So, I just realized that I suddenly switched to Mai and Naru calling each other fiancé/fiancée even though Naru never asked Mai to marry him, so we're just going to pretend that it was an unconscious mutual agreement thing. Or, you know, the twins had something to do with it.

Disclaimer: I own nothing!

Chapter 4: Unexpected, Unconcealed Surprise

Mai wanted to cry and scream at the same time. She huddled on her swing, pulling a blanket tighter around her. Her clothes along with several of the others', had been revoked. She didn't know why. She didn't care why. All she cared about was getting out of the damn place. She hated this cage more than she'd hated her school, which was saying something.

"I need to get out of here," she whispered as she felt the stinging crawling along her cuts and the bruises that had appeared along her skin. Where did she get them? She didn't know that either.

She flinched involuntarily as the cage door was ripped open. A teen Mai had only seen a few times was flung through the door, tumbling passed the others until she slammed into the opposite side of the cage.

Mai peaked through a crack in her blanket, watching Ash as he closed the door, and watching, more closely, the locks slide into place of their own accord. She was pretty sure that they were somehow enchanted to unlock only at his presence, but she couldn't be sure until she found a way to test it out. She just knew that Ash didn't carry a key of any kind.

She remained tense, her muscles coiled for anything Ash might do, until he dissipated into the darkness of the spirit world.

"I hate him so much," she whispered, clenching her fists around the edges of her blanket.

The teen crawled up onto the swing opposite Mai. She pulled her knees up to her chest, dropping her face into them.

"What did he make you do?" Mai whispered, watching the teen.

The teen raised her head. She was maybe a few years younger than Mai, seventeen or eighteen at the youngest. She had eyes of a deep, brick red. Her hair, once a shiny black, was now dulled and fading. Three or four months prior, she had looked young and beautiful, and remarkably like Mai's boyfriend/fiancé/whatever-you-wanted-to-call-him. Her voice was now crackly, like crunching cellophane. Once, it had been the prettiest voice Mai had ever heard. "He made me possess a woman and use her to get some group to come to the orphanage."

Mai laughed bitterly. "What a joke. He must think it's funny, calling that place an orphanage. It's more like a jail."

The teen gave her a small, strained smile. "Yes, but there is nothing we can do about it."

Mai frowned, finally processing what the teen had said. "What was the name of the group you were talking about?"

"Um, I think it started with an 'S'."

Mai's blood turned to ice. "Please tell me that the group wasn't 'Shibuya Psychic Research'. Please tell me it wasn't them."

The teen's eyes widened. Slowly, her face softened with sympathy. "Yes, that was the group. I am so sorry."

Mai sighed, pushing down her tears. "Don't be. They're strong. They can overcome anything he throws at them."

"Like you?" the teen asked, smiling.

Mai didn't answer as the tears slipped down her cheeks. When Ash returned for the teen, Mai had managed to cry herself into a fitful sleep.

…..

Gene let out a squeak of surprise and fear as they pulled up to the orphanage. "Naru," he growled under his breath, eyes flashing to his twin's horrified expression. "Why didn't we even consider the possibility…" He trailed off, glancing up at the building. "We are so screwed."

"Daddy," Kamin whispered, wrapping her arms tighter around Gene's neck, "I don't like this place. It's scary."

The way Gene and Naru shivered, but tried to hide it, it truly was scary. "Yes, it is," Gene whispered, hugging her close.

"Do we have to go in there?" Tamaki asked, sitting high in Naru's arms.

"Unfortunately, yes," Naru told him, sucking in a deep breath before trudging up the steps to the doors. They pushed through the doors.

The SPR team exchanged worried looks before following the twins.

"Oh, you guys got here fast," Agana called in her subdues voice, happiness pushed somewhere between her death and her sleep. Suddenly, her soft, drugged smile turned into a snarl as her eyes landed on Rex trotting at Gene's side. "What is that doing here?" she snarled, her voice deepening until it just barely sounded like a woman's voice.

Gene glanced down at the albino German Shepard. He glanced up, drawing his eyebrows together. Rex growled deep in the back of her throat. "She is our nanny for the twins. See her pack?" he asked, nodding to the saddle across Rex's back carrying little odds and ends for the twins' enjoyment. He was taunting the woman. He knew, somehow, somewhere deep in his borrowed chest, that she wasn't exactly who she said that she was.

"She cannot stay here. She must go," Agana spat.

Gene shrugged. "Alright, but that means the twins, Shibuya-san, and I go. Can't leave the kiddies unattended now can we?" He smiled. 'Your move.'

Agana gnashed her teeth. "Fine, the dog can stay," she growled, then her voice and face softened once more, "Let me show you to your base then."

Rex's growl cut off suddenly. She whimpered, somehow managing to sound confused. Her tail flicked discontentedly.

Gene glanced down at her. "Don't worry, girl," he whispered, scratching between her ears, "Everything will be fine in the end."

'I hope,' he thought silently, following the woman deeper into the building he'd hoped never to set foot in again, beside the boy he'd entered and left with. He couldn't help but thinking, 'We're so screwed.'

…..

"Did you see the kids?" Gene whispered to Naru, his head in his hands. He felt the need to break down and cry. He loved Mai, he really did, but sometimes her body could be a little emotional. Usually, he could control how much Mai's body affected him, but this was not one of those times. He could feel tears pricking at the back of his eyes, making his nose tingle and his eyes sting. "They looked so terrified."

"I did," Naru muttered so only Gene could hear, his voice cold and remote. His coping mechanism had taken affect the moment they'd stepped up to the building. He wouldn't be coming back from it until this case was over and done with. "It has a different director. We need to find out what they are doing to make the children so scared."

Gene sighed. He wished they could concentrate on that, but they had a job to do. He breathing in deeply, sniffing. His nose had begun to flood in preparation for the tears. "First we have figure out what to do about the ghost, or if anything is here at all. Then we can focus our attention on the children."

"Yeah," Naru agreed, but he was far away, off in his own thoughts as he plugged a monitor into the power strip.

Sighing, Gene rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hands, glancing around the room. The others had left to scope out the orphanage and get acquainted with its many crevices and hidey-holes, taking cameras and microphones with them. Monk had taken off with Tamaki and Kamin, Rex in tow, always the warden. Ayako was the only one who had stayed behind, laid out in a corner.

Nausea slammed into Gene again. He hated the feeling, but he hadn't found the cause of it. It seemed to be nothing, but he couldn't be sure. There were so many variables that went along with possessing a soulless body that he couldn't begin to narrow them down.

He stumbled from the room and down the hall, pushing into the communal bathroom around the corner from the base. Boys and girls shared the bathrooms, learning early that they had absolutely no privacy in this place. The showers were the only things that were separate. Everything else, from the rooms to the clothes, was shared.

Pushing into one of the stalls, he closed the door before dropping to his knees. There went his lunch. Well, it wasn't like he'd eaten much to begin with.

"Gene?" Ayako's sleepy voice called through the bathroom. She rapped lightly on the stall door, murmuring, "Are you alright?"

"Yes," he muttered back, sucking in a deep breath. "I think that was the last of it for now."

"Alright, well, can you come back to the girls' room with me so I can do a check-up on you?" she asked, pushing open the door and watching him struggle to his feet silently.

Gene shrugged, taking the hand she held out to him and gripping it tightly as they started out of the bathroom. "I guess, if it'll make you feel better."

"I'm not the one that we need to put at ease," Ayako sighed, staring sadly ahead.

…..

"Okay, Gene, can you just remove your shirt and sit on the edge of the bed?" Ayako asked as she pushed open the door to the girls' room, closing it softly behind them. She wandered over to her bag, pulling out her medical bag. It was small and red, but knowing Ayako, there was about ten pounds of equipment in that bag.

Gene pulled his shirt over his head, shivering as the cold air skittered across his skin. The last time he'd taken off his shirt with a woman in the room had been when he was fifteen and in his own body. That had been the night that he'd helped create the two best things in his life. Smiling stupidly to himself, he allowed himself to travel back to that night, reliving the moment. He was snapped back to reality as Ayako pressed the cold metal of her stethoscope to his abdomen and her even colder hand against his lower back.

Hissing, he just barely managed not to recoil from her touch. "Jesus, your hands are like ice."

Ayako shrugged. "Just hold still and do as I say," she told him.

They maneuvered their way through a simple check-up, Ayako's eyebrows pulling closer together as the time ticked by. Finally, rubbing at her forehead, she muttered, "This doesn't make any sense."

"What doesn't make any sense?" Gene asked, pulling his shirt back over his head. They really needed to be getting back to Base. The others would, or at least should, be wondering where they were at that point, and he wanted to start talking to some of the kids about the happenings.

Rubbing at her forehead, Ayako asked, "I didn't think I needed to ask this question, but now I think it needs to be asked. Have you gotten your period this month?"

"Period?" Gene asked, confusion leaking into his voice, "Why would I have one of those? I'm a guy."

"In a woman's body, meaning that your body will have it whether or not you are a girl or a guy," Ayako corrected, raising an eyebrow at him. "So, I take it that you haven't."

"No, I haven't had one since I possessed Mai's body. I didn't think anything of it," Gene explained, shrugging.

Ayako's eyebrows jumped higher up on her forehead. "Oh? I guess that means that Mai was pregnant before that douche bag took her."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, back up. Are you telling me that I've been pregnant this entire time?" Gene asked, eyes wide. He thanked whatever deity or god that watched over them that he hadn't consumed any alcohol since returning.

Ayako shrugged, nodding. "Unless you've had sex with your twin or someone else in the past three months…" She trailed off at the disgusted look on Gene's face, trying not to laugh. "Didn't think so."

"Okay, okay," Gene said, rubbing his forehead as his mind tried to wrap itself around this new information, "Okay, was there anything else that I should know about?"

"Well…"

So, sadly, I'm thinking that this will probably be my last Ghost Hunt fanfic. I've been writing them for three years now. I'll still be following the manga and creeping in the fandom, but I'm not sure if I'll be writing anymore. I've got lots planned for this story as a sort of finale. I'm going to have fun with this and try my hardest to surprise y'all.