CHAPTER 06: "A Night of Fright is No Delight"

The blond guy introduced himself as Fred. The redhead with the purple dress was Daphne, the nerd with the orange turtleneck was Velma, and the tall beanpole with the jittery disposition was Shaggy. The dog, of course, was Scooby-Doo—and the members of Mystery Inc. considered him an official member of the team, prehensile tail and speech impediment and all.

"We solve mysteries." Fred had taken point on the introductions, proving himself the leader of the gang once again. Daphne nodded along at his side, backing him up as he said, "We specialize in debunking the supernatural, and we're very good at what we do."

"We're technically here on vacation," Velma said, "but when we heard that people were going missing here, we knew we had to check it out."

"Mystery solving never ends," Daphne said—and then she rolled her eyes and sighed. Something told Yusuke that she wasn't too happy to have her vacation interrupted. "All I wanted to do was soak in a nice hot spring, but now we're here, instead." Daphne eyed the dank, dingy room with obvious distaste. "This place is definitely not the spa."

Shaggy nodded so hard, Yusuke feared his head might pop off. "Yeah—like, zoinks!" He put his hand on Scooby's head, fingers scratching the dog's ears on reflex. "This isn't much of a vacation, is it, Scoob?"

The dog (that goddamn talking dog the gaijin didn't bat an eye at) shook his head. "Ruh-huh," he said in his garbled voice, leaning heavily against Shaggy's leg. Whites still showed all around the dog's eyes, tail tightly tucked between his legs. "Ro vacation rat rall!"

Kurama's mouth moved, almost imperceptibly, as he stared Scooby. "Ro ray-cay-shun at all…?" he murmured, and then he pinched his nose between two fingers and sighed.

Yusuke just crossed his arms and raised a brow. "OK," he said. "I guess all of that makes sense." His eyes narrowed as he stared at Fred. "Some name you all've got for your little detective business, though."

"Yeah." Kuwabara stood next to Yusuke, eyeing over the Mystery Inc. gang, squad, whatever-they-were with skepticism. "You said you're good at what you do, but not you're not actually very good at solving mysteries, now are you?"

Shaggy blinked a bit, confused; his ears found their way to Scooby's ears again. "Huh?"

The others all gasped, shocked at being insulted—but Daphne walked right up to Yusuke, heels clacking against the rotting floorboards, eyes as fiery as her red hair. "What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded with a glare.

Yusuke glared right back. "It means you can't be very good detectives when your demon is right under your freakin' nose."

Daphne—who reminded Yusuke more and more of Keiko as time went on, sharp glare and pretty face and all—bared her teeth. "Ex-cuse me?"

Yusuke pointed at Scooby. "Him. That." He performed a vigorous display of jazz-hands, sardonic smile like a gash across his face. "Celebrate, kids! Your search is over! You've got a demon right there!"

All eyes turned to Scooby-Doo.

Scooby-Doo looked at everyone, perplexed.

A beat passed.

And then the lightbulb went off. Scooby-Doo dove to his belly, covered his eyes with his dinner-plate paws, and trembled against the dusty floor with a whimper of fear.

But was this show of cowardice an act, or a genuine expression of dread?

Only one way to find out.

NOTE: Honestly if Keiko wasn't off in the background somewhere, Yusuke/Daphne would make a weird degree of sense.