DISCLAIMER: I don't own Fruits Basket or any of it's characters.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'll be honest with you, I'm really one for original character fan fictions. Nothing against them, they just arn't usually my cup of tea. When this popped into my head though I had to write it down. So, please give this one a try. I promise you won't be disappointed

Also, I've read up to Volume 22, so I am pooling my knowledge from that. There are no spoilers in this chapter, though I think there may be some further on in this story, but I will warn you if there is going to be any in a chapter and which volume they are going to be from. So don't worry. As it stands this story takes place around Volume 19 and onwards. No spoilers in this one though, I promise, that's just the time frame. So, here it goes, please enjoy….

CHAPTER ONE:

Yuri looked around her on the crowded street. The sun was setting and she was lost. She didn't like this city. It was new to her and she was having trouble finding her way. At least in a more rural area help was easily attainable, but here….

She shook her head as if to shake those thoughts away. No, she would find her way home, it would be okay. She quickly turned a corner, only to find her self directly in the pathway someone else in a hurry. Before she could do anything about it Yuri found herself crashing headlong into the young man. Oh no! Yuri thought panicking. She was going to transform and then she would be in trouble. Maybe if she ran away fast enough the person would think they dreamed it all. But…..

Yuri opened her eyes and found herself on top of one of her new classmates. She recognized him at once because of his strange hair and all his piercings. He had shaggy white hair and was black underneath. Yuri liked it because it made her less self-conscious about her own strange hair. A dark red color with white tips. Of course the boy's hair was surely dyed, but still. Having landed on top of a strange classmate wasn't what shocked her though,

"I'm not a fox!" she exclaimed before she could stop herself.

"I'm not a cow…." The boy said wonderingly, in an absent minded sort of way at the same exact time. And then realizing what the other had said, they stared at each other amazed.

"WHA?" they said in unison.

… … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … …

Yuri sat silently sipping the tea the smiling girl had given her. Tohru, that's Hatsuharu had said, Yuri reminded herself.

"So Haru, you two hugged, (or rather ran into each but still…..ahaha) and you didn't transform?" The dark haired man asked Hatsuharu. Shigure, his name was. And the other two, Yuki was the handsome, light-haired one and Kyo, he was the angry orange-haired one, Yuri thought to herself.

"Yes, that's what I said." Hatsuharu explained calmly. Shigure looked at him intensely then turned to Yuri, that same serious expression on his face.

"And you're being honest with us when you say you are a woman?" he said. Yuri glowered.

"Of course I am!" She said offended. Shigure waved his hands in front of him.

"I don't mean to be rude, but this is important…can we check?" he said with a grin. Yuri turned beet red and rose to slap him in the face. But those two, Yuki and Kyo beat her to it.

"Pervert!" they said at the same time, both punching him full in the face.

"I meant Tohru would check, of course!" he said weakly from the ground.

"Well why didn't you say that to begin with!" Kyo said angrily at Shigure.

"Yes….." Yuki said, rolling his eyes at Shigure. "Why do you always try and stir something up? Act like an adult for once…" he sighed and then turned to Yuri.

"It really is important though. It's not like any of us think otherwise, but we need to verify." He said. Yuri nodded, after what she had already learned from Hatsuharu she did understand.

"Honda-san?" Yuki asked. Tohru nodded,

"I'm sorry," she said to Shia apologetically, "it really is important,"

When Tohru and Shia returned, Tohru said to the group,

"She told the truth." She said smiling. The whole room turned to look at Yuri shocked.

"I had a feeling that she had." Shigure said slyly, "Call it, writer's intuition…."

"Oh, please…." Kyo muttered.

"It's not that we didn't think you were female," Yuki hastily explained to Yuri on seeing her almost offended expression. "It's just…well it's hard to believe there is someone out there like us." He explained. Yuri nodded, understanding, it was hard to believe herself.

"I understand completely." She said smiling gently.

"So," Shigure said, "I gather you already heard all about us from Haru. Our family is cursed by the 12 animals of the zodiac." He said calmly. Kyo glared at him, "Oh, right, sorry, the 12 animals, plus the cat." Yuri nodded. She had heard all about it from Haru already.

"And as you can maybe guess, Kyo here is the cat, Yuki's the rat, I'm the dog and Haru as you might know is the cow." Shigure finished. Yuri shot a look at Tohru wondering what animal she was,

"Oh," said Shigure noticing Yuri's look, "Tohru isn't a Sohma, be it she's a part of the 'family.'"

"I see," Yuri said, "Is it common for outsiders to learn of your family secret? " she asked. Thinking about how carefully she guarded her own.

"Not at all." Shigure said with a strange expression on his face.

"Honda-san…." Yuki said almost absentmindedly, "is a special case." Yuri looked at Tohru who still sat there with a goofy smile on her face and smiled. She really did seem to be an extremely nice girl.

"So, " Shigure said, clapping his hands together, "You know all about us, tell us about yourself, kitsune-san! "

"Yes, " Yuki said, "It's amazing to find to someone else who is cursed by…."

"I'm not cursed!" Yuri cut him off sharply, she glared at Yuki and explained.

"Yes I transform when hugged by a member of the opposite sex. And yes I have all the senses and instincts of my animal. And yes my animal comes if I ask, and sometimes when I don't…" almost as if on cue a small fox ran across the yard and into the house, jumping into Yuri's lap, curling up at once. Yuri smiled at it and stroked it like one would a cat. "But I am not cursed!"

Everyone in the room (except Haru who had heard this speech before) stared at her wide-eyed. Shocked by both how angry she got and by what she was saying.

"It was sometime after my mother had gotten married to my father. My mother desperately wanted a child and my father desperately wanted an heir. They tried and tried for a child but my mother didn't get pregnant. The years past but no child came. My father got angrier and angrier with my mother, saying it was her fault that they didn't have a child. Their marriage was falling apart. One day after a big fight my mother went on a walk to nurse her emotional hurt. As she walked down the side of the rode she saw a small fox pup sitting in the middle of the street.

"How cute…." She thought and then she saw the truck coming towards it at an alarming speed. Horrified she ran into the street and grabbed the pup and was just barely able to get out of the way in time. She rolled onto the side of the road the squealing pup in her arms.

"Thanks goodness." She thought to her self. And then she saw it. The Fox spirit.

"My dear," it said to her, "Thank you so much for saving my child! I can not begin to repay you for the sacrifice you almost made for my child. Thank you thank you. And even with a child of your own growing inside of you."

"What?" my mother said shocked.

"Oh! You didn't know?" The Fox spirit exclaimed, "Well I am pleased to be the one to tell you, you are with child. And as my thanks I am going to bless this child. It will be able to speak to my kind and they will always be of help to her. They will love her when she needs companions and be her friends always. And also I will give her the instinct and senses of my kind so that she will have something to rely on when she is faced with danger. The last gift you will find to be a mixed blessing, but that is the only way it can work. She will be able to transform into one of my kind. At first though it will come unbidden, but it time she will learn to control, this I assure you."

And with that the spirit left.

My father was overjoyed at the news, and everything between them seemed well again. But I was a girl, and he wanted an heir, he wanted a boy. It didn't help I turned into a strange creature whenever he held me. That is enough for any father to hate his daughter. My father was worse then ever to my mother after I was born and even after my little brother was born it didn't help. He left us."

Yuri stopped. She seemed to be trying to get a grip on herself; she was wiping at her eyes.

"That doesn't seem like much of a blessing." Kyo said harshly.

"Kyo!" all three men said at once.

"But it was!" Yuri insisted. "My blessing helped me many times and always having foxes with me is great. Also it saved my life once." Everyone listened intently.

"My mother, she doesn't have good taste in men, she kept picking bad ones. She couldn't see they were bad though, but I did. My instincts could tell, I could smell the danger. I could usually get them to leave pretty quickly, but one stayed and became my stepfather. Mother thought he was great, but I saw through him right away. My instincts knew right away. And sure enough, he came to me late one night. He would have done horrible things to my child's body, but I transformed into fox that could scratch and bite. He left the next day. My mother was upset, but I…..I was proud of myself. So you see, the fox spirit saved my life." Yuri finished, her eyes shining, her face flushed with anger. Kyo, like the rest of the room looked stricken, and Tohru, Tohru was crying.

"I'm so sorry!" she said to Yuri, sobbing, "that's such a horrible thing to happen! If not for being a fox, something very bad would have happened!" Tohru managed to get out between sobs. Yuri's eyes softened and she wrapped her arms around Tohru.

"It's okay, it was long ago now. And…I'm okay now really, I'm okay. Thank you, Tohru, really, but I'm okay." Yuri said soothingly to Tohru.

Hatsuharu smiled at Yuri comforting Tohru, and repeated the words Yuri had said to him earlier,

"It really is all how you look at it. A curse, a blessing, the only difference is how you see it. Is the glass half-empty or is it half full? It's a matter of perspective."

"Yes….." Tohru mumbled in Yuri's arms, she lifted her head up suddenly and looked at Yuri, "that's it! Yuri-chan likes to look at the positive side of things. She likes seeing the glass as half full!"

"That's right." Yuri said nodding. Tohru smiled and Yuri returned it.

After Hatsuharu had left to walk Yuri home, which in Kyo's mind seemed like a stupid plan seeing as Hatsuharu had the worst sense of direction at of all of them, Kyo sat on the rood brooding. He felt guilty making Yuri bring up that painful story just to defend herself. A cat crawled up on his lap and mewed; Kyo scratched its chin. A blessing? He stared at his beads, there was no way he was….blessed. He sighed, and petted the cat. But maybe he was a glass half full.

Yuri followed Hatsuharu down the path away from Shigure's house.

"Haru? That blond boy from school, your relative, is he a zodiac member too?" Yuri asked to fill the silence.

"Yeah, " Haru said, not phased by her talking to him so informally,

"What animal is he?"

"He's the rabbit, " Haru explained, "That's why he has the backpack."

"Oh!" Yuri exclaimed, "That's why he seemed so tasty!" She grinned revealing sharp, fox-like eyeteeth and then laughed. Haru grinned.

END OF CHAPTER 1

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