Dark Horizon
Note: This is my first Fruits Basket fic, (well, actually my first non-yu-gi-oh fic) so I hope it goes well. Please be nice in reviews, since I'm new to this area and, quite frankly, don't count my knowledge of Fruits Basket to be as complete as that of Yu-gi-oh. I have yet to read the manga (I'm going to soon, though) so this is based on the anime alone. Please, please, read it and review!
Disclaimer: I don't own Fruits Basket. Only the character Kara and her life story belong to me, as well as the plotline of this fic.
Prologue (Yes this is important!)
One stormy, cold night, the tired granddaughter of a great seer at last gave birth to her child. She beamed up at her beloved husband and cradled her little silver-eyed daughter. Everything in her life was perfect at that moment.
"My Kara, you are born at last." For she had known, perhaps because of her heritage, what it was that she would name her child. Her husband beamed at her.
"Now I have two lovely woman to love," he teased.
But their joy of that night was not to last. There were ill forces at work. Soon after the girl Kara was born, her mother died of mysterious causes and the father wept as due, holding the only remnant of his love for her, their daughter.
And he raised her well, to be a caring, sweet girl who loved to frolic in the sun. But that was only the surface of their world, for underneath the same evil that had killed Kara's mother still bore witness to their days. On her fifth birthday, her father, who had been ill for some time, died as well, and she began, small as she was, to wonder why both her parents were gone.
Her aunt and uncle took her in, and she grew to love them nearly as much as she loved her father. She made friends, went to school, and behaved essentially as any normal girl would. A year went by and then tragedy found her again. The dear aunt became ill, and, after another year of struggles, she too passed from the earth. By now, of course, all who knew her began to wonder as well why so many near her fell ill and perished.
Her uncle still loved her as a daughter, and was only slightly afraid that he too may leave this world sooner than expected. He tried, however, to stress to her the importance of many things that one generally left for later in life. Now seven years of age, and starting to show the world what type of person she would become, she learned lessons and heard stories of love, life, and hardship. But this, too, was not to last. Another two years passed her by, and even at her young age, she could tell that some illness ate away at her beloved uncle. One more year was all she got to spend with him before he passed.
By now her relatives feared her, partly because all of her friends were now getting sick as well. She was afraid for them, but she didn't know what to do. It took a while, but she found someone willing to take her in. Her grandfather on her father's side, who didn't believe in the idea of a curse, became her guardian, but not for long.
She spent nearly six years with her grandfather before he died. She no longer spoke with her old friends, and as soon as she'd moved away, she heard tell of their miraculous recoveries. She found it impossible to deny that she was clearly cursed. It was the only logical explanation as to why everyone she ever cared for, everyone who ever knew her, died.
Her current best friend, who now spent her days in bed with a fever and clinging to life, did not agree with her. "You aren't cursed. There's no such… such… thing," she said softly.
"But you're sick. Grandpa died, uncle and auntie died… my parents died… What other explanation is there?"
"You aren't a very lucky girl, I'll admit, but you aren't cursed."
Kara didn't believe her. Why should she? The next day, her resolve complete, she left. There was simply no way she could ever, she reasoned, make friends again.
She found a decent looking town, and better yet, the school was huge so she could likely escape notice and keep from hurting anyone. An abandoned hut in the woods served as her home, and she passed the entrance exam with flying colors. Perhaps it would be alright.
But she didn't believe it would, not for her. She thought about the things she'd never be able to do, like fall in love, or get married, or even just go to dances with her friends, and it made her very sad. It would be hard, but she couldn't let anyone get close to her. It was for their own good, after all.
Chapter One: Yuki Sohma
Kara stepped apprehensively into the office on her first day of school, the first day of that term, as it happened. The secretary smiled when she saw her and rushed her off to her locker.
"You happen to be the only new enrollee for this term, besides the first years, of course," she said. "Therefore, I have the time to find someone to show you the ropes." The woman looked up and down the hall as if searching for a victim. Her eyes locked on a boy who, Kara noticed, was being stared at by every girl in the near vicinity. "Ah, Yuki, you'll be perfect," she declared, pulling him over. "Yuki, this is Kara Silvers, who just moved here a few days before the start of term."
"Hello. It's pleasure to meet you, Miss Silvers. I'm Yuki Sohma."
She smiled a little, but kept in mind that she couldn't let herself like this boy, kind words or not. She inclined her head in greeting and said nothing.
"Yuki, I'd like you to show Miss Silvers around today and make sure she settles in alright. Can you do that for me?"
"Of course," he said, ever the picture of politeness. Kara found herself staring along with the other girls.
He almost seems inhuman… no one could really be so… nice. Or maybe it's just because the secretary's here. Yes, he'll be a jerk once she leaves, I'll bet. A pretty face and a pretty dream, maybe, but not a pretty reality.
"I'll leave you to it, then. Have a nice day, Kara!"
Kara nodded again and then fiddled with her lock. Her old school didn't have combination locks. They'd used keys. She found that this new method of opening a lock was more complicated than she might have imagined.
"It can be difficult the first few times," Yuki said from behind her. "Would you like me to help?"
She gave up trying to ignore him and stepped aside. "Thank you," she said softly, running a hand through her long, permed blue hair. She'd needed a change, and something to make her less noticeable. With her hair terribly frizzy and left tied back, she wasn't nearly as attractive as before, and therefore more easily escaped notice. A badly done home perm had been the perfect solution to the problem of boys flirting with her and making life more difficult. Now hardly anyone gave her a second thought. It was lonely, but it was necessary.
"There you go," Yuki said with a little half smile. He seemed, she realized, to be expecting something of her, something that would let him down in a way. Whatever it was, she could tell that he wasn't seeing it in her and wondered why.
"Thanks," she said again, throwing her bag into the locker with a little thud and scrolling her schedule to see what she'd need.
"Your first class is the same as mine, so I can walk you there," Yuki, who had apparently been reading over her shoulder, said.
"Oh," she muttered, fumbling with her books.
"In fact, your whole schedule is the same as mine," Yuki said in a slight astonished voice.
Startled partly by the sound of his voice and by his words, she dropped the books. "Drat it," she muttered, kneeling to pick them up. Yuki handed her some of them and she remembered that, while she couldn't make any friends, it wasn't her plan to be rude. "I guess the secretary knew what she was saying when she said you'd be perfect," she said with a slight smile, then a wince as she realized how it sounded. "Um… I didn't mean that the way it sounded…" she explained. "I meant you'd be perfect for the job… since you schedule's the same as mine… you won't have to deviate or anything." I'm babbling like a total idiot. Well, at least he won't want to have anything to do with me again after today.
He nodded. "I suppose that's why she chose me."
Kara stood up and dusted off her skirt. She'd always been on the clumsy side, she supposed, but something about this Yuki Sohma's presence unnerved her.
"I guess we'd better get to class."
"Yes, we should."
She followed him to a classroom full of people, all of whom looked up at stared. Several of the girls in the class scowled at her and she realized what Yuki had been expecting earlier. He'd been expecting her to act all crazy over him like all the other girls at the school. She laughed to herself, imagining how annoying that must be, and then remembered the room full of people. Her cheeks flushed and she looked at her feet.
Yuki had, she noticed, walked up to the teacher and started explaining to her who Kara was. She followed him, feeling the tension of the girls in the front row.
"Welcome to our school, Miss Silvers," the teacher said to her with a bright smile.
She inclined her head to him as well. "Thank you very much."
"You can sit…" he scanned the room. "Next to Kyo Sohma, in the third row." He pointed to a boy with orange hair, slumped in his seat and looking disagreeable.
She slid into the seat, not looking at this Kyo person. He, too, was strange in nearly the same way as Yuki. Something in his… presence… just didn't feel right. She'd always been able to read people's emotions and, well, their feel, like an aura, almost, very well, sometime uncannily so. Wait… he did say Sohma. So these two must be related. Strange. Everything about them except for that odd hint in their presence is completely different.
He never tried to be friendly with her, and she was partially glad, knew that she should be fully glad, but was too curious not to want to learn more about him.
She barely heard the teacher as he talked about something that sounded like a class trip or some other useless nonsense. She was too busy looking around the room at all of the interesting people there.
There was one girl who seemed very nice, not at all selfish, and like she had a secret that she was keeping for someone. A secret that, she was certain, involved the two Sohmas.
Strange.
The girls in the front row, were, she realized, very, very, deep admirers of Yuki. In fact, most of the girls in the class were. A few of them regarded him as just a friend, one of whom had an oddly… electric sense about her. The other was a bit violent, but she cared very much about her friends. The electrical one stared at her oddly the entire time, and then whispered something to the other, who laughed and shook her head.
I came here to make sure that I wouldn't get close enough to anyone to hurt them, and now it seems like there are a million people I want to learn more about. It's going to be a very hard time, I can tell.
