DISCLAIMER: We claim no ownership of Fruits Basket.

Chapter Two: Shigure
September
Thursday
New Tokyo, Japan

--

Hatori glanced at his watch again and wondered for the thirty-fifth time—when was Shigure (that IDIOT!) going to come downstairs? He'd been waiting…

"Haa-san!"

The doctor turned and watched as his younger cousin finally dashed down the front steps of his new house two at a time.

"Shigure."

Shigure hadn't changed very much at all in the year and a half they had been apart—he still wore his hair in a dark mop of black strands falling all over, and his brown eyes still twinkled with mischief and joviality and something else that told the world he was smarter than one's average fop. The sleeves of his white dress shirt had been rolled up sloppily below his elbows and his tie was loose. His black slacks were nicely pressed, though, and his shoes were in better condition than Hatori's.

He probably just bought them, Hatori's mind supplied, an oddly jealous edge hinting at the whispery words. Shigure always did have connections.

He shook the thoughts away.

Shigure's house was quite big by Japanese standards—only natural, considering how fond he was of flaunting their family's wealth. He'd bought up the entire little three-family apartment building, which was something that was utterly ridiculous, considering that it was only Shigure and sometimes his niece, if her parents decided to disappear off of the face of the earth again. What did the neighbors think? And who was paying for the house anyway, Shigure or… Or was it Kaname, one of the richest men alive, one of the best businessmen out there, the head of the Sohma family? That certainly wouldn't surprise Hatori. Shigure was the beloved, after all… The only one of the inner circle who hadn't run away from home at the first available opportunity.

"Hurry up and get into the car, Shigure. I'm already ten minutes behind schedule." And that was even taking into account Shigure's tendency to be vague.

"So… You got lost, didn't you, Haa-san?" Shigure asked shiftily over the top of the doctor's car as he opened the door.

"Yes," was the clipped reply as Hatori turned the key in the ignition. "Your directions were terrible. 'Turn right at the tree.' Shigure, have you any idea how many trees I turned right at?"

--

"So, Hatori—"

"Yes, Shigure?"

"When is your lunch break?"

"…Why do you want to know?"

Shigure feigned an innocent expression.

"Well, maybe you could come and visit me and Yuki, you know, since it'll probably get boring after a while and we won't have anything to talk to each other about and then Yuki might not want to st—"

"Fine, fine. I take it you're staying the whole day, then?"

Shigure nodded slowly.

"I suppose. I mean, I don't really have anything else to do at home other than listen to depressing war news and such…"

Get a job, then, Hatori wanted to say, but knew from experience that such a suggestion would amount to nothing other than a laugh which, coming from his most darling cousin, clearly meant I-do-not-want-to-talk-about-that-so-case-closed-okay?

So neither man said a thing, and silence set in. Not that it was an awkward silence, of course. Hatori and Shigure had grown up together, and a year and a half apart was hardly anything to get awkward over. And besides, it wasn't as though Hatori was the most social person in the world, and Shigure knew it. Still…

"Shigure… Why did you come to New Tokyo?" was Hatori's smooth question at last.

Shigure seemed to contemplate that for a moment.

"I could ask you the same question, Hatori. But… it's a secret." Shigure put his index finger to his smiling lips. "After all, I can't have you knowing all my little secrets, Haa-san!"

"You're such a child. How old are you? Six or twenty-six?"

--

"What do we have today, Noriko?" Hatori asked as soon as he got into the hospital, shrugging on his white jacket and striding out of the locker room with Shigure in tow.

"Doctor! The patient in room 429—"

"Ayaka-san? What now?"

"She fell into a coma not too long ago, sir."

Damn. Damn, damn, damn.

"Shigure," Hatori began, "Yuki is in room 634. Just look around for the Sasaki Sadako wing."

"What?"

"Sasaki Sadako wing!" Hatori called over his shoulder.

"The girl with the cranes?" the other man asked, but there was no reply, and Shigure was left to watch as his cousin ran down the hall with his nurse quick on his heels. He sighed resignedly.

"…Ah, sumimasen, miss," he asked the first (very cute) nurse that passed by, "but would you by any chance know where the Sasaki Sadako wing is located?"

--

Yuki blinked at the man standing in the doorway of his room.

"Shigu…re?"

"Hello, Yuki-kun. How are you this fine morn? Any sponge baths lately?"

"What are you doing here? Weren't you still at the estate?"

Shigure smiled graciously, quite obviously pleased with himself.

"Se-cr-et!"

"SHIGURE—!"

"Hush, now, Yuki, I have a feeling that yelling at me isn't good for you. Now. Since, as you know, I have bought myself a fine new house smack-dab in the middle of New Tokyo and since you, according to the never-wrong Haa-san, are getting better with each passing day, I was contemplating the possibility of current arrangements being swapped around so that you and I could live in my wonderful new residence and lead happy-happy lives amidst this rising utopia that is New Tokyo."

And with that, Shigure scooped Yuki up into his arms and deposited him gently into the wheelchair not too far away from the hospital bed that the boy had once been lying in.

"Shigure, have you been smoking again?" the boy asked uncertainly.

"Yes. But fear not, dearest cousin, it wasn't the cheap stuff this time. It was the really cheap stuff. Let us depart now and find… somewhere better than this place, at least. Such ugly walls."

Yuki stared at Shigure.

What have I done?

--

Hatori wandered down a corridor of the Sasaki Sadako wing, stopping only when he came to room 634, the nameplate outside which read Sohma Yuki-sama.

He peered in.

--

"Shigure—!" –you IDIOT!

"Oh, dear. Yuki-kun, don't you think that sounded extraordinarily like Haa-san?"

"…Uh…"

The nanophone at Shigure's hip began to vibrate and the man listened quickly to the caller ID before hooking it over his ear and answering it.

"Excuse me for a moment, please," he told the occupants of the room before launching into a gleeful, "Haa-san—!"

"Yuki. Where did you take him, Shigure?"

Ooh. Hatori sounded kind of… blank. Which meant that he was probably kind of… mad. To tease him or not to tease him… That was the question… And Shigure was leaning towards—

"Shigure. Now."

—Not teasing him! Yes. That had been his plan all along. Yeah. Just because Hatori was sounding dangerous—that had nothing to do with it. Yeah.

"Oh, uh… Pardon me, miss, what room is this?" Shigure asked.

--

On his end, Hatori was burying his head in his hands.

"Room 636."

Within moments, Hatori was in the doorway, nanophone still curled around his ear.

"Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, Haa-san. Were you worried?" Shigure waved his hands in a relatively placating gesture. Hatori sucked in a breath (and with it, many of the admonishments that he had been simply itching to throw at his cousin) and replaced his nanophone in his pocket.

Yuki simply continued with his business.

And the patient in room 636 stared, more frightened of them all than anything else.

"Shigure. Why did you take Yuki out of his room?"

The younger of the two grinned.

" 'Human contact', dear cousin of mine," he confided in a low tone. "It was only next door, you know. And you said it yourself, Yuki-kun doesn't get out that much. So we went walking—well, walking and rolling, anyway—and found Tohru-kun sitting here all alone." Shigure raised his voice. "Tohru-kun isn't a nurse, are you, Tohru-kun?"

"Ah… no?"

And so it was, for the first time, Hatori saw the much-rumored-about patient of room 636.

--

Notes

Sohma Yuki-sama: According to the oh-so-wonderful and humorous manga Gravitation, hospitals use the '-sama' suffix to refer to which patients reside in which room. So, no, Yuki does not have 'lord' status or anything… JIC you were wondering.

Sasaki Sadako: If you don't already know her story, it might be worth it to read it. While it's not overly important for this fic, it's one of the many things that inspired us into writing Folding Cranes; and so, we named the wing that Yuki and Tohru reside in after her.

First glimpse of Tohru (outside of the prologue, that is…)! Not a very good glimpse, though… More like a foggy impression… or something.

We'll warn you now: Yuki is somewhat hard for us to capture, especially in these early stages. So he'll seem a little like Akito at points, and a little like the regular Yuki, and a little something extra, given the situation. Just a warning.

Sorry for the delay. We don't have a working computer between us, and it wouldn't feel right, trying to post when chapter six hadn't been started. And then RIP got re-addicted to Switchfoot songs and Robin McKinley, and fluorescent got re-addicted to Franz Ferdinand and The Naming and both of us started reading Diana Wynne Jones and nothing we wrote for chapter 5 actually worked with our idea of this fic… What a disaster…

--/thankyouthankyou/--
(done by RIP)

Lucinda the Maid: Thanks so much for your wonderful review. One of the reasons why this fic is so fun to write is because most of the characters are shrouded in mystery, even to us. We like to reveal things little by little, both through dialogue and through actions, rather than by stating them outright. Things are so much more fun that way. Ah, yes.fluore-chan is adamant about having perfect spelling and passable grammar, so before posting a chapter, we have to edit it twice each. But it's worth it, I suppose. Anyway, thanks again!

Placid Snowflake: Ah... Well, the number 636 is significant to fluore-chan, if to no one else, I'm sorry to tell you. It was the number of the classroom her favorite class (Freshman Composition) was held in this year. :sheepish grin: Yes, multiple plots. One for each main character, of course! We hope it'll be interesting! Thanks so much for your review!

october-darkness, Different Child, Lil-Kudo: Thanks so much for reviewing!

AeiishiAkuma: Shigure makes me giggle, too. He's very giggle-worthy. And Hatori! We love him ever-so-much.We both hope that we're getting him right because as enjoyable as he is to read, he's ever-so-enjoyable to write, as well. And intrigue is just so fun, isn't it? Thanks so much for reviewing.

MistressofHeaven: Hm. We're not sure, actually. Most of them will pop up at one point or other, though. Thanks for your review!

miss toad: Ah! Such compliments! I like this alternate universe, too. It's fluore-chan's making, mostly, so I appreciate it just about as much as any outsider to the story. And we're both glad to know that we're getting Shigure right!

Thanks to anyone who read but didn't review. It'd be nice if you reviewed it this time, though... :hinthint: Any critiques are welcome, though fluore-chan's ego is somewhat damaged by flames, even though she doesn't like to admit it. :grin:

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4/15/06
REVISED! Hope you had fun reading!