the guys sat us on the bed and sly began. "you see... our family isn't exactly...normal..." we looked at him incrediously. shmuffy's eyes narrowed "of course not. not with a freak like him!" she jerked her head over at shigure who had come to sit by me again. i diddn't even notice him there. i was still in shock that he'd hugged me so intimately. that is, until i found his hand on my hip again. "uh...?" he was grinning at me again. i could feel the blood rush to my face. "what's this? not shy are you?" i turned away back to shmuffy. i gave her a pleading look. she gave me one that said 'what can i do?' i sighed and turned back to sly. "you were saying?"

"well...our family...it's cursed." me and shmuffy both let out a snort of laughter. "you mean like voo doo and stuff?" "no like a real curse." shift took over. "certain members of our family are cursed with the spirits of the thirteen members of the zodiac. now i know what you're thinking, there's only twelve but-" "the cat." it was shmuffy. she looked at me. we both looked very sad. we then told the story together. "one day god told all the animals 'tommorrow i'm having a banquet. don't be late' when the mischevious rat heard this he went and told his neighbor the cat that the party was in two days. not the next day. so the cat went to sleep dreaming of the party he could never go to. and thus the cat was excluded from the zodiac. such a sad story" "yes exactly. well we happen to be three of them. when one of us thirteen is hugged by a member of the opposite sex, or are under extreme stress, we transform into that animal. i happen to be the ox. sly here is the cat. and shigure...he's the dog. that's why we were so shocked when he diddn't change." "oh, i see." "wha...? you beleive us? just like that?" "yeah. me and jappy have seen some pretty strange things on our travels. not much surprises us now." "yeah and since we live alone together now, we can do all sorts of things. not to mention meeting all kinds of people."

"oh alright. that makes sense. well shift and i were wondering something... could we... i mean do you think we could...if you say no that's okay too... but-" "what he's trying to say is,...do you think we could see if it's true? or if it's just shigure." we looked at eachother. i whispered to her. "should we...? it wouldn't really hurt anything..." "it wouldn't hurt...and not to mention they're really hot." "totally." we looked back. "sure why not." we stood up with them. they took a step closer to us. i could feel my heart racing. shift was going to hug me. he put his arms around me and gently held me to him. it was only for a second. not at all like shigure.

"i diddn't change..." sly had hugged shmuffy "me neither..." they just stared at each other for a minuet. "why? is it gone? is the curse gone?" "we need to see." they ran out side to a car waiting. "hop on in girls!" we all loaded in and went back to civilization. we parked next to a little pastry shop and walked down the street. sly was looking around. he spotted a girl by herself. he kinda bumped into her. (on purpose) it was definitly close enough to count as a hug. there was a puff of orange smoke and an orange cat darted into the alley next to them. the girl looked confused but kept walking. shmuffy ran down the alley. "sly!" she ran to him and picked him up. poof another smokey thing and sly was back. "ah!" shmuffy spun away. "you reversed my transformation!" now they knew. it wasn't the curse. it was us. there was something different about us. we went back to the pastry shop and got some little cakes. we ate them and then decided we'd better go get shigure. they said they were taking us to the 'main house'. i'd heard some pretty nasty stories about that place. "do we have to?" "yes. you're going with us." we were both freaked. we'd heard bout akito. he was evil. he hurt people. shmuffy sat forward "you can't make us if we don't want to." by now we were back at the cabin. i'd been paying attention to the road. it'd only take us five minuets to the apartment, if we ran. if we ran fast. really fast. we could do it though. we'd handled worse conditions.

"shmuffy." i whispered so they wouldn't hear us. "when we all get out i'll bend over to 'tie my shoe'. after that they should be a little ways away. when i stand up we bolt. i don't wanna deal with akito. we'll get our stuff from the apartment and we'll go." "good plan. i watched the road too. so we both know which ways to go?" i nodded. we were ready. we only had a backpack each at the apartment. we traveled alot. we all got out of the car. the boys went ahead a little bit to get shigure. "crap my shoe's undone." i bent over. "yeah well get in here as soon as your done." it was sly. i nodded to him and kept working on it. i finished (i undid it in the car) and stood. they were just at the door, a good ten feet away when shift looked back at me. i mouthed to him 'sorry' realization dawned on his face and he took off towards us. we'd already taken off. we were going full throtle. we ran full force all the all the way to the apartment. sly had joined shift in running, but they'd fallen behind long ago. "we gotta get our stuff!" we ran into our room and stuffed all our things into our backpacks and ran down the stairs. we were about to go out the door when we saw the guys there looking around. "crap that's right! there's only three apartments in this town! no wonder they came so fast. this one's closest!" we turned to go up the stairs and they saw us.

we bolted up the three flights of stairs and into our room again. we tried to ignore their yells but it was hard. we locked the door and ran to the window. i wrenched it open and we flew out. we practically skipped half the stairs on the way down the fire escape. we heard them thundering down after us. as luck would have it, being me, i turned back to look at them to see if they were closing in and hit the wall. luckily i was already off the stairs. i wasn't hurt at all, all it did was make me dizzy. or so i thought. i diddn't notice the pain in my leg and kept going. shmuffy grabbed my hand and lead me. "where to?" "the bus station." we were exauhsted. we could barely keep running. about a block away from the bus they caught up to us. well rather they tackled us then. when i hit the ground i felt a searing pain shoot through my leg. shift was trying to keep me down. "you can't leave. please. we have to find out why this is happening!" "if we go you have to promise to let us leave as soon as we want to!" "...fine. i promise."

we stood up. shmuffy and sly were still struggling. "shmuffy!" she stopped to look at me. sly hefted her off the ground and held her wrists. "i guess we're going with them." she hung her head. we both knew we'd have to eventually. even if they chased the bus they'd catch us. i took a step forward but i couldn't move my left leg for the pain. "ah!" i fell down on the gound and shift dropped down next to me. "i thought i heard something crack when you hit the wall. yup. it's broken. "every time he touched it i felt white hot flames lick at my leg. i gritted my teeth and tried not to show my pain. "well only one thing to do." "wha?...eh!" i was suddenly lifted up into his arms bridal style. i felt the blood rise to my face. shift looked down at me. 'she's cute when she blushes.'

he carried me back to the cabin. we got in the car (again) this time shigure was with us. sly drove with shmuffy in the passenger seat. me, shigure, and shift sat in back. shift wrapped up my ankle as we went. it was kind of embarrasing sitting there, needing help from him. i felt so useless. at least he sat between me and shigure. i still think he's a freak. so creepy. we arrived at the main house in about twenty minuets. shigure had called on the way there so they'd know to expect us. we parked and i noticed a few cars gathered around the building. "akito must've called everyone here." shift lifted me out of the car.

i gasped at how quickly and easily he could move. i put my hand up mear my mouth so that if he looked i could hide my blush. i diddn't notice him watching me out of the corner of his eye. 'she's so adorable. she looks so frail.she's so small in my arms, and so light. it's amazing.' we went into the building to see a whole crap load of people staring at us. "oh great. everyone knows how much i love crowds." shmuffy could tell i was ticked. i hated being around people i diddn't know. 'oh no. not the fingers. she is so ticked. calm down jappy! please!' when i got angry or worried i'd start tapping my middle finger and thumb together very rapidly. it was one of the few ways you could read my emotions.