Disclaimer: I own no part of Ouran High School Host Club or Fruits Basket; they belong to Hatori Bisco and Natsuki Takaya, etc. (And obviously the first paragraph isn't mine; I borrowed it from the LunarAnime translation of the Ouran anime.)
Author's Note
Hello! I'm SheherazadeSohma and this is my first fanfiction. It's a Fruits Basket/Ouran High Host Club crossover. I've seen all of the Ouran anime and am currently making my way through the first volume of the manga; I've read up to volume 14 of Furuba. This story is situated sometime before the end of the Ouran anime, and between chapters 82 and 83 of Furuba 14. (Ch. 82 is the one where Tohru visits Rin in the hospital and they get to know each other a bit better. Ch. 83 is where the hilarious miscasting for the Cinderella play occurs, and Yuki goes into the Student Council room's closet before Kimi, with her great timing, tells him the lock is broken, and Yuki is locked in.) We'll just pretend there are a few months between those chapters, shall we? I don't think there are any Furuba or Ouran spoilers.
Now that you know how much my knowledge extends, I hope you'll forgive me if I make a mistake here and there, though I'll try and avoid those. If one happens, and it should have been covered in an episode I saw/volume I've read, I either did it for the story, or my memory was being stupid.
Please enjoy!
Chapter 1: The Web is Spun
Ouran Private Academy is defined by one, prestigious families, and two, wealth. And prosperous people have much time on their hands. Therefore, this Host Club is about these handsome guys that have time giving hospitality to these lovely ladies who also have time….and profit off them. It's an elegant game unique to this super-rich school.
But of course, all games grow old if the rules and players stay the same…
"Kyouya-senpai, what's wrong?"
Kyouya Ohtori glanced up from his laptop, dark eyes locking onto the younger girl's face. Haruhi Fujioka stood next to him wearing a brunette wig with braided pigtails, a traditional German dirndl, and a concerned look.
He pushed his glasses higher up his nose. "What makes you think something's wrong?"
"You look more poker-faced than usual."
Kyouya smirked while the rest of the Host Club, decked out in lederhosen and cleaning up behind the two, sweatdropped at Haruhi's characteristic bluntness.
"Daddy's little girl will never learn tact," Tamaki Suoh, King of the Host Club, lamented to himself. His "daughter", as he frequently called her, looked absolutely adorable today in the German dress—the white longsleeved shirt under the black-bodiced, red-skirted dress, the pretty little white apron…
"Is Tama-chan going lovey-dovey over Haru-chan again?" Hunny Haninozuka said, waving his pink stuffed rabbit in the taller boy's face.
"GEH! Wha—!? No, I—!!!" He blushed to his blonde roots and started sweeping with a scary vigor.
"Plus, you were so worried about your work, you didn't join in the club activities today," Haruhi continued, adding a mumbled, "Or perhaps it was the thought of wearing lederhosen, eh?"
The older boy motioned Haruhi to stand behind his shoulder so she could see the laptop screen. "I've been working on a fairly consuming project as of late," Kyouya replied while typing out, Mother of God, yes. I'm deciding how to kill the idiot Frenchman as we speak.
"Ah yes, wasn't it something about the Sohma heirs, Kyouya?" Tamaki the idiot Frenchman called out. "When are they coming anyway?"
"We haven't a fixed date yet, but it won't be long now."
"Eh?" Hikaru and Kaoru, the devilish twins, gave Haruhi a minor heart-attack when they popped up behind her. "Sohma?" they continued in unison. "So they're finally sending the next generation to Ouran?"
"Apparently."
"Would someone please fill me in?" Haruhi asked, absently slapping the twins' hands as they each teasingly tried to curve an arm around the waist of her black bodice.
"As you would expect, the Sohma clan is very rich and powerful, even by Ouran Academy standards," Kyouya informed in his low, smooth voice. "They don't really specialize in dominating any one area, but build strong establishments in a variety of fields—oil, insurance, finance, commerce…there's even one, an Ayame Sohma, I believe, who made quite a coup a while back concerning fashion."
HISSSSSSSSS!!!!!!
Haruhi jumped away from the twins. With white-hot eyes, auburn hair sticking straight up, and teeth lengthened impossibly, they were pissed.
Feeling uncharacteristically kind, Kyouya patted the hand Haruhi wasn't clutching to her heart. "A high-ranking politician contacted their parents personally to commission a wedding dress, but then chose Ayame Sohma, who operates a small costume business, to make it instead."
"WHICH WAS BULL!"
Hikaru growled out, "It was just because Sohma had more experience with that sort of thing—"
"—that such a freakish tailor was chosen instead!" Kaoru finished with a snap.
"Just because—"
"Of all the stupid reasons—"
"WE'D NEVER MADE A MAN'S WEDDING DRESS BEFORE!"
They all stared at the Hitachiin brothers, looking red-faced and slightly insane in their lederhosen and traditional caps.
"Eh!?!?" poor Haruhi wailed.
"But I digress," Kyouya said deadpan. "The Sohma clan is a mighty force, but also an unusually quiet family. They're enormous in number and considerable in wealth, and yet only five or six from each successive generation have ever enrolled in Ouran. What's more, none of those enrolled were ever the head of the family, a strange move."
Haruhi nodded. Many of the country's most powerful dynasties sent their heirs to Ouran, to prepare them for taking over the family and company.
"The Sohmas always control things behind the scenes, and are quite secretive—" It's a wonder you're not a Sohma, Shadow King-senpai, Haruhi thought "—making them an object of mystery to many.
"Recently though, it's been made known that the present head of the clan plans to enroll quite a few heirs in Ouran, causing quite a stir. Superintendent Suoh asked me to make preparations to welcome the Sohmas into the student body."
"Heirs?" Hunny piped up from his position on Mori Morinozuka's back. "More than one is called the heir? Does that mean they all will be heads of the family, Kyou-chan?"
He shook his dark head. "It's unclear who will be the designated heir, Hunny-senpai, as Akito Sohma has no children. There are rumors of a Yuki Sohma, a distant cousin, but nothing official. The ones being enrolled now are apparently all favorites of Akito-san's, and will likely inherit the most when he passes. He's very young, but of poor constitution."
While he spoke, he stood, reached for a stack of folders, and spread them open across the tabletop.
"What is most relevant to us is…their pictures."
"HMMM?" Tamaki, Hikaru, Kaoru, Haruhi, and Hunny peering down from Mori's shoulders, took a good look.
"Yuki, Kyo, Hatsuharu, Momiji, Hiro, Kisa, and Isuzu Sohma," Tamaki read off the folder's tags.
"Pay attention to the boys," Kyouya prodded.
"Why…they're all handsome! They look like they could be—"
"Hosts." The Shadow King of the Host Club allowed himself a triumphant smirk.
The wheels in the other hosts' brains started whirring…expect for Haruhi's. Wearing a deadpan look on her face, she muttered quietly:
"What. The. Hell."
"WHAT THE HELL!?!?"
Shigure Sohma had tripped in his Japanese robes while trying to duck behind the screen door, but had succeeded. Now he was trying to figure out how much time he had before his upset young cousin punched through the paper to rip out his neck.
"Now, now, Kyo-kun, just let me get a word out—"
BAM.
Shigure winced as a copy of his latest masterpiece, Summer Break Fantasies, slammed through the paper door and into a wall, narrowly missing his head.
He looked through the hole in the door to see that Kyo Sohma, orange hair sticking on end, lanky limbs set in a martial arts stance, was shooting the flames of hell out his golden tiger eyes. He sucked in another breath to continue with—
"What the hell do you mean, WE HAVE TO FRICKIN' TRANSFER!"
"Akito wants—"
"YA THINK I GIVE A DAMN WHATAKITO WANTS!?" Kyo roared. "I CAN TELL YA WHAT AKITO NEEDS!"
"Kyo-kun, let's be reasonable!"
Yuki Sohma and their housekeeper and unofficial member of their family, Tohru Honda, finally made it to Shigure's side.
"Are you all right, Shigure-san? I heard an awful bang!" Tohru said worriedly, blue eyes enormous. "Is Kyo-kun all right?"
"Well, there's nothing the matter with his lungs!" Shigure laughed nervously as Kyo took aim again.
"What's he yelling about now?" Yuki said wearily, running a hand through his dark gray hair.
"Eh, well, funny you should ask that—"
"AKITO NEEDS A GOOD KICK IN THE ASS, IS WHAT HE NEEDS!"
Shigure ducked as another book sailed though the hole, only to raise his head again indignantly. "That's it! I did not work on that book for a solid year only to have it used as cannon-fodder, as it were—GAH!!" The beleaguered novelist was too slow, and had his glasses clipped off the top of his head as a series of pens whizzed by like arrows.
Yuki picked up the second book, giving his cousin a flat look. "Bad Boys and Naughty Girls by Miroku Kinoshita?"
"The critics raved!" Shigure snapped.
"Who's Miroku Kinoshita?" Tohru asked innocently.
Shigure opened his mouth to explain his pen name, but Yuki whopped him in the head with his school bag. "Let's not shatter her image of you, shall we?"
He rubbed the bump forming under his slate-gray hair. "You still have those dictionaries in there, don't you?"
"How ever did you guess."
"TELL 'EM, YOU DOG! TELL 'EM NOW SO THEY'LL LET ME KILL YOU!"
Kyo's red-hazed eyes cleared enough to see Yuki's violet eyes staring at him reproachfully. "Only if you stop pitching everything you see at Shigure. He can't tell us anything while in a coma—" Kyo snarled "—and you could miss and hit Honda-san."
A moment of silence…then Yuki slid the door open. To Shigure's relief and Tohru's puzzlement, the volatile Cat sat at the end of the low table, quietly growling to himself, head bowed, arms wrapped tightly around his torso to keep them from finding the sensei's neck.
"Now, first off, let's not make this Shoot-Shigure-the-Messenger-Day," Shigure said nervously. He sat and crossed his legs on the opposite end of the table from Kyo. "As you know, I visited Akito yesterday. He told me that…for some time now…he's been making arrangements for those of the Juunishi who are still in school. Starting next Monday…" Shigure paused, savoring what was possibly his last breath.
"You will no longer be attending Kaibara High, but Ouran Private Academy."
AmIdeadamIdeadamIdead…..Shigure lifted his head from his robes slightly, and cracked open one gray eye.
Yuki was looking at him with a kind smile on his face.
"Run before I kill you."
"YUKI-KUN—!!"
Before he could hightail it, he found Tohru tugging on his long sleeve.
"Shigure-san, please, why? It's the middle of the year, and, and…" Her shocked, sweet blue eyes made the Dog's heart waver as none of his cousins' threats could. "I won't see them as often…will I?"
A dash of pain flashed across Yuki's eyes. Kyo's shoulders stiffened, and his gold gaze suddenly couldn't get enough of Tohru's face.
Shigure sighed. He placed a hand affectionately on Tohru's head. "Akito seems to think it would benefit the remaining school-age Juunishi to be educated at Ouran. It's a very prestigious academy, with an excellent history for taking in the heirs to the country's top businesses and giving them a good education. We're a wealthy family with many companies, so it makes sense."
"But why now?" Yuki snapped. "It'd be one thing if we were just starting high school, but we're well into our junior year, we're nearly finished now!"
"Who can guess Akito's thoughts?" was the non-reply.
"Goodness, it's a Monday night! They have less than a week before they go!" Tohru's long brown hair swung forward to block her face. She sounded on the verge of tears.
"Eh-heh, I'm, eh, not sure you want to hear this, but I've known for about a month."
"What!" Yuki gasped.
"I was afraid if I told you too soon," Shigure whined, "Kyo would kill me in my sleep!"
"There's always tonight!" Kyo spat.
"Oh dear…"
"This is bull," Kyo rasped. Whether it was from his yelling or his struggle not to yell, who knew? "Sending his precious Yuki to a fancy-pants academy, I can get, but why me? He doesn't give a damn about me or the Cat."
"It's not just you two, Kyonkichi," Shigure said softly, "but Haru and Momitchi. He's also pulling out Hiro and Satchan, and Rin, if she gets out of the hospital in time, and if she doesn't fling herself out a window rather than comply."
Kyo slammed his fist on the table. "Dammit, he's trying to play with our lives again! There is no way in hell I'm going, got it? No way! I'd rather join Rin and fling myself off the roof!"
"Kyo-kun!" Tohru gasped.
Kyo ran out, Tohru following suite. Shigure sighed and reached for the cigarette pack on the table, only to find that Yuki had pulled it away.
"It's because of Honda-san, right? After the summer house, he's becoming more and more desperate to keep us from her."
Shigure tucked his hands into his robe sleeves, looking at his young cousin squarely. "You don't think it's because he wants you to have the good education Ouran provides?"
"As the Cat said, that's bull. It's because Ouran is competitive and expensive—even if Tohru wanted to transfer and leave Uotani and Hanajima behind, she'd never make the entrance exams, much less the obscene tuition."
"You could always say no."
"Yes, just as easily as you could say no."
Not even silver-tongued Shigure could reply to that.
"Kyo."
The Cat heard the Rat's footsteps on the roof tiles, but didn't raise his head. "The hell do you want? You never come up on the roof. I thought it stank too much of Cat, or somethin'."
"We need to talk about Ouran," Yuki said evenly.
"Not much to talk about. If Shigure brings it up one more time, swear to God, I will jump off the roof. DAH!" He dug his fingers into his hair. "I wanna rip it out!"
"…What?"
He looked at Yuki. He couldn't tell Tohru, since being a non-member of the Zodiac it'd be difficult for her to get it, he was homicidal towards Shigure right now, and…what Yuki had done by coming to the roof, the Cat's domain, a place only Tohru had been on before, was significant somehow.
Aw, what the hell.
"The spirit of the Cat," Kyo gritted out. "Day by day…I'm making peace with it. And it's been there since I was born, these feline instincts, the strength...and I'm coming to terms with my bitterness, but there's still some there, and it's obviously not all mine."
"The blood remembers."
"Yeah…so, I got this war-peace thing going on with the Cat. And the times it feels like war—I want it gone, ripped it out, just have a knife put in me and have the spirit leave me alone. Because, dammit, I know she's crying down there in her bed right now, and all I wanna do is hold her tight, I wanna hug her tears away, but I can't, 'cause if we touch she'll end up clinging to a cat!"
Yuki sat silently. This was the first time Kyo had admitted something so personal to him. All he could say was "I know."
"That's why I swore I'd snuff myself. Akito can't make me go if I'm dead."
"Those are your hormones and temper talking; you'd be spared from Akito, but separated from Honda-san anyway. Every one of us needs to go, for Honda-san…Tohru-kun's sake."
"If he's trying so hard to break us apart, why not a boarding school?"
"We wouldn't be in a Sohma house then, would we?"
Kyo lifted his head to the stars, as though the stars would whisper an escape to him. "I know we have to go. If Akito's obsessed enough with keeping everyone away from her, including the Outcast…he'd go berserk on her if we didn't obey. It'd be rebellion, wouldn't it?"
"Yes," Yuki agreed, "if we count you as a Juunishi, that would make the majority of the Zodiac disobeying an order of Akito's. He'd tear Tohru-kun apart."
No one questioned the Bond, forged in blood—Akito was the tie that bound them, and could wrench their heartstrings like a puppeteer with his marionettes.
Tohru was the tie that broke Akito's—the New Bond.
She was the Angel of the Zodiac, the Angel of Death to Akito—and in more danger than all the Juunishi combined.