Me: I'M SO SORRY I TOOK SO LONG TO WRITE THIS! I was working on ACTs and final projects and finals are in 2 weeks.
Naru: At least you focus in you studies, unlike some people I know.
Mai&Gene: HEY!
Me: Anyway, I'm extremely sorry for the delay, so here's the next chapter I hope you like it! ^-^
Naru: Silver doesn't own Ghost Hunt.
Mai: When I'm in Dreamland it will be bold and Italicized… Just like this! XD
Gene: Please R&R!
Mai's POV:
"Honey, we're home!" Izo called, making me flash to an old time show that Hana and I had seen one night when we couldn't fall asleep and channel surfed, about how the husband would come home, the wife would always great him with a kiss on the check, and then takes his briefcase while he relaxed. 'Also, knowing how Hanayo, that would be completely and totally possible.' I thought, chuckling softly to myself, causing Gene and Yasu to throw a glance at me which I just shrugged off.
"Perfect timing everyone!" Madoka said, coming out of the kitchen with an apron on and some flour on her checks. "Hanayo and I just finished up dinner."
"Thanks Madoka, it smells great." Izo said as he led us into the dining room where all the plates were set out and Hanayo was carrying in the last try of the meal as she flashed a bright smile in our direction.
"So, how is the case coming along?" Madoka asked, sitting down at the table while everyone else followed suit while Izo pulled out the chair for Hana to sit down in and then pushed her in like a gentleman. Seeing this made my respect go up for him, since he did seem very sincere about loving Hana, and the scene that happened when they came home had just been a stupid quarrel between the two of them. Though, I still had an eye on him since it did prove that he had absolutely no clue how to deal with a hysterical woman. Correction, hysterical pregnant woman. I depaned, hoping that I could take care of Hana when that did happen as I refocused on the conversation that was going on around me.
"It progressed to knives being thrown at us, but as for information, we got zilch." Yasu explained, taking the dish of mashed potatoes and putting some onto his plate and then passed the dish to the right.
"I see, so I heard that you all had a surprise from Mai today." Hanayo said, throwing her husband a look which made him blush and look away making her chuckle at his reaction.
"Yes, and actually, I was wondering if you would shed some light onto this subject." Naru stated, eyeing Hanayo with an analyzing and expecting look which was met by a small smile dancing on her lips. She took a deep breath and then leaned back in her chair to get comfy, prepared for the interrogation that Naru has planned out.
"Why what subject would you like to discuss?"
"The eyes." Naru depaned, getting straight to business as usual. The stupid work-a-holic. 'I swear he's gonna run himself into the ground if he keeps this up!' I raged, fighting to keep my annoyance to myself.
"I see, well, what do you wish to know, because although I am a mind reader, I can't use too much of my abilities with the little ones on the way."
"Why don't we start with why you and your decedents have them in the first place?"
"I suppose the beginning is the very best place to start. Let's see, to tell you the truth, these eyes were given to us by Jesus."
"WHAT?!" John asked, jumping out of his seat and looking at Hanayo with wide eyes filled with disbelief. Everyone had flinched away from his outburst since it was so unusual for the priest to do so. Normally he was the calm and peaceful one in the group while the rest of us had outbursts. Minus Naru and Lin that is. Hana seemed to recover from this very quickly and smiled at John.
"Yes, it goes back many centuries. John do you remember the passage where Jesus healed a blind man?" John nodded his head and sat back down with a bright red face as he realized what he had just done. "Well, that was my and Mai's ancestor."
"That doesn't explain the weird things you guys can do." Monk pointed out, making me face-palm at the fact that he couldn't put that much together. Granted, I might have thought that too if I hadn't of been wised up to all of this for the past months that I've been here.
"Well, along with being given the gift of sight we were given the complete gift of sight."
"Huh?" He asked still not getting it.
"I see, so he was then able to see into the future and see apparitions correct?" Naru questioned, making sure that he had all of his facts straight.
"Correct."
"Hold the phone, if that's the case, then why are you Wiccan, shouldn't you be, like, Catholic or something along those lines?" Ayako interjected, bringing up a point that even I questioned at this point in time. After all, this was really my first time hearing the whole story of how the eyes pass down in the family. I mean I have gotten bits and pieces of it throughout the time that I've been with her, but I've never heard the whole story.
"Well, yes, but what happened was that our ancestors were prosecuted as witches because of what we could do and of our strange eyes so many of us were killed off and the remainder that was left, which were three little girls, triplets actually, and were angry with God for not protecting the people that he had gifted and in turn turned their back on him and looked to the one who saved them."
"Who saved them?" Masako asked, with her sleeve covering her mouth, making sure not to give away her expression while her eyes showed that she was definally interested in the story as well.
"An old woman who lived in the forest. She lived away from the other villages and she ended up raising them as her own and that woman was a Wiccan. The little girls then went off into the world and had families of their own. Our clan has always been judged and persecuted by our eyes and our abilities. This is why most of us were killed off. Now all that's left of us is Mai-chan and I with these three soon to add to that count." She explained, rubbing her baby bump lovingly. Izo picked up on this and kissed her on her temple to bring her out of her musings on the past. Her mile widened and she leaned on him a bit looking for a sense of comfort which he happily supplied.
I looked over to Naru to see if he would ask anything else, but he seemed to just nod at this and then focused on eating, showing that the discussion had officially ended and that he had gotten what he needed from her. With that, everyone fell into normal dinner conversations about how life has been and thoughts on the case, filling the dining table with laughter and smiles. Once dinner was over, we all headed off for some much needed sleep since it was close to eleven o'clock after all.
Gene, Yasu, and I ended up going to the room that we were in the first night that the case had started. We talked about how interesting the story was and how I came from such a special back ground when I felt a pain in my chest. I was never one who liked lying, and I defiantly didn't want to lie to my two closest friends. Especially about who I am and where I came from, so I gathered up my courage and became determined with my decision to tell at least them the truth.
"Hey you guys." I said, getting their attention as we got under the covers and became comfortable for bed.
"What's up Mai?" Yasu questioned, shifting to his side so that he could face me since I was sleeping between the two of them.
"Yeah, you've been thinking about something for a while now." Gene added, taking me by surprise at how well these two actually knew me. A small smile came on my face at the fact that they actually noticed my change and it in turn encouraged me to tell them.
"I have a secret to tell you two, and you can't tell anyone else. Also, it might change how you look at me." I added, feeling tightness due to nervousness to what they'll say and how they'll react to the news replacing the pain of lying to them.
"You can tell us anything Mai." Gene said with a serious face that made him look a lot like his brother, minus the gray in his eyes that is.
"Nothing's gonna change the fact that you're you." Yasu supported, grabbing my hand in encouragement to what I was about to say. With that one action all doubts and nervousness fled from my mind and I was filled with instant calm. I took a deep breath and then let it go, allowing me to loosen up just a bit more so that I was ready to tell them.
"Well, I'm actually not blood related to Hanayo, at least I wasn't, but now I am." I said, biting my lip as I let them process what I had just said. Gene's eyes widened significantly while Yasu's became blank. It wasn't until five minutes later that they snapped out of it and actually looked at me.
"Please explain, cause my head is gonna explode if you don't" Yasu said, clutching his forehead to emphasize his point.
"Well, Hanayo became like a mom to me and I became a daughter to her. She found a spell in one of her ancestor's books that could make someone into a blood relation with her. She asked me if I wanted that, and I jumped at the opportunity. Just the fact that I would have blood family that wouldn't leave me made me feel reassured and confident that there would always be someone to turn to when things got rough." I explained, not feeling a shred of regret at all at what I had done, and I knew that deep down if I had to re-due that moment that I would still choose to do that again. Gene seemed to contemplate this and nodded his head in understanding.
"Makes sense." He decreed, stretching this arms up and then letting them drop down to the floor.
"Same here, but why do you need to keep it a secret?" Yasu asked, giving me a curious look as he curled up closer to me so that he could hear me better.
"With all the stress that the triplets are giving her and also having SPR here I don't want Hanayo to have any more stress on her, and knowing the rest of SPR they would jump down my throat for agreeing, and then her's for actually completing the spell." I explained, getting an 'O' face from him.
"Gottcha, well, know that I don't see you any differently then I did when I first met you." Yasu said, yawning at the end of his sentence, while his eyes started to droop due to sleep calling to him.
"Same here." Gene agreed, also yawning and snuggling into the blankets.
"Thanks guys, now let's sleep." I said, but they had already beat me to it , making me smile softly at these two people who I considered to be my brothers. With that cleared up, I closed my eyes and then followed their lead as I went to dream land.
I opened my eyes to see that I was inside of a different room then that I fell asleep in. I looked around and saw that it seemed to be a nursery of some sort. The room was a soft pastel mint green and had a soft white carpet. There was a little white bed pushed to the left side of the room that pressed right up against the walls. On the other side there was a pile of toys that ranged from toy cars to stuffed teddy bears with big blue bows tied around their necks. I picked one up and placed in into a suitcase. I didn't exactly know why I was doing this, but I trusted my gut and moved quickly for something bad was going to happen if I didn't.
"Mama, what are you doing?" a little boy's voice asked. I turned around to see the little boy from my previous dream in the door way. He couldn't have been more than three years old. He was dressed in a blue onesy and held a worn-out, and obviously loved, purple blanket in his left hand.
"Getting ready to leave." I replied, closing up the suitcase and grabbing a jacket for the little boy. He looked up at me with a puzzled expression, and tilted his head to the side.
"Why?"
"Because if we don't then bad things will happen." I answered, putting him inside of his coat, and then lifting him up into one of my arms while the other grabbed the suitcase full of his and my belongings.
"What about Papa?" he asked, making my blood run cold at just the mention of that man. However, I didn't let it show and instead put on a smile to calm the boy.
"Papa will be okay."
"Okay." He said, seeming to take my response as an appropriate answer.
I quickly snuck down the stairs and checked to see if his truck was in the driveway, and luckily it wasn't. As fast as I could, I tightened my hold on the boy and ran off into the woods. As I made my way to the forest, I was extremely careful not to let any of the dog bark and alert anyone that something was going on, but once I made it to the actual woods, I sprinted as fast and far as I could to get some major distance done before HE came home and found us missing. I didn't even want to think about what he would do if he found us.
I had made some pretty good distance and I stopped once I got to a clearing with a large tree in the center. I put the boy down and he sat under the tree and took a little nap, figuring that we were stopping for now. Seeing his peaceful face, I sat down next to him and brought him into my arms and held him so that he could sleep comfortably. Without me knowing it, I had dozed off myself, and I didn't reawake until I heard the howling of a dog. Immediately I shot up and checked to see if the boy was okay as well as to see if the surroundings were clear.
Quickly I scooped up the boy, grabbed our bags, and then went to make a run for it, but it was too late. Before I could take a step, a dog came shooting out and blocked our path. I let out a shriek and held the boy closer to my chest to try and protect him. Before I knew it, four more dogs had joined the first and now made a circle around me. I had backed away from them all up until I had my back up against the tree.
"You Fucking WHORE! Where the hell do you think you're going?!" a voice boomed, waking up the little boy, and officially marking the end of it all. The man that I had seen so many times in my dreams appeared, and came stocking over to me. I held the child even closer to me, and I tried to use my boy as a shield to protect him. He reached a hand out to try and take the boy, but I curled around the child as much as I could.
"Sto-" but before I could finish my sentence I was slapped across the face. I was so shocked what had happened that I didn't notice that the boy was taken from my arms until the weight of his body was gone from my arms and I saw the child looking at me fearfully from his spot in his father's arms.
"No! Give him back!" I cried reaching out for him, only to be stopped by a growl from the dogs, reminding me of their presence.
"Mama?" The boy asked, reaching out to me when all of a sudden the man took a rag and placed it to the child's mouth. The boy passed out in a matter of seconds and went limp within the man's strong arms.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM?!" I shrieked, lunging to try and get him into my arms, only to end up getting punched in the gut and then falling to the ground. I coughed for a moment, and a hacking sound could be heard. The next thing I noticed was the taste of rust in my mouth. I looked down to see that the man had hit me so hard that he made me cough up blood.
"You're just a bitch. A female dog in heat that will do anything to be satisfied, even if it means betraying your husband." He grabbed my hair and pulled my head up so that I was eye level with him. "You're just as pitiful as a dog, and you deserve a dog's death." With that said, he shoved me down to the trunk of the tree and then whistled to the dogs. The dogs responded by growling again and then came closer to me. Immediately I knew what was going to happen. Though, it was to be expected. Bad dogs were punished, punished by death. I closed my eyes then and looked up at the sky, seeing that it was a clear night and the moon was full, it would be a perfect sight for me to end my life with. I felt pain rip through me, as one of the dogs bit my arm. I pulled so that I could still see the stars, finding that they would be my only refuge from this hell. One after another the bites came, but still I refused to move. It was only when one bit my neck that I decided to say a prayer. A prayer that my little boy would be safe and that I could be with him again soon.
I shot up from my spot in bed and panted heavily. I had felt death before, but nothing that long, drawn-out, and painful. During the Urado case at least it had been quick, but with the dogs, it was an endless hell.
"Mai, are you alright?" a voice asked, causing my head to shoot up, only to see Hanayo still in her kimono looking at me worriedly.
"Just another dream." I replied, trying to shake it off, but the things I saw and felt would not go away.
"Do you want to talk about it?" She offered, but I only shook my head in response. Talking about it will only make me relive it, and I need to tell Naru what happened, so I would like to talk about it as little as possible. "I see." A moment had passed, and I had started to calm down a bit when I felt the atmosphere in the room change a little bit. "Hey Mai?" She asked, smiling softly at me with a glint of deviousness shining in her eyes.
"What?" I asked, getting a feeling that I shouldn't have asked. My feeling was only proven right when he smile widened and devilish aura around her increased, causing me to shrink in her presence.
"How about taking a walk to this troublesome house of ours?"
Me: I hope you liked it!
Mai: This one was a longer one too.
Naru: Whatever.
Gene: Joy kill.
Me: Anyway, PLEASE REVIEW! XD