Bonjour, everyone! This just so happens to be my first Fruits Basket fanfic, and I'm not exactly sure how it got so dark so fast. Not that I mind--I love dark stories. I've always loved Kyo's story, also--he's the loner, the outcast, forever abhorred by his family because of a curse he was born into and is not responsible for (Not to mention his amazing looks and awesome personality). He also has another (really third) form--even before that was revealed, I knew something was special about him--and for some reason in every anime or manga I get into, I favor the person who has some sort of alternate form above everyone else--usually even before the second form is revealed! Faves from other anime/mangas have been Beast Boy from Teen Titans, Dark from D.N. Angel, and Inuyasha from (duh) Inuyasha. My current favorite is, of course, dear Kyo-kun from the best manga ever, Fruits Basket! So, of course, my first Furuba fic centers on him (Readers, I'm sorry/happy to say, though, that most of my later ones probably will as well). This is a Kyo/Tohru story (I've supported that couple ever since the very first book) and NOT a yaoi story, for all you people who...um, like those. Kyo and Yuki may get a little closer to becoming friends, but NOTHING MORE. Okay? So...please, no questions about that if you don't mind. Sorry, for those who were hoping for...er, that.

Disclaimer: If I owned Fruits Basket, which is, in fact, owned by Natsuki Takaya, do you think I would be here, writing fanfics about the manga? NO! I would be named Natsuki Takaya, and I would still be working on the actual books, continuing the story through volume 30 at least! I would also be an extremely wealthy genius, and would be typing in Japanese kanji. Obviously, I am none of those things. Shocking, huh? NOT!

Chapter 1: Nightmare

Sometimes I fall asleep and then I lose control

I try to find my way out without letting go

And will I lose my mind if it comes back this time?

If I don't turn out perfect, will you be a friend of mine?

-- Slow Bleed (Thousand Foot Krutch)

Kyo felt it first. The dark, terrible presence of the monster clouded his being with feelings of menace and hatred, distorting the temperate skies of his mind with cruel, warped indifference. He smelled it next. Its rancid, graveyard-born odor of rotting corpses filled his senses with an amazingly concentrated strength, making his eyes water and his head spin. Even in his muzzy, dulled dreamlike state, he felt ready to gag and retch from the power of its evil.

Then…he saw it. It crouched, hunching its grotesquely disproportioned limbs over a dark shape in the deep blackness that constituted the landscape. The creature growled deeply—a rumbling, terrifying sound—as he crept unwillingly closer. It was as if he was being dragged towards the manifestation of his curse by an invisible gravitational pull, wandering ever closer until he could literally hear the rasping of breath shuddering its way through the thin, skeletal neck that supported its head.

As he neared the growling leviathan, it raised its reptilian face towards him. Kyo was shocked to see blood dripping lazily from its jaws, its teeth bared in a horrific grin. Then…it spoke. The monster's voice was deep and gravelly, ancient and laced with a wild fury.

"Want a bite?" it snarled, chuckling darkly at the startled look on the orange-haired teen's pale face. The creature moved aside from its prey, clearly enjoying this, and walked around behind Kyo. The boy found he couldn't move—he was pinned in place, frozen, while the tepid breath of the creature that haunted many of his waking thoughts bloomed across the back of his neck.

"Why don't you go over and look?" it whispered in his ear, laughing wickedly at the cat's fear. Again, the invisible, powerful force compelled him to move slowly forward, though he was fighting it every step of the way. Kyo reached the prone form lying on the ground, and knelt down next to it. He saw a tanned hand—his hand—reach out and grab the limp shoulder. Suddenly, the monster's prey became more visible, in a way that reminded him of a spotlight on a dark stage. He felt it then, too—the soft fabric on his fingertips, the cold flesh beneath. It was then that he realized what he should have discovered long ago; the body was human.

The teenager felt his heart speed up, and adrenaline tingled down his limbs as he again tried and failed to control his motions. Before he was able to work himself into a panic, sensible thoughts calmed him. This can't be real. This must be a nightmare. How could that monster be outside of me?

Then, as his unbidden hand pulled the sprawling body over onto its back, he gasped in horror and all of his sensibility drained away to shock. No! No…no, please no. Please, no! No, no, no, no, no, no!

It was Tohru. Her long chestnut hair splayed, unkempt, beneath her, and her eyes were closed. A deep gash in her side revealed the cause of her unconsciousness, and her cheeks were still wet from tears. Suddenly, her soft blue eyes fluttered open, and focused slowly on him. She flinched away from the stricken boy in a spasm of terror, paling, and then whimpered and curled into a fetal position as she re-disturbed her wound. Tohru slowly, painfully, sat up, and her eyes stared at him fearfully. She licked her lips, and opened them as if to speak. After a few tries, he finally heard her voice. It was raspy and dry from screaming, and it trembled with fear.

"Kyo-kun…why did you do this? Why? I'm sorry…did I do something wrong? Why did you hurt me, Kyo-kun?" she whispered brokenly, a thin line of blood trickling down from the corner of her mouth. He tried to speak, to convince her that he hadn't done this, that he would never do anything like this, that he was so, so sorry that this had happened, that he loved her, but it was all in vain. The force that controlled all his motions was too strong.

Tohru continued to stare up at him, terrified azure eyes striking against her pale skin, and his nose began to sting. His throat closed up, and hot, angry tears welled in his eyes. This wasn't fair! He hadn't done anything, and the person he cared for most thought…she thought that he had given her this terrible wound. She gulped, and seemed to come to a firm decision.

"Kyo-kun…is something wrong? You know…you can…talk to me…" Her voice came harder now, and her breath had quickened into shallow, painful gasps.

He wanted to console her, tell her to lie down and take it easy, but he still couldn't move. She reached out to him with a shaking hand, and he unwillingly slapped her away. He was as good as a puppet on a string to whatever was controlling him, and his heart swelled in self-loathing as she hit the ground, hard. Why couldn't he even regain control of his own body? Was he that weak and worthless?

This time, when she sat up, her eyes were dimming and losing focus. Blood crept down her forehead from a scrape, and her side wound had reopened, spilling more life into the unchanging blackness of the landscape. Crystalline tears rolled openly down her cheeks, and she sniffled loudly. He wished so much to be able to lean over and wipe them from her face. She spoke, one last sentence, as she keeled over onto the hard, unyielding earth.

"Do you really hate me, Kyo?" she mumbled as death took her. He couldn't help but notice that she left out the honorific, so characteristic to her speech that it was pretty much a given. If everyone started calling him Kyo-kun, he probably wouldn't have noticed. But now...he was just Kyo?

The gentle girl's blue eyes stared blankly out into open space, and her mouth was frozen in a grimace of pain. She was gone. She was really gone. The distraught teen heard one more thing before grief tore him from the scene. The monster that stood behind him was laughing maniacally, letting loose deep thunder rolls of mirth as dark as the rotten center of its evil soul. The bastard!

Kyo dragged in a deep, shuddering breath, finally snapping the bonds that had held him prone for so long. He closed his eyes as the tears that had been withheld streamed in rivers down his face.

"NNOOOOOOO!" he screamed, jerking upright and opening his eyes for a moment before squeezing them shut again. He was back in his room, sitting up on his futon with the thin sheets tangled about his legs, drenched in sweat. He screamed again, the cry halting as his throat caught and jerked in heavy, loud sobs. He sucked in a quick, sniffling gasp before the tears came again.

Hearing soft footsteps padding their way into his room, he tried to grasp some control, but again it failed him—for a different reason, though. He was too swept up in his grief to care too much about anything right now. Feeling the edge of someone's pajama pants near his fingers, he grabbed onto the cloth. Clinging to it like a lifeline, he continued crying hysterically. The person—whoever it was—dropped to their knees, and Kyo switched his handhold. Grabbing fistfuls of nightshirt, he jerked the person towards him, tucking his head into his or her chest and sobbing into his cotton-swathed fingers.

After a while a hand awkwardly patted him on the back, but it did nothing to relieve the terrible feelings of guilt and sadness, hate and fear, that tore through him like icy daggers, or the uncontrollable cries that wracked his body. His chest heaved with every wail, and he soon began to get a stitch in his side, but the tears still kept flowing. He felt like a wimp--he hadn't cried in years, and now he was making a fool of himself, breaking down like this. Oh, please, he thought, despair haunting his mind. Please be a nightmare. Please!

Kyo smelled the gentle scent of lavender on the shirt he was grasping, and wondered faintly who he must be clinging to. Whoever it was…he hoped they would forgive him. This was pretty embarrassing, to say the least. It didn't register in his half-crazed mind that there were only three other people in the house, or that he was only friends with one of the three, but it was a nice sentiment anyway.

Then he heard two more sets of hurried footsteps stop at his door. The lighter pair turned wildly and rushed in, making soft tup-tup sounds against the hard floor. Then he tensed in relieved shock as he heard Tohru's voice. It was like a godsend, shining a bright beam of light into his dark world of despair.

"Kyo-kun! What's wrong? Are you okay? Kyo-kun?" she called, worry apparent in her rushed, frantic tones. She didn't sound hurt at all, and he couldn't help but notice that the honorific she used in his name was again in place. He felt her hand rubbing small soothing circles into his back, and he began to calm. But...he needed assurance. Making sure to keep his eyes closed, fearing the worst, he let go of the shirt with one hand and reached out in her general direction. After a typical "Eh?", she realized what he wanted, and grasped his hand firmly. Kyo squeezed her hand tightly, interlacing his fingers with hers, and his body relaxed. Thank god. It was only a nightmare.

His sobs slowly subsided into raw, tired sniffles, and he collapsed into the lap of the person he was holding on to, suddenly exhausted. The last thing he heard before he fell into a deep, contented sleep was the high-pitched giggling of Shigure…from the doorway of his room.

Well...this scene popped into my mind one day, and I was like 'Huh...well, I've been wanting to do a Furuba fanfiction, so...' It turned out waaay worse than I wanted it to, but I hope I can make it better as I go on, and get used to writing the characters. I have only done Teen Titans fics to date, so I'm used to writing their personalities, and I need to adjust before I can really get into a rhythm with Fruits Basket. So, please, for those wonderful people who read this, bear with me.

I read back through this and realized that not only was this chapter freakishly short, Kyo was totally out of character. As was Tohru, I believe. I know the cat-curse-monster wasn't, though, because...ehe...I made his personality up. (sweatdrops) Anyway...if you read this, and feel like I totally suck, don't be afraid to say it in a review! I would really appreciate some critique...it is very, very much needed. I may end up rewriting this chapter one day, but it was just one of those times when you get an idea and have to write it down before it is lost forever. Hopefully, fellow writers, you understand what I mean.

Also--do you think I should write a prologue to this? Just jumping into the plot seemed a little...wierd. I probably should...to set the scene up, get the characters in character, etc. Yeah. Yeah, I should. Why am I still writing? ... Okay. Ciao, awesome people. Luv ya all.