eugene has to die, Eugene can't exist anymore, because Eugene is just going to bring him down. Bang. Eugene will be the death of him. Bang. There's blood on the pages but he doesn't care. Bang. Screams echo in the cell but he doesn't care. Bang. Bang. Bang.

The book snaps. Flynn throws it to the side- but in that moment of weakness, Eugene seizes the bottom of Flynn's vest and tears it as he drags him down. Buttons spray across the cold stone as Flynn Rider hits the ground. Eugene rolls over, clawing blindly- not at his face anymore but everywhere, and Flynn can feel his fingers drag painfully across his chest, across his white shirt, over his mouth, digging scratches across his face.

He grunts as he reaches out and yanks Eugene down, ready to smash his face into the cold, hard ground, but even within inches of Flynn's own head, Eugene doesn't stop. He struggles against Flynn's hand in his hair, hands racing up and down Flynn's chest in an effort to hurt him somewhere, anywhere, just to make him beg for mercy, to regret what he's done. Flynn knows that Eugene wants to make him scream and wish and repent for everything- everything.

Eugene's eyes blaze as he bites Flynn's lip. Hard. Blood sprays from Flynn's mouth, falling into Eugene's hair and splattering across Flynn's shirt. Flynn thickly swallows his own blood and tries to push Eugene away, but he won't stop- he's heavy on top of Flynn, the only person he's known and the person he hates most of all, and holds him down as he presses his teeth to Flynn's face, his mouth, this throat, biting deliriously and whispering something that neither of them can understand-

Flynn's hand regains control and creeps up to Eugene's throat, wrapping around the thin column of skin hard enough to bruise; he doesn't know what he's doing, but then again, he doesn't know exactly what Eugene is doing, either, and he can hardly see for the red swimming between his swollen eyelids. His hand tangles itself into Eugene's hair and drags him lower until he's right on top of him, heavy, straddling him so tightly Flynn can hardly breathe.

Flynn hisses as Eugene's lips brush the cut that's still throbbing, but there's no room to pull away when it's just the two of them and the cell floor. He struggles against Eugene's mouth as it seals over his, pressing violently against his own; this isn't right, this doesn't make any sense, and it's disturbing- some kind of weird nightmare- but Flynn would never, even facing the hangman's noose, admit that he likes the way it burns, likes the way it hurts. He pulls at Eugene's raggedy vest, digging his fingers into his shoulder blades until Eugene shudders in pain and the entire thing tears off, but it doesn't stop there- no!- because this is sick and twisted and strange and Flynn just can't stop.

He kisses Eugene back, but it's hardly a kiss. It hurts. It's not soft or tender or loving or any of those things kisses are supposed to be- but all of that pent-up anger seems to stream out as he runs his tongue over Eugene's teeth, as he clamps down Eugene's lower lip so hard it makes him groan, long and painful into Flynn's mouth. And Eugene retaliates even more angrily, with so many years of pain that he wants to wreak on Flynn in these last few moments-

It's insane.

It's all-consuming, fiery and angry. It's crawling up his spine with malicious delight; his breath comes in fire and his body twitches with fever. It's grabbing his sanity by the throat and throttling it until it dies, until he's gasping for air, until his vision goes red. It makes no sense, and it's against everything he believes in. He can smell the hatred on Eugene's breath. It's like poison.

It's not love. It's something else, something dangerously far from love: something shameful and angry and fiery. And finally, in the end, it feels so good to burn.