"Seriously, I have no idea what you're talking about." I was literally shaking. How did Hatsuharu know about the Zodiac- and how did he know what sign I was?
"You can tell us, Shawny!" A voice cried from behind us. I turned around to see Momiji standing behind me.
"I really don't-" I started again.
"Awww, Shawny, you don't have to lie. We know what you are because we are them ourselves!" Momiji skipped up to me and grabbed my arm, pulling me around in a circle.
"You... are... like me?" I asked, quietly.
"Yes." Hatsuharu responded, then swiftly swept me into his arms. Just as it had been with Kyou, there was no poof and no turning into a cat. Maybe they did know what I was, and maybe they were one of the families that my aunt had been talking about. One of the families like ours.
"I... I believe you, but that doesn't mean my cousins will. I'll keep you're secret safe if you keep mine. That means nobody but the three of us can know about the Zodiac." I said. I was scared the head of the family would find out and punish the Sohmas. I wasn't too sure about them, but they seemed honest, and it felt nice to be held like Hatsuharu had held me a minute ago. If the head of my family, Uncle Mitch, found out that they knew our family secret and they turned out to just be strange people who could hug us, then they could be killed. Even if they were a family like ours, Uncle Mitch may still get angry. So I had to protect them now, too.
"YAY! Shawny's like Kyou, Shawny's-" I grabbed Momiji and covered his mouth before he could utter another sentence.
"What did I just say?" I hissed.
Momiji gave me a big set of apologetic eyes before I let him go. This time, he remained silent.
"That better," I said after a few moments of silence. "So, what animals are you?"
"I'm the rabbit!" Momiji was back to bouncing and smiling. "Haru's the ox." Hatsuharu nodded slightly, as if to verify that Momiji's answer was correct. I turned back to look at Momiji and noticed, at that moment, that Momiji was in a girl's school uniform.
"Uhhh... Momiji?" I asked hesitantly.
"Yes?" Momiji beamed at me.
"I'm not from around here, so I could be wrong, but I thought Momiji was a boy's name." I offered.
"Yup! It is! I just like the girl's school uniform much better!" He smiled brightly.
"Oh. Okay." I didn't know what else to say, and was quickly receding back into my grumpy rainy day mode now that the shock was wearing off.
"Hatsuharu, what did you so urgently need to speak to Curna- san about that you pulled her away before the introductions were finished?" Yuki's voice rang out behind me, making me jump a mile.
"Nothing, please forgive me, Yuki." Hatsuharu was immediately at Yuki's side, touching his face.
"Incest much?" Kaia whispered into my ear.
I shot her an angry look and replied softly, "They're our new friends. don't be rude." in my no nonsense voice.
"Sorry." Kaia said, visibly hurt. I pretended not to notice.
"Yuki, please, call her Shawna, like everyone else. Formalities are lost on her. You won't find an ounce of 'polite' in her body." I heard Dean's voice behind me, and turned around, rage showing on my face. And then commenced to chase him around the school, occasionally punching him, to the amusement of the others.
Weeks passed uneventfully, with Kaia and Dean getting fan clubs to rival Yuki and Kyou's. Hatsuharu said I had one too, but I just wasn't seeing it. I spent the majority of my time sitting around with Hatsuharu and Momiji, participating in activities when they did and not when they didn't. It didn't matter to me that they were a year younger than me, they new my secret, and were pretty cool otherwise. I wanted to get closer with Kyou, but I was afraid that he would guess my secret because we're the same sign. I was getting used to my life here in Japan, actually not missing New York at all when IT happened. Every Zodiac member's worse fear.
"Um, Shawna?" I heard Momiji's voice behind me and was immediately worried. he only called me Shawna when there was trouble.
"What happened, Momiji? Are you okay?" I whipped around to see a very scared looking Momiji.
"Remember when you said that the only people who could know about you and you're family was me and Haru?" Momiji fidgeted.
"Yes." There was a tone of warning in my voice that made Momiji shake more.
"Well, what happens if one other person accidentally found out?" Momiji asked me.
"I would hurt whoever told." My voice was deadly now.
"Um, maybe you should just come see?" Momiji looked scared out of his mind. I followed him to a secluded area where I saw Hatsuharu leaning on a wall, looking down at a hunched over figure who was holding a curled up miniature dragon.
I ran forward and snatched Dean out of the person's hands, noting that they were female. She had probably tried to force herself on Dean and succeeded in getting her arms around him. "What the hell do you think you're doing!" I shouted. "Can't you see you're scaring him?" Hearing my voice, Dean uncurled himself and shot up my sleeve.
"I- I'm sorry, Shawna." Wait! I recognized that voice!
"Tohru!" I exclaimed.
"Y- yes?" Tohru slowly stood up and turned to face me, nervously.
"Shit." I cursed under my breath.
"Shawny, Tohru already knows about our secret, so you shouldn't worry about her knowing yours." Momiji offered.
"Why didn't you tell me she knew!" I yelled.
"You never asked." Hatsuharu shrugged.
"I- I thought you said that you weren't related to Kyou." Tohru stuttered out.
"As far as we know, we're two totally unrelated families." Another soft voice said from behind us. I whipped around to see Kaia there. When I opened my mouth she said "Nobody else saw you and Momiji run across campus, don't worry."
"But how-" Tohru started.
"My family has always know that there were other families like ours that we scattered all across the world. We just were never expected to meet them." I cut in.
"The two families are expected to look a lot alike. I thought you guys looked a lot like us, but there was no way to tell for certain that you were one of 'the others'." Kaia added her input.
"There really is no way for us to tell if that is one of the other families, short of hugging each other. We don't poof then. But if we're wrong, you could see where that could become fatal, can't you?" Dean said from my shoulder, having climbed out of my sleeve at his twin's arrival.
"So there's just one thing that I want to know," Kaia began.
"How'd YOU find out, Shawna." Dean finished Kaia's sentence.
"We told her." Momiji said, trying to help me out.
"Why would you tell a person you just met something big like that?" Kaia asked, suspiciously.
"Because she told us." Momiji shrugged.
Kaia turned shocked eyes to me, and Dean angrily bit my ear. "They guessed." I said stiffly, flicking Dean away, and, as luck would have it, he turned back into a human mid- flight.
Kaia pulled out her cellphone as Dean pulled on his clothes and dialed the main house, back in New York. I froze as I watched those numbers being put into the phone. I wasn't scared of much, but Uncle Mitch was worthy of my fear.
"Yes, is this Rebecca? Hey, Becky, what's up? We have a little bit of a stiuation here in Japan. Yes, some one found out. Actually, there's three of them. You might want to send Jesse. Oh. Are you sure? I think Jesse could handle it. No, no, I'm not the one who makes the judgment. If Uncle Mitch wants to come all the way out here, he's welcomed to. It's fine by me. Thanks, Becky, It was great talking to you, kisses, bye." Kaia hung up her cell.
"Y- you didn't." I stuttered.
Kaia looked at me coldly. "Uncle Mitch is coming out here to fix this mess personally. Keep you're mouth shut. If it wasn't for you, we would have never been in this mess in the first place." Then she marched away.
I was vaguely aware of Dean's hand resting gently on my shoulder. This was it. If Uncle Mitch was coming to Japan himself, it meant the end for the Sohmas. He would kill them. And probably send me along for the ride for keeping it a secret that they knew for so long. There was no way that Hatsuharu, Momiji, Tohru, and myself would live to see another day.