Disclaimer: I'm passing my dibs to Sakura Avalon or Kinomoto because she threatened me with forks and I'm afraid of sharp objects. O_o So no, ^_^ I don't own Fruits Basket.
Yay! I'm going to quickly thank my reviewers and then get on with the story. If I forget to mention it, thank you all for coming back to check out this story, or if it's your first viewing, for reading this far!
Sakura Avalon/Kinomoto: happy now? ^_^ I'm guessing you like Card Captor Sakura. So do I! And I will check out your story ^_^.
R Junkie: *wince* I'm sorry about that! I miss things sometimes. I'll try to correct it without really changing it if I can. If I go OOC in the future, I apologize in advance, but I don't mind being told. The plot-line of this story is going to get a bit beyond canon so it might happen…
Incoherence babbling: Yes I did stab Kyo. But I like Kyo too and he won't be unlucky for the entire story, promise. You asked your friend to read? *blushes* Thank you so much!
Merryday: thank you! That is a wonderfully kind thing to say. I'm really happy you think so!
The Great Thing: I adore your reviews! They are some of the best I've ever gotten and I'm beyond flattered. Is Kureno going to meet up with Arisa? Heck, yeah!! There will be all kinds of romance. Please just keep reading and reviewing!
Melinda the Digimon Pet: I hope it's not going to fast, but I am trying to keep it moving along! Thank you very much. Ikebana is translated as "Japanese Flower Arrangement." Sorry I didn't note that.
Grrl N: Yes, I know it's been done, but I can't write this story with Arisa and Uo in the dark. There will be more to the story than that though, trust me!
Rivulet: I adore your reviews too! They are so wonderful! Thank you! There is more of Belduine to come and I don't want to spoil it by telling you anything about him, but I hope you're intrigued! Please keep R/Ring.
Mizaya: Aw, you're the first to review the new installment, my little duckling! (remember, you started the name-calling!) Have I talked to you since I last posted? I can't remember. Anyway, I hope you like this chapter too! You think Belduine is RJish? It's possible he could fit in... Well, I'm hoping you like my take on Akito and I also hope you're enjoying CB. Oh, and dang it, update your story! Divine Interventions… I want to know what happens!
All right. I hope no one was too annoyed by such a lengthy introduction. I've never replied to reviewers before because I don't want to be annoying, but it is kind of nice to be thanked and it means so much to me when you review, so that's why I do it. ^_^ Anyway, on with the story! Again, I don't know why the centering doesn't work anymore…
Evermore
Chapter 3
By Zapenstap
When Shigure entered the kitchen, Tohru and Yuki were staring at a pair of tomatoes sitting on the counter. Shigure looked back and forth between them, noting the boiling water, the rumpled dishtowel and the half-made, forgotten dinner.
"Yuki," Shigure said mildly.
Yuki jumped a little, averting his eyes from Tohru and half turning to look over his shoulder. Shigure was leaning through the doorway with both hands on the frame, peering at them with blinking brown eyes and a smooth expression. Yuki closed his mouth and composed his face, knowing what was coming. "I hope I wasn't interrupting anything. Akito is here. It would be impolite not to say hello." The writer turned his attention to Tohru. "Tohru, if you'd like to bring that water to Hatori, we're trying to clean Kyo up a bit." He smiled. "Not to mention the floor."
"Is he awake?" Tohru asked in a hushed, quiet voice, mechanically turning off the stove and lifting a pair of pot holders to bring the water as she was asked.
"What is Akito doing?" Yuki demanded.
Shigure addressed Yuki's question first, still calm. "Nothing yet. He just walked in. Momiji came with him. And no, Tohru, I'm afraid Kyo is not awake yet, but he is stitched back together and though he looks a little pale, his pulse and breathing are normal."
"What about Uo and Hana?" Tohru asked in a contrite tone that had quickened and trembled in response to her nervousness. She raised her eyes to look up at Shigure, hands clenched under her chin, braids hanging down her back. Her voice was so small. "What should I do? What do you think Akito will do?" It almost sounded as if she thought any of this was her fault.
"Yes," Yuki added, looking away because that expression on Tohru's face troubled him so greatly. "What are we going to do?" He tried to imagine what Tohru might be thinking, what she must be preparing herself for. If just Saki and Arisa's memories were erased, they would forget about ever having known Tohru, if she remained connected with the curse. For a family member, that would have been the fateful decision. Yuki remembered the friends he had made when he was little, some of the first and only friends he had ever made, and how he had had to let them go because he had been erased entirely from their memories. That would be Tohru's fate if Akito decided, for whatever reason, to keep her in the Sohma family sphere.
"I don't think you should have to worry about it, Tohru,' Shigure reassured her. "We'll just have to wait and see what Akito decides."
Shigure spoke calmly, but even though he seemed collected, Yuki detected a touch of worry and uncertainty in the Dog's eyes. Suppose Akito chose to have Tohru's memory erased along with her friends', sending her back to her old family as if she had never known any of the Sohmas? Yuki knew it was more likely and perhaps it would be better, for her at least, but if that happened…if after all this time that happened, Yuki thought his heart might break.
But perhaps that had been what Akito had been planning all along.
The realization made him feel decidedly sick with knowing, and he stumbled past Shigure and out of the kitchen in a daze of understanding. He had to distance himself from Tohru, make her look as if she were not even remotely as important to him as she truly was. If Akito suspected the way he really felt…what would he do, to hurt them the most? Let his attachment to her build until loosing her would break him, until he wanted to accept the hopeless, enclosed, caged life Akito offered as an alternative to his own choices? He had to distance himself from her for two reasons: to protect her and to protect himself, because ultimately…ultimately Akito's will could not be defied.
But a part of him raged. Why?
And he knew he would not be able to get his heart to listen to reason. He could not forget her, or obliterate the feelings he had for her…
"Ah, Yuki, there you are." A simple statement, by a voice so mild it was like a caress.
Yuki looked up, trying desperately not to betray any emotions, to bury what was truly him so deep that no one could ever find it….
Akito stood just inside, a striped blanket wrapped around his thin shoulders, one hand clutching it closed around his chest. He wore a small smile on his face the way one might hang a painting on a wall, and his eyes gleamed as he assessed Yuki from his position in the center of the room. Akito seemed to draw all attention, not because he was physically impressive, but because he weighed so devastatingly on everyone's mind. Momiji stood silently by the door with his hands behind his back, eyes downcast, blonde hair poking out of a very silly pink hat with a white bunny embroidered on the upturned, circular bill. Haru sat cross legged by the door leading into Shigure's study, within calling distance if the Doctor asked again for his assistance, but not close enough to be in the way, and though he was watching Akito with a straight face, it was a concentrated one. Miss Uotani and Hanajima sat on the floor by the far wall where they had been comforting Tohru. Arisa was looking at Akito with more curiosity than anything else, and Saki's expression was impossible to read, a carefully controlled front that leaked not the slightest betrayal of emotion. And yet, Yuki could feel the emotions from everyone, the undercurrents that Akito's mere presence stimulated, circulating just beneath the surface, the subtle fear and anxiety that made them all shift their balance and summon up the reserves of their strength simply to hold their own.
The way Akito had addressed him made Yuki's skin prickle, that cool, oily voice that was seemingly devotedly caring and deeply possessive, deception twisting every syllable.
"You look to be doing well," Akito murmured, and just when Yuki felt like those words were going to crush him, like those eyes were going to consume him, Akito turned his face away as if Yuki didn't matter at all, as if there wasn't a thing about him that contained any value or interest. Akito's eyes dimmed until they looked bored as his gaze passed over Hatsuharu with something that barely reached recognition, like he was a chair or a piece of litter, and wound their way around the room and settled on Arisa and Saki with a smile that would have looked more appropriate on a viper if you knew him at all. "And who do we have here? I don't think we've met. I'm Akito Sohma, a cousin of the people you see here."
Yuki felt his throat close up as tension in the room threatened to choke him.
"Yeah," Arisa said in a brusque manner that almost made Yuki swallow his tongue. "There seem to be a lot of cousins in this family. But I don't think Tohru's ever mentioned you. I'm Arisa Uotani."
"Saki Hanajima."
Akito's smile never wavered, but his eyes took on an almost metallic sheen as he weighed the two girls sitting on the floor by the wall, his thoughts locked up where Yuki could not decipher them. "Friends of Tohru's?" he murmured. "Tohru Honda? That ugly, uninteresting girl… What sort of friends might she have, I wonder?" His lips twisted. "What strange, twisted sort of people would be friends with someone like that?"
A flash of temper erupted behind Arisa's eyes, a quick burst of indignation that burned with impulsive fury. "Hey. Don't talk about her like that! Who the hell do you think you…?"
Saki laid a gentle hand on Arisa's arm, never shifting, never blinking, her head turned toward Akito, her eyes focused only on him. She said nothing and made no other movements, but Arisa stopped talking. The silence in the room thickened until Yuki thought he might suffocate, but he too found himself absorbed by Saki's dark, penetrating eyes, and could scarcely remember to even try and breathe.
Akito smiled at Saki, a sickly, dead-eyed smile, but gradually his smile faded, replaced by a grimace of sudden anger. Yuki started, mouth parting as he took half a preventive step forward. Momiji raised his head. Haru looked up too, all of them breathless with anticipation, but before anybody could move Tohru came out of the kitchen with the pot of water in her hands. She stopped moving when she took note of the scene.
Saki abruptly turned her head, her eyes dropping from their lock with Akito's as she turned to look at her friend. The tension was cut like a sword snapping a string. "Tohru," she said. "We wondered where you went. We were just making introductions."
For some reason the fright that made Tohru jump made Yuki relax. "Oh! I'm so sorry!" She looked frantically around for a place to put the pot of water she was holding, and eventually just held onto it, practically shouting over the top. "Sohma Akito is the head of the Sohma family and uh… Akito-san, these are my friends, Arisa Uotani and um, Saki Hanajima."
"You weren't listening," Arisa said blandly. "Hana said we met while you were in the kitchen."
"Oh. Um." Tohru looked flustered.
The tension in Akito's face and shoulders had relaxed visibly, though he was still eyeing a placid-faced Saki through narrowed eyes, as if trying to ferret out her secrets by sight alone. If she was aware of his scrutiny, she pretended not to be. Gradually, Akito's stare turned to Tohru, who now had everyone's attention simply by standing there with a pot of water in her hands, and the sharp look in Akito's otherwise deadened eyes flared to something like jealousy, an emotion in Akito Yuki could scarcely process him being able to have. He didn't understand it.
"I'm supposed to be bringing this to Hatori," Tohru said quietly, and excused herself from everybody's attention. "Akito-san, I… It's a pleasure seeing you again."
Akito grimaced, his eyes dark anger, and ignored her. "Shigure!" he snapped, and the Dog emerged from the kitchen, assessing the situation without expression.
"Oh, Akito. I see you've met everyone. What can I do for you?"
Akito's eyes swung away from Tohru's friends as he brushed hair away from his face. "I'm tired. I want to lie down."
"I'm sure the journey was taxing. Did you want to see Kyo first?"
The annoyance in Akito's face was obvious, but Yuki carefully looked the other way, as did everyone else. "No," he snapped. "Why would I?"
"Well, he's…"
"It makes no difference to me," Akito said negligently. Then he smiled a thin, silky smile, his eyes holding Shigure at the corners, catching him as he passed him by. "Even if he died, it makes no difference. Perhaps you thought that it would, since I came all this way, since I came here to check up on you? Since I came here to make sure you were doing as I would want, that you were not overstepping your bounds? If he were someone else perhaps I would care enough to come and see him… but why would I care about that thing? That creature? If I see him later it will be more than he deserves. Because it is convenient I might see him, but I did not come here to look at him. It makes me sick to look at that monster. It is evidence of how much I care that I would bother with him at all."
"His bracelet has been stolen," Shigure said quietly. "Do you care about that?"
Akito's eyes narrowed dangerously, focusing on Shigure piercingly. "Why must you always pester me? Why don't you just do what I want? I said I was tired. I want to lie down. Why are you so slow to serve me? Why must you always question me?"
"Forgive me," Shigure said contritely, turning his hands over in a gesture of innocence. "I only wish to keep you informed. There is a room prepared for you upstairs."
Akito's leaving the room was like the receding of a shadow. He stopped only once to look into the room where Kyo laid unconscious, Tohru kneeling by his side with a wet washcloth in her hand, dabbing tenderly at his forehead. Akito's expression was sour, his eyes dark and unreadable. He waited until Hatori looked up, but when the doctor stood, Akito turned away with a snarl, climbing the stairs and leaving them all standing attentively in his wake, except for Shigure, who followed him doggedly and reticent. When the two of them disappeared from view it was like wind rushing into the room, and suddenly Yuki was able to breathe again. His head swam and he sank to the floor dizzily.
"So now what?" Hatsuharu asked, still sitting cross-legged by the wall.
"What happened at the Main House, Momiji?" Yuki asked, relaxing against the wall himself and leaning his head back.
Momiji raised his head. He had been standing so silent and unobtrusive that it had been difficult to see him until now, but gradually the energy was returning to his eyes. "Akito knew, Yuki. When Kyo was hurt, it was like he knew it. He told Hatori to get the car and then Hana called. And when Hatori called from the school and told him that they were coming here, he wanted to come. He told me to come with him."
"I don't understand," Yuki whispered. "I don't understand what motivates him to do the things he does and says."
"Well I don't understand any of this," Arisa snapped, and then added, "though I'll admit that my interest is piqued."
Yuki had forgotten they were there. He looked to Haru for direction, but only got a shake of the head for a response. Were they expecting him to make the decisions while Shigure was with Akito and Hatori was tending Kyo? Yuki sighed and stood up. "Well, we might as well eat the dinner Tohru prepared for us," he said at last. They would have to wait to hear Akito's decision it seemed, and would just have to avoid questions until then.
"Good," Arisa said, also standing. "Because whatever the hell just happened has made me really hungry." She stretched, reaching her hands over her head, and then looked down at Saki. "You comin'?"
Saki stood gracefully to her feet.
Marching across the room, Arisa knocked on the wall above Haru's head and leaned sideways into Shigure's study. Tohru was still kneeling beside Kyo, oblivious to everyone and everything. Kyo lay on his back, his head turned to one side so that his hair fell half over his face, eyes closed and skin pale. A blanket had been pulled up to his waist, partially covering the bandages that had been wrapped repeatedly around his middle, but under those bandages was a knife wound stitched up with medical thread. Yuki watched as Tohru brushed hair from Kyo's eyes, watching anxiously in case he opened them.
"Hey, Tohru," Arisa said. "Why don't you let him rest and come eat dinner with us? You heard the Doc. Orange-top's going to be fine."
Lifting her head, Tohru got to her feet slowly. Hatori nodded reassuringly at her and continued packing his medical supplies back into their case. Looking around, Tohru's eyes spotted the bloody towels lying on the floor and began picking them up until Hatori waved her away. "Don't worry about that," he said. "Shigure and I will take care of it. Go and eat dinner. That's the best thing you can do for him right now."
Tohru turned her head and Yuki caught her eyes as they latched onto him. He straightened in surprise when she came forward and took his hand in both of hers, as if looking for some anchor to latch on to, her fingers curling around the inside of his palm. "Miss Honda," he said quietly. "Everything's going to be all right."
She nodded and smiled, looking up at all of them. "Momiji," she said suddenly, sounding startled. "I'm sorry. Now that I think of it, I think Shigure said something, but I didn't even notice you were here."
"Yep!" the Rabbit exclaimed. "I came to help out, Tohru!" His smile broadened as he bounded off the wall and took one of Tohru's hands, disengaging her from Yuki and pulling her toward the kitchen. "There's lots of people so we'll need to make lots of food to feed everyone," he said. "And you know what, Tohru? I'm going to help you. I'm going to be your junior assistant chef! You just tell me what to do and I'll do it! Okay?"
Tohru blinked, coming to herself as if stepping out of a dream as Momiji pulled her along. "Oh, um, okay. Thank you, Momiji."
Yuki stayed out of the kitchen with Haru and Tohru's two friends, engaging them in polite conversation while they waited. They sat down to eat twenty minutes later. Momiji had made enough rice to stuff twenty people, and by the time Tohru had finished serving the rest of what she had made, they were significantly distracted from the proceeding events to enjoy themselves and the conversation. After a little while, Hatori joined them at the table, welcomed enthusiastically by a smiling Tohru, and they all began to relax, settling comfortably into their respective personalities.
It wasn't until Shigure came back downstairs that they quieted, looking at him expectantly.
"Oh, thank you!" the writer beamed at them. "Your devotion is touching." Then he paused, a very false look of betrayal breaking his expression. "But why didn't you wait for me? Is there any of my future little wife's delicious cooking left? Tohru? Tell me you haven't left me for another!"
"I told you to stop joking about that," Yuki said angrily, and threw one of his chopsticks at Shigure's face.
"Oh! Yuki!" Shigure laughed, ducking. "I didn't see you sitting there. Silly me."
"Shigure," Hatori cut in sharply. "What did Akito say?"
Shigure's goofy expression slipped as he sat down, his personality altering subtlety. "Well, he doesn't seem very happy, but he's not terribly upset either."
"Which means you really have no idea what he's thinking, do you?" Hatori inferred.
"Well, he did say not to bother about Tohru's two friends," Shigure said with a sigh. "Which I must admit was more than I expected."
Arisa blinked in confusion. Saki displayed no reaction, but the rest of those seated at the table stared at Shigure in astonishment. Tohru's eyes widened.
"Why not?" Yuki blurted. He had never seen such a hopeful look on Tohru's face. She sat very quiet, listening attentively, though she said nothing. He couldn't help but wonder with a sliver of fear what game Akito might be playing now.
"I'm not really too sure just yet," Shigure said. "But at any rate, he said not to bother about them. He specifically said that he 'doesn't care about them' and that they 'don't matter,' provided they don't talk about what they've seen or heard."
Hatori looked amazed. "I don't suppose you're going to explain that."
Shigure didn't answer.
"We don't matter because we don't have any power over your affairs," Saki said suddenly, dipping delicately into a bowel with her chopsticks to put some more vegetables on her plate. "And we won't give away your secret because we wouldn't want any harm to come to Tohru." She completely ignored their stunned silence and Shigure's carefully considering look. "I've always known there was something unusual about your family," Saki continued calmly. "From what I understand now, you are all living under a very old and powerful curse, something that must have afflicted your family for generations." She closed her eyes. "Yes. The signal is very strong now that I know what it is. You all transform into different animals, like Kyo did into a cat. When you are under a great deal of stress…"
"Or when hugged by a member of the opposite sex," Shigure finished with an uneasy laugh. Saki opened her eyes. Arisa blinked. Haru was gaping at Saki. Yuki had no idea what his own face must look like. "Embarrassing, isn't it?" Shigure continued. "But well, you've figured it out and as Akito has no apparent objection, there's no sense in hiding the particulars. It's true. The Sohma family is under the Curse of the Chinese Zodiac. We have lived with it for hundreds of years, though it afflicts only 14 total members of the family at a time, the twelve Zodiac animals, plus the cat…"
"Like in the story?" Arisa interrupted. "About how the thirteen animals are invited to a banquet but then the rat murders the cat or something so he doesn't show up?"
"That's not how it goes!" Yuki protested.
"The Rat tricks the cat, Arisa," Saki corrected calmly. "And because the Cat misses the banquet he is excluded from the Zodiac." She paused thoughtfully. "How very sad."
"Yes, well, that's part of it," Shigure said. "And Kyo is officially excluded from a great many things unfortunately, as is consistent with the legend, but…"
"And this Akito guy," Arisa interrupted again with a leap of intuition and hand slap on the table. "He's the fourteenth member, right? What is he, the Zodiac God?"
A silence fell around the table. "Well a matter of fact, he is," Shigure said, sounding surprised.
"Strange," Saki said suddenly, cutting into another stretch of silence she might not have noticed. "I guess Tohru must have found out your secret, and then promised not to tell. That is so like her, to keep something so significant even from her closest friends for so long, simply because she cares about the people she is protecting." Tohru looked down at her plate and said nothing. "No, Tohru," Saki objected, and placed her fingers on her chest with a small smile. "Do not be ashamed. It was very honorable. You have my complete forgiveness. And," she added, "for your sake the Sohma family has my silence."
"Yeah," Arisa said. "I won't tell anyone either. Not that anybody would believe me anyway."
"You must be…surprised at least," Shigure said slowly. "To learn that we have caught Tohru up in something so terrible."
"What's so terrible about it?" Arisa demanded. She chuckled. "I mean, it's kinda funny. You turn into animals when hugged? It certainly explains a lot."
"It's not funny," Yuki said with a bite of anger. "It's miserable. You have no idea…!"
"Hey, Prince, chill out," Arisa said. "I'm not claiming to know that much about it. I'm just saying that it doesn't make me want to keep you at arms length. Geez. Enough people have ostracized me that I know how unnecessary that is." She laughed again. "Which animal are you anyway?"
"Yuki's the Rat," Shigure said. "I'm the Dog. Haru is the Cow. Momiji over there is the Rabbit. And Hatori is the…"
"Don't," Hatori warned. "I'd rather not explain."
Shigure smiled. "As funny as you may find it, it must be disconcerting to realize we are so strange."
"No," Saki said. "Unlike Arisa, I do not think it's funny at all. Indeed, I have often wondered what darkness shadows the members of your family, but I can hardly be disconcerted without being a hypocrite, considering how strange I am myself."
"Well," Shigure said, rubbing his chin. "I suppose that's true. I guess I never considered what your angle on it might be." He seemed more surprised at their lack of reaction than either Arisa or Saki had been hearing of the curse, but then, Yuki thought, Arisa and Saki were strange people.
Saki took a sip of her tea without replying.
"All right," Arisa said as if rallying for a game or a fight. "I guess we'll figure things out as we go then. I don't suppose anyone has any objections to my asking Tohru questions now, do they? No? Good. But first I want to deal with this stabbing thing. What did this Akito guy think about Kyo's being attacked? Or does he really not care like he said? 'Cause I gotta tell you, I'm hella pissed off!"
"He was upset that an outsider interfered with the family," Shigure said slowly. "But he really didn't seem overly concerned. I imagine he might have more to say about it tomorrow. It's getting dark, so I doubt he will go home tonight."
Yuki grimaced but said nothing.
"Then Hana and I are coming over again tomorrow," Arisa declared. "I want to get to the bottom of this. Oh say, Hana, didn't you say you felt something weird earlier today? Before we got those truffles?"
"Yes," Saki replied. "Someone was watching us."
Yuki remembered something Kyo had said too.
'It…prickled. Just for a moment.'
"That Cat said his bracelet felt funny too," Yuki told the group, annoyed by the condescension in his tone but unable to change it. "Right before…" He trailed off, lowering his eyes uncomfortably. Right before I knocked him down and let him go off on his own…into that danger both he and Saki sensed and I in my arrogance ignored! But was that really his fault? He couldn't have known what would happen.
Tohru looked up, speaking for the first time since Shigure joined the table. "Hana, do you think you could sense it again? Do you think you could find the person who attacked Kyo?"
"It's possible," Saki said in a monotone, "that I would recognize him if I ran into him, as everyone's electric signal is unique."
"Well, that's something anyway," Arisa said. "He was near the school. Maybe he's someone who goes there."
"Doubtful," Saki said, and continued to eat. She was the only one still focused on her meal.
"I…I met someone strange yesterday too," Tohru said suddenly. "A young boy, maybe my age? He…he gave me a flower. He said his name was Belduine Terwhin?"
"That's a strange name," Shigure said.
"And a strange thing to do," Yuki added darkly.
Shigure smiled at his younger cousin. "Well, I don't know, Yuki. It's just a flower."
"Tohru got hit on by a stranger?" Arisa said, and then leaned back. "Man, that's funny."
"He was foreign," Tohru added hastily to distract from the conversation. "He said he was from some place called Evermore?"
"There is no place called that anywhere around here," Hatori informed them.
"Strange," Saki repeated, staring at her plate as if wondering where all the food had gone.
"He could be the same person who attacked Kyo," Arisa mused. "I guess I had assumed that Kyo got into a fight with someone and pissed them off or something, but maybe he was targeted. But if it was this guy he would have had had to book it to the school to make the timing fit. Was he carrying any weapons, Tohru? That probably would have been a hard thing to miss, huh?"
Tohru waved both hands in front of her face. "Oh no!" she said hurriedly. "I didn't mean to accuse anybody! He was really nice to me! And I didn't see any knives or…or anything like that!"
Arisa pushed her hair away from her eyes, regarding Tohru with a measuring blink. "All right. Chill out," she amended. "Innocent until proven guilty."
Shigure sighed. "Well, we're probably not going to solve it tonight. But Saki, you will, um…keep your electric signal on the lookout, hmm?"
"If that's what you want to call it," the psychic murmured without looking at him.
A loud bang sounded from Shigure's study and everyone except Saki jumped where they were sitting. The mood changed instantly. Yuki and Haru shared a significant look between them.
Tohru was the first on her feet, one hand clutching at her chest. "Kyo?"
The others scrambled up from where they had been sitting.
"Careful, Tohru," Shigure whispered. "We don't know if he's stable. He might transform."
Tohru paled visibly, but she still took a step forward. Shigure quickly followed her.
"Transform?" Arisa asked. "He means into a cat, right?"
"No," Saki said from behind. She was still seated at the table. "Something else." She declined to comment further.
"The cat is a monster without that bracelet," Haru explained. "For being excluded from the Zodiac, the Cat's vengeance against its own family results in its being doubly cursed. His true form is a monster. I've never seen it myself, but they say it's pretty awful."
Everyone was quiet as Tohru and Shigure approached the door. Arisa hung back with Saki. Haru, Hatori and Momiji hadn't moved much either, watching from a distance. Yuki followed a few paces behind Tohru.
"Perhaps there's no need for anyone to see it now," Shigure suggested, turning to smile at all of them. "It sounded more like some of my books falling on the ground than anything else." He sighed regrettably, one hand on the door. "And to think, I just organized them all this morning."
The attempt at light-hearted conversation was having small affect on the rest of them this time. Tohru's eyes were focused anxiously ahead. "Kyo?" she whispered, and then turned to look at Shigure, who was blocking her admittance. "Shigure…?"
"Oh, right," Shigure laughed, and pushed the door open for her. Yuki watched his face as he did it, noting how his smile slipped as soon as Tohru was no longer watching him, how he stepped out of her way casually but carefully.
Tohru stepped inside and they heard her voice fill with relief. "How do you feel?" she asked, meek and concerned but not a bit frightened. Yuki let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.
"How do you think I feel?" was the sarcastic reply, but speaking to Tohru the bite of real anger in Kyo's voice was not present. "I feel like I've been stabbed, that's how I feel! How did I get here anyway, and where the hell is everybody? I thought I heard voices. I'm hungry too. What time is it?"
"Oh, um…" came Tohru's garbled answer. "Everybody's just outside, Kyo. There's some dinner left, but uh. I…" She paused. "We were all really worried about you."
"Yeah right."
Silence followed this statement, but then Shigure followed Tohru in, murmuring something Yuki couldn't quite understand. Whatever it was, it made Kyo yell at him. Shigure said something about "energy" and through the crack between the door and the wall, Yuki caught a flash of orange hair and a pair of very cross brown eyes. His vision was obscured when Momiji darted between him and wall, slipping through the door and throwing himself at Kyo with exclamations of unrestrained joy and a million questions about his "fateful duel with a masked assassin." Where Momiji came up with that story, Yuki had no idea, but the utterance of the title combined with Momiji's bodily contact resulted in a shriek from the Cat as he doubled over in pain.
"Kyo!" Tohru exclaimed in horror.
"Momiji," Shigure chastised, his exasperation hiding something closer to amusement.
Kyo, apparently hurt but not dying, shouted something at the blonde boy that ought not to have been said around Tohru. Yuki sighed in irritated resignation, still out of view and glad of it.
When Hatori entered, he began by asking Kyo about how he felt, questioning him about his appetite, his vision, the condition of his head, etc. Kyo answered these questions with an attitude of annoyed unconcern as Tohru continued to smile at him. Yuki watched through the crack in the door until Haru joined him.
"Worried weren't you?" Haru asked him in his usual placid tones.
"No," Yuki said, unable to mask his irritation. "Why should I be?"
Haru didn't say anything.
"Orange-top okay in there?" Arisa asked, joining Yuki on his other side.
Saki had apparently traded dinner for the sequel of Shigure's trashy, summer romance series. She sat with her back against the wall and her ankles crossed, reading quietly, ignoring all activity around her.
"I'd go in," Arisa continued, "but it looks sorta crowded in there and I'd rather not face that temper just after dinner. You know, my stomach has to settle first."
Yuki did not attempt to puzzle out this logic. Conversation was picking up again in Shigure's study.
"What happened?" Shigure asked. "Tohru's two friends found you, and Haru, but there was nobody else there, and no clues."
"They're here?" Kyo exclaimed. "Did I…Did they see me?"
"They saw you turn into a cat," Tohru was saying quietly, and then added in hasty uptalk, "but, it's all right! You don't have to worry. Everything is going to be fine! Just rest. We just have to…"
"That's not what I meant," Kyo said. "I can't remember exactly what happened, but I remember thinking…" A pause. "It's still gone." His voice shook, something Yuki had not heard it do before. There was real fear in it. "I have to find it. I have to… Did anyone see who…?"
"As Tohru says, it's best if you just rest for now," Hatori cut in. "There may be reason to worry, but panicking won't help. Just relax and concentrate on getting better. We're looking into it."
"Kyo," Shigure interjected. "Anything you can remember might help."
Yuki approached the door cautiously. Haru was staring off into space, apparently not noticing that he had moved. Arisa didn't seem to care one way of the other. Ignoring them both, Yuki stood just outside the door, listening with a concentrated ear, hoping that stupid Cat would remember something useful. Like Arisa, he wanted to get to the bottom of this. For some reason, he felt this had to do with a lot more than Kyo's bracelet. This was going to involve the whole family.
"He came out of nowhere," Kyo was explaining. "I was just sitting there, and all of a sudden I felt…" He trailed off. "Whoever it was knew what they were doing. It wasn't like some delinquent stumbled on an easy victim. It was almost like I had been targeted. The way he…"
"You're sure it was a man?" Shigure whispered. "That's something at least."
"Yeah," Kyo said negligently. "I'm pretty sure it wasn't a girl. The guy was strong. And quick, that's for sure, probably as quick as…"
At that moment Yuki walked in the room and Kyo stopped speaking.
Yuki had only a moment to assess the situation. Tohru knelt beside Kyo, her sweet smile ajar with vacant eyes that attended happily only to Kyo's conscious state. Momiji sat smiling against the table where Shigure's computer sat open and unused, piles of books scattered about save for one toppled pile on the floor. Shigure knelt on Kyo's other side. Hatori stood just by the door, his back half turned to the scene. Kyo himself was sitting up, a blanket wrapped around his waist, one hand pressed to his bandaged side, but his eyes were focused on Yuki, wide and round and surprised. For a brief instant a deeply pained look crossed his face, a look which turned suddenly to anger, and from anger to hate.
And then it happened.
Tohru recognized it immediately, mouth parting, eyes widening as the blood drained from her face, but everyone leapt to their feet, scrambling backward by instinct and fear as Kyo began to change. Yuki stood stock still, staring, paralyzed with shock as Kyo convulsed, covering his face automatically, screaming intelligibly as his skin darkened and hardened, his hands enlarging, evolving into thick, three-toed claws. His eyes widened and then narrowed, gruesome cat-eyes set in the scaly head of some hairless, long-legged greenish cat-monster that hunched over itself, close to the ground.
"What in hell?"
Arisa's voice, eyes wide, mouth agape, and Saki and Haru right behind her.
Enormous, powerful arms swung wildly and Shigure's computer crashed into the wall, exploding in a shower of sparks as the table it had been sitting on was hurled on its side, cracked in two, books sliding off onto the floor. Tohru ducked, hands covering her ears, eyes shut tight as books missed her by inches. If anything, in seeing her crumpled over and shaking, Kyo looked twice as dangerous, pain and shame and rage erupting from his throat in a hollow roar that shook the walls. Without the blast from sound, it would have sounded more like a pained cry.
"Kyo!" Shigure shouted desperately. "Akito is here!"
"Get out!"
The monster straightened menacingly to its feet and they all fled on impulse, retreating from the room one by one, but once through the door, Tohru remembered herself and turned back, braids whipping around her head. The door slammed shut on her face before she could reach it, but her little fists banged on the wood repeatedly, her small, tear-choked voice whispering over and over, "Kyo. Kyo. Kyo. Kyo."
Outside, Yuki trembled, his hands shaking, recovering slowly, feeling a little nauseous and slightly dizzy, but was it because of Kyo's form, the sight and the stench, or the sickening thought in his head?
Is it me? Do I do this to Kyo?
"We have to find it," he heard Tohru moan as she sunk to her knees, still beating weakly on the door. Sobs racked her voice. "Kyo, please. Let me in. Kyo! I'm going to find it. I'm going to find it!"
TBC
Wow. That was all one scene, wasn't it? Mini-confrontations with Akito and Tohru's friends getting in on the situation and now this little problem… Did you get through it? Is this story exciting or dull? I hope people are still reading! I know I'm just getting started, but I have a lot of story to tell, so please keep reading and let me know if you're out there! Expect another update sometime within this next week. ^_^ Thank you so much!
