Disclaimer: I do not own Ghost Hunt.

"English speaking"

"Japanese speaking"

'Thinking'

Chapter 3

When Yasuhara entered the room he had seen Mai and Naru enter, followed by Prof. Davis, Lin and Madoka, he had a hard time not laughing out loud at the sight that greeted him. Mai and Naru were each sitting on their own sofas with a coffee table separating them, scowling at each other. The sheer intensity of their staring made him imagine lightning bolts shooting from their eyes.

"Noll. You can't just drag the speaker off the podium like that. Miss Taniyama, are you alright?" Martin asked as soon as he entered the room.

"I'm not quite sure, professor. That really depends on whether or not your son is about to split my head open to find the answers I won't give him." She didn't look away for a second.

Martin was impressed that she was standing her ground. And against Noll of all people. Nine out of ten people would be cowering in fear at this point. He looked between them. Noll was completely ignoring him.

"Yasu." Oliver barked. "Do you know why she was gone from her body for eight days straight and nearly died?"

Martin, Lin and Madoka looked at the young man, who was shaking his head. "Sorry big boss. But if Mai doesn't want to tell you then I won't either."

Lin and Madoka had expected this answer and the latter sighed. Martin was again low key impressed that another person was withholding information from his son, and not batting an eyelash at Noll's tone of voice.

Mai smirked. "Sorry Naru. But even if he was willing to tell you, you wouldn't get much out of him. Not even he knows all the details of what happened."

"Why won't you tell me?"

"Why do you need to know so badly?"

"Just tell me, Mai."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because you have no right to know. And you can't argue against that."

Oliver stayed silent, staring daggers at his former assistant.

"Mai." Mai was confused for a moment before she realised that Lin had been the one to say her name. She looked to her left and met his eyes. He had sat down next to her on the sofa. His expression was mild yet somehow stern. She had always been more intimidated by Lin than Naru.

"I'm not going to tell you either Lin, so don't even bother asking."

"I won't. But I will ask you another thing. What was the reason for you goin in in the first place? Was it a reckless action where you didn't think before jumping in with both feet? Or did you consider the consequences beforehand?"

Mai looked at him. She wasn't sure if she wanted to answer. But at least this wasn't the part she had revealed to no one else. The answer to this question was written in a case report. She sighed. "The latter. We had spoken about it for days. We always concluded that it was too dangerous. We didn't know enough and even though I am very reckless at times, even I don't like the idea of going in blind. But it had gotten to a point where I had no other choice."

"What happened?" Oliver asked. Some of the steel in his tone had gone. He was relieved to finally be getting something out of her.

Mai sighed again. "Alright, fine. I'll tell you the facts of the case." Looking at Naru, she noticed that the last three in the room had now also found a place to sit down. "It was basically a repeat of the Urado case."

Madoka gasped.

"Wasn't that the one with the fake Dr. Davis?" Martin asked the room.

"Yes, it was. People had gone missing, but in this case they also always turned up again a week or so later." Everyone was silent as she explained further. "In the first five days we were there no one had been taken. We were gathering evidence and doing background checks on everyone associated with the house. We couldn't find much, but eventually learned that an elderly man had lived there during the early 1900's. He was a wealthy man with many servants and a large family. While he lived no one had ever been killed, but everyone, family and servants alike, had all stated at some point that being in his presence was something like nauseating. They always had a feeling of being drained of energy when they left the place. That's when I remembered how all of the autopsy reports on the found victims had said that they had all died of unknown causes. There were never any visible markings on their skin, and the coroner could never find anything once he opened them up."

"He was literally draining their energy. Their lifeforce." Naru commented.

"That's right. Just like with Urado's case, we all decided that being in the house was too dangerous and we had no ideas by that point as for how to exorcise him. So we started packing up. But again, as we were about to leave, John was taken by him. That is the reason I had to go in. Because Unlike with Urado, we had nowhere to assume where John was. We had eliminated every square inch of the house. We had combed the grounds. There was nothing indicating that the people had been taken anywhere. So…"

Mai took a deep breath, but had trouble finding how to explain. To her luck, Yasu saw her struggling and took over.

"Mai explained to us how she believed that the old man was taking people to the Astral plane in both body and soul, just like Urado had done in order to get people through the solid walls. But instead of depositing the people somewhere, he kept them there. And given that John was now in danger, the only way we could see to get him back was to let Mai go in after him. She told us to keep an eye on her body and then she went in. Ayako sat by her side for hours making sure she was fine. Eventually John reappeared and told us that Mai had come running, jumped the old man to get him to let go of John. Some sort of white light had appeared then and distracted the spirit and Mai then took that opportunity to push John back through to our plane. What happened after that, I don't know. When Mai didn't wake up after another day, we all agreed to take her to the hospital so she wouldn't dehydrate. And while there, her heart did stop for a little while. They shocked her multiple times before it started beating on its own again. After a few more days, she finally woke up."

Mai was looking at her friend. She had never heard the story told by any of the others before. The pain and worry in Yasu's voice was stabbing her in the heart. She truly had never meant to worry her friends so much. She knew how they all felt, they had all told her. But this was different. She wanted to apologise all over again, but knew that it would do no good.

"Why didn't you go back with John?" Naru asked her.

She looked at him then. The anger was almost gone. But the worry was still slightly visible.

"I couldn't."

"Couldn't or wouldn't?"

She hesitated. She couldn't tell him the truth. She didn't know if he was aware that Gene had not passed on. She didn't know if Martin had any idea that his deceased son had ever been in contact with her. Because that white light had been him. Gene had followed her into the battle and had tried to protect her from the spirit of the old man. She couldn't and wouldn't have left him there to face the man alone. And she couldn't tell Naru about it.

"Let it go, Naru. Please." She said pleadingly.

Oliver had heard that tone in her voice many times. He knew then that it didn't matter how much he pushed. There was a reason other than her stubbornness that was preventing her from talking. And he had a feeling he knew what. Or rather who.

"Fine. I'll let it go for now."

Relief flooded Mai and she couldn't keep all of it from showing on her face. "Thank you."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-

30 min later.

With the metaphorical battle of wills now over, Martin had to go and try to appease the situation of the aftermath from Mai's speech. Madoka had gone with him to help, since it was actually her job as Martin's right hand woman. Martin had instructed Mai, Yasu and Naru in the least, to stay in that room until everything was dissolved.

Now Mai, Naru, Yasu and Lin were sitting in awkward silence. Mai then remembered something and chose to get this out of the way, now that she had the opportunity.

"By the way, Naru." He looked at her. "Thank you for what you did earlier. For getting them to quiet down when they got riled up the first time, I mean."

Naru looked at her for a moment, then nodded in acknowledgement.

Silence again. Mai wished she had something to do instead of just sitting still. And just like that, her wish was granted. A voice that was unknown to her came from her right.

"So is this a better time Miss?"

Mai stiffened, which got everyone's attention. She blinked a few times and then turned her head slowly. The dirty face of the old man she had seen in the lecture hall was looking at her a mere half a metre from her face, smiling innocently. Mai screamed and jumped back landing on Yasu's lap. He had taken Lin's place when the other two had left.

"OW! Mai-chan what.."

"Don't do that! You scared the sh*t out of me!" Mai shouted.

"What? I'm sorry I don't understand what you said. What language is that?" The head of the old man said.

"It's Japanese. And I said don't do that. You scared me. Do you realise that you look like someone stuffed your head and mounted it to the wall?"

"Oh, I'm sorry I didn't think of that." The man laughed a bit and grinned.

Flashes of white light started circling the man's head. "Hey, what are these things? Hey!"

Realising what they were, Mai turned to Lin. He and Naru had both stood and were by her side. "Lin, I don't think he's dangerous. Please call your shiki back."

Lin looked down at her, but it was Naru who spoke. "Are you sure?"

She nodded. Lin then made a low whistle at the corner of his mouth. The lights immediately flew to him and vanished in the air around him. "Thank you." Mai told him and got up off of Yasu. Who was very grateful that she had moved. Not because she was heavy, but because her tailbone had been digging into his thigh. He rubbed at it.

"Can you please come out of the wall now?" Mai asked the man.

"Oh, right, sure." The rest of him became visible and he now stood in front of her looking just as dirty and grimy as he had earlier.

"So tell me. Who are you and why are you seeking me out?"

"My name is Charlie Wilkens. And I thought that since you can see me, you could help me."

Mai turned to Yasu and repeated the man's name. A command to find out as much as he could within the next few minutes. He grabbed his shoulder bag from the floor and got out his laptop. Typing away at a speed very few could match.

"What do you need my help with?"

"Well, you see.. I just want somebody to find me."

"Find you?"

"Yes. I've been waiting for someone to find me for a while now, but I'm afraid no one is going to."

"Did somebody hide your body or something?"

"No no. Well yeah I guess I kinda did myself."

Charlie was beginning to look very see-through.

"You're fading. You don't have a lot of time, it's taking too much energy to show yourself to me. Tell me where you are and I will look for you."

"But I already told you. I showed you last night, remember?"

Mai remembered the dream she had had last night as they had arrived in London.

-0-0-0-

Mai opened her eyes and knew she was having one of the dreaded first person dreams. She just hoped this wasn't going to hurt. She was lying on the ground outside and was very cold for obvious reasons. The night air was swirling with big fat snowflakes that looked like cotton balls. Her entire body ached. She was hungry and freezing. Looking up the alleyway where she was, she saw a light shining. The sound of cars driving by somewhere could be heard. The light was sharp, but she could see letters beneath it. 'Molly's Soup Kitchen' it said.

'If only they would have given me a bit more food. Oh well. Can't fault them for just trying to be fair to everybody.' She thought. 'Better cover up so I can try and get warm'.

She covered herself in old coats and newspapers as well as she could. Then dragged some pieces of old cardboard over her to keep the snow away. And then she went to sleep.

-0-0-0-

"Molly's Soup Kitchen." Mai whispered.

Charlie nodded.

"You froze to death, didn't you?"

"I think so. December is a very cold month." Charlie was almost gone now. "Come find me, won't you?"

"Yes, I'll come find you." He smiled and disappeared.

Mai turned to the others in the room. Having quite forgotten they were all there she was a little shocked to see Lin and Naru staring at her like she was some sort of oddity.

"What?" She asked completely nonplussed.

Neither of them spoke. Just looked at her curiously.

"Seriously guys. Don't look at me like I'm crazy. I know you couldn't see him, but you both know what I can do, so you know that I wasn't just speaking to thin air."

"Mai. Do you realise what you just agreed to?" Naru asked.

She shrugged her shoulders. "I've agreed to go find Charlie."

"You've agreed to go and find a dead body. A rotting corpse. And since you said he froze to death, I'm guessing he is at least a few months into the process."

"Yeah, he said that he died in december. And it's not like I haven't seen a corpse before. It's kind of an occupational hazard in this line of work."

Oliver was completely floored. The Mai he had known would have at least cringed at the thought of finding a dead body. But he supposed that she was right. He felt the same way after all. But it gave him a feeling of uneasiness to know that Mai had seen so much gore that this didn't even face her.

"Uhhmm… Mai?"

Mai looked at Yasu. "Yes?"

He looked at her apologetically. "I'm afraid you're not going to like what I have to show you."

Mai sighed for the hundredth time that day and squeezed her eyes shut. "What is it?"

"That place you mentioned. Molly's Soup Kitchen. It's not just a single place. There are seven of them here in London." He turned the laptop around to show her an image of a map of London with seven little red markers pointing to various places.

"Oh, for crying out loud. You have got to be kidding me." She sank down into the sofa again and buried her face in her hands. "So at least now I know what I'll be spending the rest of my day with. And I was holding out hope to get a bit of studying done."

"Studying?" She heard Naru ask.

"Yeah." She lifted her head to look at him. "I'm taking a few college classes online, and I have a paper due on tuesday."

Naru looked thoughtful for a moment. "Well, since we're all stuck here until my father comes back, maybe we can help you out a bit."

Her brows furrowed. "How is being stuck in this room going to help?"

Lin had turned and was taking his own laptop out of his bag. He sat down and started typing. "You say you saw the place in a dream right?"

"Yes."

"Then If I pull up images of all the places with that name then would you be able to identify which one is the correct one?"

"I might be. That's brilliant."

"Yasu. What did you find out from the name?" Naru asked the bespectacled young man.

Yasu didn't hesitate. "Charlie Wilkens. 56 years of age. Lost his home after his business went bankrupt a few years ago. He was a house painter, but had allegedly gotten very slow and the quality of his work had gone down. His wife Sarah died 5 years ago of breast cancer and he had used all of his resources to pay for her treatment and care. No living family to speak of."

Naru sat down next to Lin again. "That's fast work. Well done."

"Thanks big boss." Yasu smiled and pushed his glasses up his nose to make them glint in the light.

"Lin, how are you doing with the images?"

"Compiling them now to make them easy to look through."

"Good."

Was this really Naru She was seeing in front of her? There was absolutely nothing for him to gain from helping her with this case. It was just a stray spirit. There was no pay involved and the case wasn't even really interesting. It was just a sad story that needed a bit of help to find an ending. So why was he helping her?

"Does this happen often?" He suddenly asked her.

"Hmm? Oh, you mean spirits coming to me themselves for help?"

He nodded.

"Sometimes." She acknowledged. "Mostly when it happens they are just like Charlie. People who have died under various circumstances and just want somebody to find them and let their families know, or just get buried and put to rest."

"And knowing you, you can't say no to them once they say please and give you poppydog eyes."

Mai smiled softly. "Of course I can't. And I know you couldn't see him, but he wasn't giving me poppydog eyes. He was smiling."

"Smiling?"

"Mhmm. I don't think he minded dying. I think maybe he just wants to see his wife again. But he doesn't feel like he can go before someone finds his body and buries him beside her."

Now this was the Mai Oliver remembered. Caring and good hearted. Smiling for someone else. Trying to give him the help she could. That smile on her lips was warm and soft. Like she could imagine the love between them, even though she had never known either. Oliver felt a sting in his chest as he remembered that Mai probably knew how Charlie felt. Having also loved someone who was dead. He wondered if she was thinking of his brother as she smiled like that, with an absent look in her eyes. 'Stop looking at her mouth, you idiot!'

Oliver pulled himself together and turned to Lin as he spoke. "I have the images here." Lin handed Mai the computer and let her scroll through the pictures. It took maybe three minutes before she told them that she had found one she thought was right.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It had taken another hour before Prof. Davis had come back saying that people had finally calmed down. He also told Mai that the sale on books about astral projection, out of body experiences, spiritual guidance and visions had completely sold out. People were so fascinated with her speech that they wanted to find any source of knowledge that could possibly answer the questions she hadn't. He was so impressed with her explanation of the astral plane that he asked her if she would consider during an actual lecture for his classes at Cambridge University. Mai didn't know what to say to all this praise, but told him that she might consider it. She just needed some time to think about it.

Both Martin and Madoka were understandably surprised to learn that a spirit had come to talk to Mai and that they were now going to look for his body. They both wanted very much to come as well, but obligations kept them at the conference centre.

Now the team were standing in front of the building that Mai had chosen to begin with. It looked right to her. Turning around she located a long and pretty dark alleyway, and told the others that she believed this to be the way. Yasu opted to stay behind as his stomach wasn't quite as hardened as Mai's.

Naru walked by Mai's side as they made their way down the darkened path. Eventually they reached a large pile of what looked to be trash with some cardboard in front of it. It smelled awful and they all recognised the smell of decay alongside sewage and other types of waste. Lin stepped forward and used a piece of an old broken plank to pry away the cardboard, as Mai said that the body was most likely under there. Charlie's body was revealed and even though her nerve and composure had strengthened over the years, Mai's stomach still turned over. She didn't vomit, but she felt green. Oliver saw this and smirked.

"Not so unaffected after all are you?"

She scowled at him. "Shut up, you jerk. It's just hard. Knowing what his face is supposed to look like, and then seeing this. It's just so very wrong."

Oliver felt a little better now, knowing that she hadn't changed so much.

"So how would you normally report something like this to the police? Just call them and tell them that you stumbled upon a dead body?" Lin asked.

She nodded. "Basically. Although in this situation I would really like to avoid all the stupid questions so, if you don't mind, I would like to do it with a bit of flair to it."

The two men looked at eachother questioningly before Naru asked her what she meant.

"I'm going to go for something along the lines of 'Foreign tourist who doesn't speak english well, found a dead body in an alley and is so disgusted that she throws up in a bin.' I thought about this plan on the way over here."

The men decided that this was not a bad plan to avoid questions and let her do as she planned. After sending a quick text to Yasu to warn him about what she was going to do, she gave an Oscar worthy performance on the phone with the secretary at the police station. The secretary got the street name and a description of the place and then told Mai that she didn't need to stay as the call had been recorded and she sounded like she needed to get out of there. Mai had after all forcefully made herself sick over a trash can to make the right sounds to be believable sick of being near the body. She also decided not to give her name, so whenever the woman on the other end asked her something she couldn't answer, Mai would reply in Japanese and apologise for not understanding.

Ten minutes later they were all sitting at an outside café table down the street so they could watch when the police came. Naru had ordered tea for the whole table and Mai was grateful for the soothing sensation to her burning throat.

"Thanks Naru. This was just what I needed."

Oliver didn't reply, but nodded to show that he had heard her.

"I must say Mai." Lin started. "That was some quick thinking with the phone call. Well done."

Mai beamed at him. "Thanks Lin."

"Well it's not like Mai hasn't done that before." Yasu commented. Getting a strange quizzical look from the other two men, he explained. "Finding a random dead body a few times a year is strange in and of itself. The police don't believe in ghosts, so Mai sometimes needs to come up with some real good excuses to make it sound believable. Although as we all know, Mai is a terrible liar, so her doing the whole thing over the phone makes it easier than standing face to face with an officer and giving a statement."

Mai huffed a bit, but didn't say anything. Then she noticed something that she couldn't help but comment on. "Hey Naru. You've barely touched your tea. Did you get quizzy too?"

He looked at her and then down at his still almost full cup.

Lin looked at his young companion out of the corner of his eye to see how he would react. He knew very well why Noll wasn't drinking the tea. There was no doubt in his mind that the younger man was thinking of a better version of tea that he hadn't had for the better part of a decade. He had noticed that Noll would often take a few sips of his cup and then leave the rest, or sometimes refuse all together. He had chosen not to speak of it however, as every time Mai's name had come up in conversation, Noll would get more distant than usual and very snappy.

"No, I didn't. I've just cut down a lot on my tea drinking. And this has not been made to my liking." He finally answered.

Mai stared at him. "You've cut down? On tea?"

He gave her a blank look. "Yes, Mai. It's not that unbelievable."

She couldn't stop the disbelieving laughter from bubbling out of her. "Says the guy who couldn't go more than an hour without a fresh cup, for over a year. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine Mai. Drink your tea."

"The police have arrived." Yasu informed them. He had been looking down the street so he could keep an eye on the situation. They all looked to the mouth of the alleyway and saw two police cars and four officers.

"Good. Now Charlie will finally be able to rest in peace."