Chapter 3 - Old Enemies

They both dropped their human disguises showing their natural Irken skin.
Rasp had a serious look in his dark red eyes, which Arac returned through his own glittering golden eyes. They scowled at each other for a few deathly silent moments, like a staring contest, neither of them seemed to blink, still as statues.
They had hated each other as long as anyone could remember. They were such complete opposites.
Arac always seemed calm and collected, yet subtly mischievous. His glittering golden eyes held a helpful power, he could listen into peoples thoughts. He was strongly built with fairly dark skin, always enjoying the company of others, and had a charming yet dangerous grin, and stood around seven inches over the head of Rasp.
Rasp, on the other hand, was a bundle of loose energy, rarely contained, he often speaks his mind or acts without thinking. His dark red eyes had more of a polished shine, than a glitter, and were often unreadable. He was thinly built, even girlishly built, but very lean, and stronger than Arac, although Arac could easily outrun him. He had never enjoyed company very much, he’d much rather be alone, preferably in the woods seeking out quiet spots to think, or watching wolves if ever he spots one.

Arac said nothing, but turned for the door. Rasp was there in a split second, trying to use his rather small framed body to block the much larger door.
Arac sighed, “What do you want to know?”
Arac would never admit it but he somewhat feared the little guy, for the obvious reason of strength but also for an unconscious reason he couldn’t explain.
Rasp crossed his arms across his chest and glared at him sternly.
“What I want to know is everything,” Rasp said, being nit-picky with Arac’s speech, “but what I need to know is what’s going on.”
Arac gave a sigh and rolled his eyes prominently, Rasp could be so infuriating.
“What do you mean ‘what’s going on’? I can’t help if you aren’t specific,” Arac said taking a seat in an old desk chair.
“You know very well what I mean!” Rasp was getting aggravated now, and it showed as the sharp edge shot into his voice.
Rasp waited a moment and calmed down. His eyes shifted to the floor, “I want to know…what do you see? What to you see in the snow? Those old memories are bugging you, what are they about? Who do you see in them? Why does it scare you? I want to know…”
Arac sat in shock, his legs partially crossed comfortably in the chair, and his glittering eyes wide. It had almost sounded as if Rasp was worried about him. He studied Rasp’s expression for a moment, to see if this was some sort of joke, but as always, he got nothing from Rasp. Arac often wondered if the boy thought at all. If he did, the thoughts always escaped Arac. Normally every person has some amount of thought he can hear, from the simplest, to the most complicated, but Rasp never had any thoughts Arac could hear. Sometimes he wondered if Rasp wasn’t Irken but some sort of thick headed Irken look alike, that was either incredibly intelligent, or incredibly dull. Maybe he was an Irken experiment like Zech and her “siblings”, he had never seemed to get many readable thoughts off of them. Or maybe he was some sort of earthen animal in disguise as an Irken, he couldn’t read the thoughts of dogs or cats- not that he had particularly wanted to. He entertained the thought of Rasp being some simple minded earth being for a while until abruptly being brought back from his thoughts by a rough clawed hand being brought harshly across his face.
“Are you even listening to me?” Rasp said, with a sharp edge in each word. His dark red eyes seemed to set ablaze when he was angry, presenting a rather threatening glare.
Arac shook the sting of the open handed slap off and rubbed his cheek. There were slight traces of red on his hand where Rasp’s sharp nails had scraped a thin layer of skin off, making him bleed slightly.
Arac tsk’d at him, “Now Rasp, we shouldn’t be doing that. We wouldn’t want blood shed here, after all, we’re just guests at this house.”
Rasps blood began to boil.
“Now Arac, do you really think annoying him further will help at all?” a soft feminine voice came from the shadows.
Both of their hearts leapt with a sudden fright at the new voice in the room. The looked over next to the window, where the light of the moon illuminated the blinds in the dimly lit room. The blinds opened with a quick swish, revealing Zech leaning against the wall coolly. The moonlight filled up the room with a calming blue light. Arac and Rasp heaved a sigh of relief.
“Don’t startle us like that!” Rasp said.
“Feh, startled? I was fine, but the look on your face was priceless,” Arac teased.
Rasp growled low in his throat at his comment.
Zech shifted and moved closer, she was taller than both of them with one natural red eye, and one eye that was partially purple and partially blue.
“Settle down you two,” she said coming to a halt next to Arac, who was still seated in the office chair.
Arac let out a slight chuckle, “So you were listening in on all of that?”
Zech chuckled back, “Listening in? No, I had just come by to drop something off…” she walked over to Rasp and placed a small brown case in his hand, “I believe this is yours.”
Rasp clutched the small familiar brown case, and in his mind, he could tell, Zech knew something she wasn’t showing.
She smiled and walked out of the room, completely nonchalant but pausing before she closed the door-
“Oh, and also, next time you two decide to have one of your little ‘chats’, I suggest you find a place a little more sound proof than a spare bedroom.”
With the she walked out, not closing the door behind her, revealing a pale Irken girl standing in the doorway. It was Wayra, and she didn’t look in to good a mood.
“Oops…” was the only thing Rasp said.
Wayra wasn’t the type to get easily aggravated, but when she does, it shows. Her dark green eyes were framed into a disapproving scowl, the way an owner would look down on a disobedient dog. She let out an exasperated sigh.
“Home. Both of you. Now.” She made it short and simple as the two of them slinked out the door and into the main room.
Rasp walked towards the door to the outside where the Voot cruiser was waiting, under about five inches of snow. Before Arac made it to the door Elet had him in a clinging hug asking Wayra if he could please stay.
Rasp felt his blood run cold… no one was going to ask if he could stay…
He walk out the door without another word stopping at the Voot. Instead of climbing in like he should have he walked by it and treaded across the small sheet of fresh snow back out to the meadow, and finally to the forest.
Jealousy was the dominant emotion in his mind. He was jealous of Arac, he had lots of friends, even after what he had done, he can still make friends. He came to rest next to a stump as the wind began to blow. He moved to the side facing away from the wind nesting away from the cold. He pulled his CD player out of his pocket and shuffled through the few CDs he had actually brought with him, put one in and curled up against the side of the giant stump, letting the lyrics flow through his head lulling him into a trance like phase where all he did was think, completely contradictory to Arac’s theories.
He sang along softly, the words to the first song that played…

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life

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