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Mai actually looked more like herself after that nap. Between the salt line and Yuu-chan kicking out any spirit that managed to get past it (plus the "safe" feeling of Naru's close presence) she had actually been able to have a dreamless sleep.
She almost missed the pissed look Masako was giving her for napping in Naru's lap. Almost.
Though just because Mai finally had some rest didn't mean she was an idiot. This house gave her a bad vibe from the start, so she dragged Masako outside before she confronted her about the looks.
"What is your problem?" demanded Mai.
"My problem? My problem is you!" said Masako heatedly. She tried to switch back to her "Nadeshiko" personality, but it was too late.
"For the love of the gods... Masako, when are you going to drop this ridiculous infatuation with Naru already? He's barely tolerating your unsubtle blackmail against him, and even Lin is getting tired of how irritable he gets after you force him to take you out on a date!" said Mai, losing her own temper.
Masako looked as if Mai had openly struck her.
"What about you? You keep sitting so close to him and he has yet to say a word about it!" said Masako angrily.
"Maybe because I don't blackmail him into it and only do it when I'm feeling like crap to begin with. Besides, there's a high chance he'll be going back to England soon anyway."
Masako stared at her.
"What."
"Naru might return home to England once he meets Yuu-chan. The only reason the two of them haven't been in the same room is because that idiot medium wants to prolong the inevitable telling off Naru is almost certain to give him for being careless."
Naru had come to Japan looking for his brother. So it only stood to reason that once he found him, that he would go home and possibly drag his twin back with him.
Which was why Mai hadn't argued about the cheerful medium hiding in her house from his twin. She didn't want Naru to leave, let alone Yuu-chan.
Masako looked shaken, but rallied quickly enough.
"And what about you! I've seen how you look at him."
"I like Naru, but I'm not stupid enough to get between a fan girl and their absurd crush. Besides, I'm terrified if he knew how I felt he'd send me away. I'm fine with watching from a distance," said Mai.
Which wasn't entirely true, but it was what she kept telling herself.
She really wanted things to change, for something good to go right with her life and make things better. But she was terrified that if it did, things would only get even more heartbreaking than what she already went through.
She would not let what happened with her "family" happen a second time. Having to go by her mother's maiden name hurt.
Masako looked at her angrily. She began to stomp back to the house, but Mai grabbed her.
"Don't. If you're going to be angry and careless, then do it out here away from that house. Otherwise you'll be another victim," said Mai. Her eyes were glowing an amber color, and her instincts were screaming not to let Masako in the house in this state. She would almost certainly not survive.
Masako almost looked like she wanted to argue, but there was something about Mai's eyes that told her it was a bad idea. She huffed and went walking around the house to see if she could find anything to help the team later. Like a secret door or something.
And to be honest, being out of that place was a lot more relaxing that having a bad day inside it.
"So there's a high chance Masako will finally drop her crush on me?" asked Naru. There was a distinct hint of relief in his voice as he said this.
He could be coldly professional around the girl, but the fact she had the gall to blackmail him for dates really pissed him off to no end. If he hadn't been sure that it would reach his parents (and Madoka) he would have snapped months ago and sent her packing once and for all.
Especially now that they had Mukuro to work with. While he was untrained and a bit more vindictive, he at least didn't annoy Naru as much as Masako had with her amateur dramatics and bleeding heart.
Mukuro came in with a pissed off look on his face.
"Have any of you seen Ken around in the last hour?"
"He said something about using the bathroom earlier..." said Monk, a look of dawning horror coming on his face.
While Ken was rude, feral and inclined to act like an animal more often than not, he didn't deserve to suffer the inevitable fate of the other victims.
"You don't think..." started John.
Mai felt a cold rage go through her soul. Someone had taken one of her friends and she was not going to let some jumped up ghost get away with that!
"Can you sense him?" asked Mai, her fury evident.
"Vaguely. I can tell he's alive, but that's it."
There was the distinct sound of some...interior redecorating... from deeper in the house.
"I think Ken's awake and pissed," said Mai, as if talking about the weather.
"He probably got lost and they grabbed him, thinking he was easy prey. How they pulled it off during the day I have no idea, but they must have been desperate," commented Mukuro. The group was already following the sounds of things being destroyed.
Ken was definitely pissed.
They managed to make it just in time to see Ken completely destroy a wall with gold in his eyes. The second he saw Mukuro and Mai, he collapsed. Monk picked him up and swore.
"He's burning up."
Naru looked past the hole. He could clearly see a line straight through...and from the limited vision from the light, it looked like Ken had broken out of the missing center of the house.
It wouldn't take long for Ohashi-san to bring in people to investigate (all over twenty as a precaution, since the spirit seemed to target the younger generation first...) and without preamble SPR and the other investigators were all thanked for their time and sent away with a nice fat check.
Naru was just happy his fake broke down when he saw the bodies, freaking out over the fact that a ghost had done such horrible things while dead.
It meant their job was most certainly done, especially since the house "mysteriously" burned down a month later.
This was it. Today was the day Naru meet "Yuu-chan", and Mai could honestly say that she wasn't looking forward to it, regardless of how funny his reaction would be.
And it was. Naru took one look at his twin brother in much brighter clothes arguing over a game with Fuuta and Ken...and his face went through a myriad of emotions.
Right before he punched Gene in the face.
"What the hell, idiot scientist?!" said Gene, holding his jaw.
"You've let me worry about you for months...and you've been hiding here?" said Naru furious.
Gene winced.
"Well for the first month, I couldn't really move that much and I was busy helping Mai learn how to astral walk properly."
"And the rest?"
"I really don't want to leave, and there was a big chance that you would want to go back to England once you found me," admitted Gene.
Naru looked like he wanted to dispute that...but he couldn't. If he had found Gene months ago, he would have tried to convince his brother to go home, if only to see their parents.
Now though... now he wasn't so sure. Especially not when he got a good look at Mai's face and understood why Gene was reluctant to go home just yet.
Naru sighed.
"One week."
"What?"
"We visit England for one week before coming back. To be honest Japan has more interesting cases and there's less chance of running into my...fans... here," said Naru finally.
Gene perked up at that.
"So you are coming back, right?" asked Mai. Even Naru couldn't miss the almost desperate tone of her voice.
"You're not getting rid of me that easily...and even if I weren't inclined to return, Gene almost certainly would come back."
Gene nodded in agreement. He liked Mai, who was a breath of fresh air compared to the other girls he knew. She accepted him completely, and could care less about his fame as a medium.
Mai was going to be absolutely miserable until she saw Naru again, once they went to visit their parents.
Mai whimpered. She thought that memory had been repressed, but apparently having Gene and Naru gone to another country had brought it back to the surface.
She hated remembering that day. Absolutely hated that moment when everything fell apart.
She was about to walk into her house when she felt something in her soul cry out that something was wrong. Something terrible had happened, something that was almost irreversible.
She turned the doorknob and went inside. Her mother was in the kitchen preparing for dinner and turned at the sound of someone in the house.
"Oh, are you a friend of..."
The world fell apart around her. Her own mother didn't recognize her, and she could see from the kitchen table that her younger sibling looked pleased about this new development. No, that wasn't right, they looked rather smug about it. An indigo hue had taken over the brown, and something in his eyes made her body felt chilled to the bone.
The scene changed, but the memory of that horrible day when her mother suddenly forgot everything about her daughter still hurt as fresh as it had the moment it happened.
She felt a presence behind her, and didn't even think twice about it. She hugged the extra like a life line while bawling her eyes out, uncaring of the memories coming back like a movie being played out.
Arms wrapped around her and let her cry it out.
"It's okay, Mai. We're right here and we're not going anywhere."
Mai didn't ask who it was. She knew who they were, but she was so upset over the memories she couldn't really register it. All she knew was that with these two around, she was safe.
The feeling of warmth chased away the darkness, revealing a beautiful sky around them. They were floating among the clouds, which rumbled and revealed the fury of a storm, complete with rain and lightning while the sun shined so brightly overhead. A dense mist had formed on the 'ground', hiding everything from view.
Mai slowly drifted off into a real sleep, unaware of the effect the dream would have on the two who had somehow been drawn into her mental landscape.
In England...
Naru, or rather Oliver, woke up with something of a start. Next to him Gene was shaking his head as if to clear it.
"You saw that, right? I wasn't just me this time?" asked Gene.
"What was that?"
"Mai's soul called to us. She did it a lot when she first met you."
"You're the reason she had such clear visions?" said Oliver in surprise. That explained a lot. He had thought it odd that an amateur like Mai with zero experience in their line of work could pull out such clearly defined visions without any effort at all.
Finding out Gene had been guiding her from the spirit realm explained everything.
"Well it's not like I had much else to do when I somehow got caught behind the seal that Mai had on her powers," said Gene, rubbing his eyes. "However it's the first time I saw that."
Oliver winced. Whatever he had been expecting when Mai dragged their souls to her while asleep, that was most certainly not it.
The fact she was openly crying her eyes out while clinging to him was a sight that was going haunt him for a good long while until they returned to Japan. Besides, there was a weird pain in his chest from being so far away from Mai.
He hadn't even realized the fact he felt at home with her until they were several countries away. And now it felt like an ever present ache that demanded he return quickly.
Gene shuddered. The visions Mai was having wasn't of someone else... they were memories she had viciously repressed for some time before she moved to Tokyo.
The fact she was so open and caring after going through that... it was a miracle. Though it did explain why she clung to his brother so fast.
"Are you alright?" asked Gene.
"I'll be better when we're home."
"And home is..."
Oliver gave him a look, and Gene perked up. Clearly his brother's definition of "home" had shifted away from England. Japan had been good for them, especially meeting Mai.
She had known about his real identity, but hadn't treated him the least bit different. To her, Oliver Davis was a celebrity she only knew about in passing and didn't particularly care about.
His brother was firmly "Naru" in her mind, and not some famous scientist with impressive psychic powers. She treated him like a normal person and put up with his quirks without even one trying to take advantage of him and she genuinely cared about him.
"So... are you going to confess you like her when we go back, or do I have to bug you until you do?" asked Gene, grinning at his brother.
Oliver threw a pillow at his twin. Though there was no denying he was blushing.
"Idiot medium."
"Idiot scientist."
