AN: This is probably the last update at least for a while. This week is turning out to be pretty busy, and while I haven't filled out the rest of my schedule for what class assignments are due when, everything is shaping up to be pretty busy for a little while. 8/ I'll have time to respond to reviews I get - if any haha - and when not doing homework/being in class/getting fresh air, I'll be outlining Pure, and figuring out a chapter count. :) So bear with me, please. And now, to tide you over for a while as I do disappear, a new chapter of Pure, with some Rat/Cat in it. Enjoy! -WF

Pure - Movement One: "Knowledge Against Instinct"
Scenes 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10

Tit... tat... tit... tat.

The rain started off slow, a drop on the sidewalk here, there. Kyo noticed it fast enough to take shelter in the closest nearby building, a small corner market, and thought he could wait it out. He didn't leave with a jacket on, only barely returning to get shoes as walking in a city without shoes on was beyond strange, so getting caught out in the rain even if it starts out small probably would be a bad idea, constituting Kyo getting sick. He hadn't been affected by the rain all that much in his True form, but that wasn't exactly a get out of jail free card. Lips curled in disgust at himself for even remotely thinking about it.

Yuki had put him in a sour mood, the rain wasn't helping, and thinking of that form in any way was just downright depressing.

By the time Kyo had stalked the store twice, debating on whether or not to get a small pre-packaged case of sushi and some milk, because obviously he wouldn't be home in time for dinner, the rain outside had turned into a deluge, strong and hard, the thunder rattling the window of the small store as Kyo walked by them. Needless to say, he stopped walking by them gritting his teeth.

Ten minutes later, and he'd spent pocket money on the sushi and milk, and sat in a back corner of the store, faced away from the storm, even though he could hear it, and popped open the sushi container. With a delicate sniff, he could already tell this was made in the morning, and it was later afternoon by now... the sushi wasn't a day old, but even a few hours old wasn't as soon as fresh. Kyo drummed his fingers loudly on the small table beside him, debating if it was worth it. But he'd spent his pocket change on it, he wouldn't be traveling out in the rain for at least a few more hours, and his stomach was steadily increasing its sound for food.

"Better not bite me in the ass later on," he muttered, and began to eat, carefully blocking out the sounds of the rain and storm outside.

"He's been gone all day," Tohru mused mournfully as she gazed outside at the deluge of rain steadily pouring from the sky. With a crack and flash of light, she squeaked and stumbled away from the lightning display, and turned away, hand on her heart to calm the beating organ. Of course, as worst comes to worst, Tohru's anxiety led to her thinking one truly terrible thing. Worriedly, she turned worried blue-gray eyes to a bored Yuki at the table.

"Y-You don't think he's stuck out there, do you, Yuki?" Her voice rose and squeaked again at the end of her words, causing the Rat to give her a cursory glance. He smiled easily around the hand which braced his chin and the fingers that lightly spiderwebbed his face.

"He may be a Stupid Cat," he started, and looked away at the rain outside, "but give him credit. He hates water, I'm sure he took shelter, Miss Honda."

Sadly, Tohru didn't look convinced. She wrung her hands and looked back toward the outside of the house, before she turned and trotted off in the direction of her room. Yuki watched her go only for a moment, sliding one hand down a bare arm - after Kyo's outburst, he had wordlessly had changed his top. Not that it would matter, because as predicted, Tohru trotted back into the room in heavier clothes and a coat, her hair hidden behind a hood, as she strode over to the door, where her hand outstretched for an umbrella.

"Miss Honda, what are you doing?" Yuki spoke up, startling the poor girl out of her wits. Yuki's brows knit together briefly in her reaction; did she honestly think she could "sneak" out while Yuki was there in plain sight, watching her? Her babble of apologies and a stream of her explanation came from panicked lips. Yuki, after enough practice and having been around the girl a lot over time, knew what she was stuttering about and dissected the phrase easily:

I'm so sorry, Yuki! But Kyo, he's been out there all day, and I don't know if he's eaten anything, and he doesn't have a jacket, and if he's out in the rain he could change into the Cat - or or or worse and he could get sick! What if he gets sick and collapses somewhere and THEN turns into the Cat when someone tries to check on him - or what if - EEEEEK!

The last scream came from when a big clap of thunder rattled the house and Tohru jumped, stumbled back, and fell into a heap at the feet of a yawning Shigure. There was a bit of a pause, as Shigure looked over the scene, and then dashed the back of his hand against his forehead. "Yuki, is this what I think it looks like?" he cried in his falsetto, over-exaggerated voice. Yuki fought the urge to roll his eyes, as Tohru began to pick herself up from the ground, her cheeks red. "You're going to send our poor Tohru out in the rain-"

"No."

Shigure paused, a little startled, and even Tohru looked over at Yuki, a little surprised.

"I'll go find him. Tohru, stay in here, stay warm, and don't let Shigure touch you." Yuki said it in a deadpan, and stood, turning away from them to go upstairs to get back into his long-sleeved shirt as well as a coat, and maybe a scarf... no, the scarf would be overkill, it wasn't so cold as to aggravate his asthma.

Merely ten minutes later, he bid Tohru a small farewell, ignoring the confused look in her eyes about why Yuki was volunteering to get Kyo - and in this weather - at all. He also pointedly ignored Shigure's comments that the world had to have been ending, for Yuki was going to get Kyo, and sacrifice his good health for his rival, and yadda yadda.

It wasn't that big a deal, Yuki decided as he opened the umbrella above him and headed out along the pathway toward town.

It wasn't the first time the Rat chased the Cat. In the rain, no less.

The sushi had been a bad idea.

The store had closed soon enough for its normal hours around six, dinnertime, and apologetically forced Kyo out into the rain, where he almost immediately burst into shiver and looked around for any other means to shield himself with. When he came up empty handed, he sighed, and decided the best course of action would be to go back home. Or rather, to make it home without any silly mishaps.

About halfway there, his stomach churned a little violently, and in surprise, Kyo stumbled to the side, impacting a tree with a solid whump! and causing the birds there that were nesting to fly off in a cacophony of sound. Kyo's arms, which had been gripping solidly to themselves as he'd hunched in the weather and ran, now reached down to gingerly cup his tummy, as it gave another violent twist.

Saliva gathered beneath his tongue as convulsively, Kyo swallowed to try and keep it at bay.

When he deemed himself able to move on, he did so, pushing away from the tree and gingerly returning to travel on foot back toward Shigure's house. Sadly, he only barely made it to the edge of the dirt road that led to Shigure's house before his stomach revolted again, with enough surprising force that Kyo couldn't keep it down. He hit the muddy ground beneath him with a surprised grunt, and immediately following that grunt came the coughing sounds. Even in human form, Kyo would lose his stomach just like a cat. And what a painful way to lose it...

Cough

Cough

Cough

Each of them getting worse, as he tried to swallow between them, but doing so choked him and made the next few coughs shake and rattle him harder.

Cough

Cough

Cough

The smell hit his sensitive nose first, and he wrinkled his nose in disgusted, now regretting that he didn't take a scarf with him.

Then came the sound of obviously painful coughs, and then the unmistakable sound of retching. The splat of stomach contents hitting the ground, heard even over the pounding of the rain.

- or worse and he could get sick! -

Suppose Tohru had it right on the money, as Yuki dashed a little further to the epicenter of the noise, seeing Kyo bent over near the edge of the road. Drenched, shuddering, a pile of stomach acid and... what looked like undigested sushi in front of him. He huffed heavily, crimson eyes half-lidded as he fought to catch his breath. Yuki watched, stunned, for what seemed to be an unbearably long amount of time, before he knelt into the mud and dirt beside the weakened Cat, and held the umbrella over him.

Kyo may have been drenched, but this would held his strained body recover. At least a little. Right?

By now, his vision had blurred and the smell of his own stomach was both disgusting but intriguing to his own nose. His stomach had finished its terror on his body, leaving the Cat to puff and huff his pained lungs and sore, wet body back into enough shape to get him back up and onto his feet.

It took quite a while before he actually recognized that something - no, someone - was blocking the rain from falling on him.

Dazed red eyes looked up, and took in the fuzzy image of who it was. At first assumption, he thought it would be Tohru out here looking for him, though he was surprised when he saw the long-sleeved figure of Yuki beside him, amethyst eyes lit in... concern? Almost violently, Kyo tore himself away from that other male, scrambling away from Yuki, and his released stomach contents. He blinked, and Yuki was carefully blank again, but inching on the balls of his feet to keep the umbrella over the drenched Kyo.

"Stupid Cat," he mumbled, fidgeting around his pocket for something; soon enough he produced a handkerchief, and reached out to the frozen Cat, gently wiping Kyo's lips to rid them of the bile splatter and a bit of the aftertaste of what he'd just gone through. "Why didn't you come home sooner?"

The Rat didn't deny, and wouldn't deny, that he had concern for Kyo, the Cat. Why he let it show on his face, while earlier Kyo had masked it beneath his normal temper and angry mutterings, he didn't know. It startled Kyo, but at least the orange-haired one realized Yuki wasn't there to hurt him or anything. Just gently wiping away the bile and acid splashback.

As a mother to her child. In a sense.

One friend to another.

Yuki saw the way Kyo's eyes half-lidded, as he began to pull his hand away. He should have seen it as a sign, instead of moving to put away the handkerchief in his pocket to wash later. Yet imagine his surprise when he turned back, and found an orange cat, soaked and trembling, with its tail between its legs and the residual orange smoke dissolved in the rain around him. Moreso how surprised he was when the wet ball of fur climbed into Yuki's lap, where instinctively he wrapped an arm around it to hold it secure, and the long orange tail unwound to curl around his sleeved arm.

"Damn Rat, I told you... not to wear long-sleeves."

Then with a close of his eyes, the Cat fell asleep against his once-terrible enemy... now turned-friend. Not wanting to disturb him, Yuki shifted toward the tree to the side of the road, his face blank just in case this was a test, before he braced the umbrella into the crook of his arm in a way that shielded them from blowing rain, and most passerby.

In spite of the storm that raged, the flickers of lightning and distant rumbles of thunder signaling its fast movement, Yuki was content there on the wet ground with this trembling body in his arms, cradling it close to his warmth. This was his enemy, he'd been raised to believe it... but believe it, he did not anymore. Not after seeing the torment of the True Form, and seeing the torment he faced in general.

Yuki's hand swept across the wet fur, and when the Cat began to purr in his slumber...

The Rat did smile.