Sad little oneshot I felt like writing. Inspired loosely by Hello by Evanesance. I will state right now I don't like Evanesance. Infact, I hate it with a fiery passion. But it was on in my friends car and my mind wandered.

Disclaimer: I don't own Ghost Hunt.

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Client: Shiiro Hitsuyage
Discription of haunting: Rapping noises. Two deaths: the eldest daughter of Shiiro, Sakura 17, drowned in her bath; A maid, Kineko Samura 20, drowned in small lake in the back yard.
Connections between deaths: None found as of yet.
Possible Ghosts/Spirits: Kimiko Satsugawa, commited suicide by drowning herself in the koi pond in the winter of 1984 at age 19, reasons unknown.
Actions taken: Standard exorsism performed by John Brown and Houshou Takigawa.
Result: Unknown at this moment in time.

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"Gene?" Mai called in a quivering voice. She had been sleeping for 10 minutes and he still hadn't shown up. "Gene? P-Please..."
Darkness covered her like a blanket, cold and lonely, fighting its way inside her small body.
She tried to ignore the ache in her heart. It was as if all the pain and hurt that she had ever suffered was coming back to her 10 fold, all at once.
She was cold.
It was as if she had been plunged into icy water and left there, able to breath but making everything slow and laboured, even the sound of her own voice muffled to her ears.
She was so very cold.
"Please..." She muttered shivering, looking around warily. "Gene...help...I don't understand."

"What's wrong with her?" Naru asked, his indifferent tone hiding his worry for his part-time assistant, as he entered the girls bedroom, seeing the worried faces of his team. Bou-san was stroking the sleeping girls hair softly. John had run upto him as he walked from his room to the base, the blond Priests eyes wild and fearful, only muttering 'Come quickly! It's Mai!' before taking off once more, back to the girls room.
"We don't know." Ayako replied, her face filled with worry. "When Masako tried to wake her, she noticed Mai's skin was cold.She called for us and when I got hear and took her temperature..." She trailed off and Naru noticed Mai was covered in almost every blanket in the mansion, yet she was still shivering violently and her skin had a blueish tint.
"What is her temperature Ayako." Naru ordered. "Tell me."
"It's 32 degrees celcius and dropping rapidly." Lin muttered, watching the girl worriedly.
Naru's eyes widened. 36.6 degrees was the regular body temperature.
"What does that mean?" He looked from one face to the other, searching for some sign of hope.
"She's entered the third stage of hypothermia." The smile in Yasuhara's voice was gone. It was emotionless and dull.
"Kimiko's spirit is killing her Naru." Masako said, tears streaming down her face. "The water she drowned herself in was below freezing temperature."
"Mai's being frozen to death." Ayako finished in a whisper, her voice thick with emotion and sorrow.

Mai was now huddled in the darkness, her arms wrapped around her knees, shivering. She couldn't move. She couldn't even speak. She tried to call out to Gene, to anyone for help, but it was as if her brain was shutting down, she couldn't even think of what she'd say if she could move her mouth. Her heart was beating fast and her breaths were spasmodic and uneven. She felt as if her whole body now, not just her brain, was shutting down.

Naru fell to his knees.
Mai. Mai who was always so bright and warm and, although it was cliche, alive, was dying.
What made it worse was that she was dying in her dreams. If it was happening while she was awake, he could do something, anything, to save her.
But in her dreams, he couldn't protect her. He couldn't help her at all.
Masako's heart broke as she watched him. The man she loved with all her newly broken heart was desolving infront of her, because the girl he loved was dying. It was now obvious to her that she never even stood a chance.
She diverted her eyes, the scene too painful to watch, but what she looked at next almost killed her.
Because Mai's body was spasming, her limbs flailing and her back arching, her head twisting from side to side even with Bou-san holding her tightly to hid chest, sitting her up.
John watched in horror, clutching his rosary tightly as the girl he had come to look upon as a little sister shook, her eyes now wide open.
Naru felt tears stream past his lower eyelids as he looked at the girl. Her eyes, once so full of warmth and affection for everyone and thing, now stared unseeingly at the ceiling, glazed over almost like coloured glass.
"Gene...Naru...help...so cold..." Her teeth were chattering so the words she muttered were almost un-understandable, but everyone knew what she had said.
"Mai..." Bou-san whispered in her ear before he was forced to let go as the fitting got worse.
"Get out."
The group stared at Naru in shock and objection.
"What-"
"Get. Out." He growled when no one made any movement. "GET OUT!"
John and Lin were the first to move, ushering out the rest as each gave Mai one last glance, tears streaming down everyone's face, even the ever stoic Lin.
Once the room was empty apart from himself and Mai, Naru crawled onto the bed, pulling her close and holding her tightly, ignoring the hits and kicks he received that would surely leave bruises.
"N-Na-r-ru..."
"I'm here Mai."
He wasn't sure if she could hear him or not, but he didn't care. If she could, then she would know he was with her.
"I'm...glad..."
So she could hear him. Suprisingly, that gave him no comfort.
There was no noise other than the bed springs as she shook but then even they ceased.
Then the coughing began. Body racking coughs, shaking her almost as much as the fitting and all Naru wanted to do was shake her until she awoke, healthy and fine, and he would kiss her and tell her he loved her and promise never to let anything happen to her again.
Soon with every cough a mouthful of water would spill past her blue lips, spraying onto his black shirt. He didn't know how the water got into her lungs. She had never had any direct side affects from her dreams to her real body before. But it didn't matter.
Mai's eyes shut for a few moments and when she opened them, Naru's almost gasped.
Her soulful brown eyes were full of life once more, but it was dimming and quickly.
"It's not a dream..." She muttered, somehow controling her chattering teeth. "You really are holding me..."
And he continued to hold her as she spasmed once more before finally stopping.
His breath hitched as he realised the reason.
Her breaths, irratic and quick had ceased altogether, her head falling back limply over his arm, her small fingers which had been clenching his shirt loosened but her eyes remained open.

Mai groaned as she awoke to complete darkness.
"Mai..." Her head whipped around and she smiled faintly at Gene.
"What are you doing here Gene? Is this one of those dreams within a dream again?" She asked curiously, noticing the shocked, pity filled and heart broken look on his face.
"You...you don't know..."
Mai frowned thinking hard. She didn't know what?
Suddenly it all came back to her.
"No..." She whispered. "I didn't know."
Gene hugged her tightly, holding her to his chest much like his brother had been doing only minutes before.
"I'm so sorry Mai."
"I...I'm dead?" She half asked, half stated, her voice small and fragile.
She felt rather than saw Gene nod.
"Do I have to go?"
"That's upto you Mai."

It had been 2 years since Mai had died on the last case SPR had ever taken.
Naru sat in his room, back in England staring at the picture in his hand.
The frame was a simple pine square. He could have gotten a more expensive or fancy frame, but he knew she would like this one more.
Although he didn't care about the frame, more the picture inside of it.
He didn't remember it being taken, therefore coming to the conclusion that someone - most likely Madoka - had taken it without them knowing.
Mai and him were walking down a hall way, her looking at him with a mix of adoration and anger and frustration on her pretty face, him with a rare, almost smile.
He felt a familer presence behind him, and the faint smell of orange blossoms - the perfume she always wore - and turned around quickly with a almost hopeful look on his face that fell almost insantly.
She wasn't behind him.
She never was.
Ever since she had left - he still had trouble with using the word 'died' about her - he had felt as if she was always with him, watching him.
He'd thought once or twice about asking Masako if she could see her around him, but stopped himself, knowing it was just his wishful mind, sending him waves of childish hope.
He placed the picture on his bedside table and climbed into bed for another night of blissful dreams.

Mai watched sadly as he fell asleep, knowing he was dreaming of her. He always did.

She remembered the look Masako had shot her when he exited her room after she died, but had silenced the medium by putting a finger to her lips in a playful gesture.

"I know you're there." She whispered, although there was no need since no one could hear her.

"You're going to go to him again?" Gene asked, appearing behind her, a hand on her shoulder.

"I always do don't I?"

Gene nodded and smiled sadly at her.

"He wouldn't know if you moved on. He doesn't even know you're with him."

She looked at him with a bright smile, one she usually reserved for Naru's dreams.

"I know that..." She moved towards the bed, gently stroking his hair. "And maybe I will move on someday. Not yet...I don't want to leave him."

"Go to him then. He'll be waiting for you."

Mai nodded and bent down to kiss the sleeping mans temple before fading slowly out of sight.

Gene could only watch as a small smile spread across his brother face and he knew Mai was with him again.

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