Heyyy! This is a bit of a shorter chapter, and doesn't have too much stuff in it, so I'll be posting the next one pretty soon!

Disclaimer: I do not own Ghost Hunt. If I did, I would know whether John refers to Naru as Kazuya or Shibuya.

John was unusually quiet as they began outside the house, measuring the width of the building and the doors. Mai's ears hummed with the silent atmosphere, and finally, she couldn't take it anymore.

"John, do you feel all right? You're awfully quiet."

"Yes, I'm fine," John replied, making a note on the sheet of paper they were making the floor plan on. "It's just the house that unsettles me, you know?"

"Yeah." Mai gave him the measurements for the door, and they moved inside. "Did you sleep well?"

John let out a little laugh and rubbed the back of his neck. "Between Takigawa's snoring and Kazuya's restlessness, I guess it didn't go as well as it does at home."

Mai laughed too. "Monk - even in his sleep he manages to be obnoxious." They moved to the first room on the first floor, which looked a little like a study. Mai briefly wondered why a study would be on the first floor before shrugging to herself. "What about Naru's restlessness?"

"Kazuya's a very slight sleeper - maybe too light for his own health," said John. "When I went to sleep, he was awake. When I woke up, he was already awake. When I rose in the middle of the night to fix my sheets, he awoke and asked me if anything was wrong."

Mai frowned. "That's definitely not good. Is he like this on every case?"

"I think so."

"And yet he's always wide awake during our investigations," Mai mused.

"Yes." John wrote on the paper. "He must be very blessed."

"Yeah." Mai wondered if this was the reason he was upset and irritated when she fell asleep on a case. Probably, she thought glumly.

They went to the next room. "What about Lin?" Mai asked.

"Lin? He's the ideal roommate. Sleeps quickly, wakes quickly, doesn't walk, talk, or snore."

"What about you?"

John turned a little pink. "I've been told I talk sometimes in my sleep," he said with a small smile.

Mai grinned. "So do I! Maybe we should try having a conversation one night."

"That would be a first." John patted his pockets as Mai gave him the length of the room. "Mai, have you seen my pencil?"

"It was sticking out of your back pocket when we came in here," she said, looking around.

"I must've lost it somewhere here then."

"Here, take mine." Mai handed him her pen.

"Thanks."

As he stood to leave the room, Mai caught sight of the unfinished floor plan. She frowned. "Hey, hang on, John, the math doesn't make any sense."

"Hmm?" John glanced at the paper. "Maybe there's a secret room or something?"

"That can't be it. The inside is bigger than the outside."

"Then maybe we measured wrong?"

"Yeah, that's probably it," Mai said, but she distinctly remembered seeing the number on the tape when she read it out to John. "Let's go back and redo it."

"But what should we redo? This room, the first room, the foyer, or the outside?"

"I see your point." Mai turned in a circle, observing the room. "Let's ditch the dimensions and draw in the rooms. We need a map, not a complete blueprint. This is dumb."

"But won't Kazuya want-"

"Screw what that self-absorbed jerk wants! I want to hurry and finish so we can have some lunch. Come on."

They walked through the rooms one by one, putting random descriptions for the rooms. Some reflected the amount of furniture, some what they assumed the rooms should be used for.

They walked into a room that looked like some sort of parlor or drawing room. There was a door leading outside on the right wall, and Mai peeked out of it as John surveyed the rest of the room, sizing it up for his sketch.

"Hey, Mai, I think I might've misplaced your pen," he called.

"Huh?" Mai looked back. It wasn't like John to lose things. He had lost his own pencil and her pen now within the space of ten minutes.

There was a sudden crash as the door they came in through slammed shut, and John yelped as it narrowly missed bruising his elbow. Mai giggled, and he chuckled sheepishly at his own jumpiness. He tried the door, and when it swung open easily, Mai went back to hunting in her pockets for a spare pencil.

"Um, Mai?" John called out nervously. "Will you come here for a second?"

"Sure, what's - oh." Mai had a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach as she saw what John was looking at so nervously. He had reopened the door not to the hallway they had come in through, but another room, one she recognized as the first room they had done.

She stood there frozen, waiting for something awful to happen. When nothing did, she ran to the opposite side of the room and reopened the door that went out. The front yard was still there, thank god. The whole house hadn't changed; just that one room.

John was still standing there, staring at the other room. "What's wrong with this house?" he whispered.

"It's playing with us." Mai came to a sudden realization. "The spirit controls the house."

"Oh my Lord," John breathed. "There's no way we could ever make a floor plan of the house."

"Yeah. Let's get back and tell Naru. I'm sick of this anyway."

"But how will we do that? I don't think we can anymore. We're lost again."

"I know how to," Mai said quietly. John's face registered surprise, then curiosity. "I can't really explain, but trust me on it," Mai continued.

He nodded and said, "No questions."

Mai took his hand tightly. "Whatever you think, just keep going - and walk quickly."

"Okay."

Mai thought about Naru. She thought about the way his passive demeanor made her want to rip her hair out and throw her arms around him and break down his walls. She thought about the way his raven hair fell across his pale, proud forehead. She pictured his eyes, the way they drew her in, how deep they were. And Gene felt it, and spoke.

That way.

Mai lead John through a maze of rooms and hallways, walking quickly, trying not to draw the house's attention until they rounded a corner and she literally walked right into Naru, who was leaning lazily in the doorway of a room while Lin took measurements. Mai stumbled away from him and he looked them up and down. Mai quickly let go of John's hand.

"What're you doing here?" he asked, calm as ever. Mai had just bumped into him! Did nothing faze him?

"What am I doing here? What are you doing here?" Mai asked accusingly. "I thought you and Lin were supposed to be doing the second floor."

Naru rolled his eyes. "We are on the second floor."

Mai frowned. "No we're not."

Naru gestured towards the window in the room Lin was measuring. "See for yourself."

Mai ran to the window and looked outside, pressing her face to the grimy glass. The ground was a long way off. They were on the second floor.

"John," she said in a small voice, "did we go back up the stairs to get here?"

"N-no," he stammered, his face pale.

"So what you're saying is that the house is playing with us," Naru said, unpeeling himself from his position in the doorway.

"Yeah." Mai told him what had happened in the drawing room.

Naru nodded slowly. "That would explain why Lin's lost three pens in the past fifteen minutes."

"And where are you getting all these extra pens to give to him?" Mai asked, bewildered.

"That's none of your concern," Naru replied coolly, and Mai huffed in indignation. She had only asked an innocent question! What was his problem? Did he enjoy watching her squirm under his unkind words?

"My point," Naru continued before she could yell at him, "is that the house is very much alive. Leave that, Lin, there's no use making a floor plan. John, come with me. We're going to get the others. Mai, take Lin down to the kitchen and fix something up for lunch."

"Me take him? Isn't he taking me?"

Naru leaned into Mai until only the words he spoke could only reach her ears. "Lin does not have Gene helping him."

And with that, he was gone, taking John with him.

Mai stood there and sighed dreamily, but Lin jerked her out of her stupor. "Let's go, Mai."

"What? Yeah, let's go."

So I couldn't remember what John refers to Naru as. I know it's either Kazuya or Shibuya, but I didn't know which one, so I took a guess. Anybody want to help me out?

For next time: A kind moment between Lin and Mai, a friendly moment between Masako and Mai, and a cute moment between Naru and Mai.