It was late on a Sunday night when a short, shoulder-length brown haired, teenaged girl stepped through the door of the local supermarket. Her hands were full of grocery bags carrying the necessities she would need for the next week.
Mai Taniyama, Naru, Lin and the rest of their team at the Japanese branch of BSPR had only just gotten back that afternoon from a 3 day case in Kyoto involving the ghost of a man whose wife and young daughter had been raped and killed before his eyes in their apartment, before he in turn had been killed. He had been attacking men between the ages of 20 to 40 in revenge trying to punish the ones who had hurt his family. It had been a difficult case where both Monk and Lin had been targeted numerous times before Mai and Masako had managed to convince the man's ghost to be purified and leave.
Of course once back at the office, Naru had demanded his usual numerous cups of tea and the research of the recent case to be condensed into a report to be emailed back to his parents at the head branch of BSPR while it was still fresh in their minds before finally allowing an extremely tired Mai to leave the office for home. These reports were part of the conditions that Oliver Davis, otherwise known as Naru to his friends and team, had to agree to in order to return to Japan and to keep their branch of SPR open after finally finding his twin brother's body and returning it to England to be buried 8 months prior.
Not that Mai minded too much about having to complete this report before heading home. Or the numerous cups of tea that she had to make Naru while she was in the office. Although the occasional please or thank you would be nice to hear for a change when he demands them. But then it wouldn't be Naru, if he didn't pretend to have no manners just to rile Mai up. She knows he does it on purpose but still can't seem to stop herself from reacting to it every time. No, the problem this night, was that it was near midnight and Mai's apartment was empty of food. Plus having school the following morning followed by a normal work afternoon doesn't leave much time for buy groceries in the normally expected shopping hours. She was just glad that the supermarket local to her apartment was open 24 hours a day to accommodate people like her who have no time in the day time.
Mai was a block from her apartment building when she started to realise that something wasn't right. It was too quiet. The normal noises that she had come to expect at that time of night seemed to be missing. There was an ominous feeling from behind her that made her think she was being followed. Although whenever she turned around to look she couldn't see anyone. Picking up her pace, Mai hurried the last few metres to her apartment building.
She had just reached the front doors of her building and was trying to transfer her shopping bags from two hands into one so she could get her keys out when someone grabbed her from behind. One large hand covered her mouth to muffle her scream and another restricted her arms from flailing and hitting out at whomever had grabbed her. Despite her struggles, Mai was dragged a few buildings down and deep into to a dark windowless alleyway. Once there, she was slammed against a dirty brick wall with one hand around her throat while the perpetrator began ripping her clothes with the other.
Mai was frightened and no amount of hitting out with arms or legs could get the strong man who was attacking her to let her go. Suddenly she got an idea. She wasn't sure if it would work, having only done it once before, but she had to try.
Closing her eyes, Mai projected herself to the astral plane. It took her a few minutes to orient herself before she travelled to the SPR office that she'd left only an hour before. Thankfully the lights were still on, indicating someone was still there. She found Naru in his office facing the full length mirror that he'd placed in his office right after the house of horrors case.
To the casual observer, Naru looked like he was talking to himself. However, if you observed closely, you would notice that the reflection didn't quite match. The hair was more relaxed than Naru's more formal style. The clothing more casual. The posture not so stiff. Naru was in fact talking to Gene, his dead twin.
Gene looked up in shock when he realised that a partly naked Mai had suddenly appeared in the room, which startled Naru in the process. He couldn't see anyone there though it was obvious that Gene could. Naru, despite all his physic powers, was not a medium and therefore could not see spirits on a normal basis. His twin brother being the only exception and only when looking in a reflective surface.
"Mai? What's wrong? What happened?" Gene said in a panic. His tone worried Naru. A startled "whats wrong with Mai?!" burst out of him making Gene realise that it was Mai's spirit form that was in the room and not her physical one. "I don't know. She seems to have astral projected herself here but she looks scared and her half her clothes seem to have been ripped to shreds. I think she's been attacked..." Gene responded concerned.
Mai nodded. Her throat felt restricted from her attack and she didn't think she would be able to speak with it.
"Mai...?" Naru looked frantically around for her. Realising that Naru couldn't see her, Mai lifted her hands to her neck where she removed a small silver key on a thin silver chain that she had taken to wearing around her neck straight after the Urado case over a year ago. It was special to Mai, being the house key to her childhood home before her Mother had passed away. It had also proved useful back then when she had passed it to the demon-kidnapped Masako while in spirit form promising that they were coming to find her. That was when they had learnt that Mai could transfer physical items through the astral plane although she'd only done it that one time.
Carefully, Mai placed the key on Naru's desk and mouthed the words "help please" to the curiously watching Gene in the mirror. "Mai wants help, Naru. I think she wants to you to use your psychometry on her key to find her." Naru looked down at his desk and nearly jumped out of his chair at the sudden appearance of the key and chain from thin air in front of him. Gene couldn't resist a small chuckle at the sight of Naru obvious surprise regardless of the severity of the situation. Mai smiled sadly at the two men as Naru reached out to pick up the key before she faded back to the nightmare that her body was currently living in that dark alleyway.
Her body hurt. She was bruised all over and there were several cuts all over her arms and legs and between her legs. Her clothes were pretty much dirty tattered rags. The attack was still in progress. The perpetrator still not satisfied despite the several deposits of seman over her thighs. Mai felt like she was being ripped into two from the constant abuse she was suffering. She had no idea how long it had been going on but it was obvious that they'd been there a long time.
She was just drifting into unconsciousness when the sound of sirens filled the air, causing her attacker to curse and rip himself out from between her legs. The last thing she saw was her attacker trying to run while pulling up his pants only to be tackled to the ground by two policemen yelling at him to get on the ground.
Mai regained consciousness to the sound of beeping somewhere to the right of her head, something uncomfortable on pricking the back of her right hand and a feeling of heaviness over her thighs. Opening her eyes, she found herself in a bright white room, indicating that she was in a hospital bed. Looking around, Mai discovered that the heavy feeling over her thighs was Naru's sleeping head. He was seated in a chair on her left side and was clasping her left hand gently in his sleep. Lin was reading a heavy looking book quietly in an armchair in the right corner of her room. They had obviously been waiting for her to wake up for some time.
Her small movements must have alerted Naru that she was awake since he blinked his eyes and lifted his head to look at her. Mai squeezed his hand gently and croaked a "thank you" to him. Her throat still was still sore despite the obvious pain killers being pumped through the tubes attached to her right hand. Lin looked up from his book when she spoke, gave her a relieved smile and left to alert the nurse that Mai was awake. Naru reached into his pocket with the hand not holding hers and pulled out her key still on the silver chain. He got up and carefully placed it back around Mai's neck before sitting back in his chair and grabbing her hand again.
"That's certainly a useful talent you have." Naru told her with a smile as they waited for Lin and the nurse to come back. Mai smiled back and replied "So is yours."