Yo! Thank you to all readers so far!

"Ah, welcome," Kiyoshi greeted, meeting Naru, Lin, and Mai further down the hall. "I'm very glad you've come. Here, let me show you to the room you asked for."

The three SPR members followed the older man down a long hallway and into a rather spacious room that was furnished with a large rectangular table, a couch or two, and a few chairs. There was a tall bookshelf in one corner, entirely stacked with books, and at the back of the room, taking over half of the wall was a massive window covered by red curtains, which gave the room a strange, bloody glow.

"Wow, this room's huge!" Mai exclaimed, unable to help herself.

"I hope it'll be appropriate," said Kiyoshi with a small smile.

Naru merely inclined his head, glancing over at Mai who was currently bouncing around like a little kid. Except she was wearing a skirt. And still bouncing. And well, gravity certainly wasn't going to keep that skirt down with those movements, which meant Naru was left with a sight that nearly had him choking.

"Mai! Go help the others with the equipment!"

Mai finally went mostly still and turned around to look at him, curious at his sudden shortness, completely oblivious that while she'd been enjoying the view of the room, Naru had been treated to an enjoyable view of an entirely different kind. "Why?" she asked.

"Because I said so."

Mai huffed but didn't argue, leaving the room while she muttered under her breath. "Stupid narcissistic jerk. Why call me here and then send me back? What the heck's the point? Probably just changed his mind again. No, it's just withdrawal symptoms. He hasn't had tea in over an hour." Her mutters trailed off as she got further away from the room.

Mai hadn't gone all too far when she met up with the others, all of who (save for Masako, who didn't do menial labour, not even for Naru) were carrying equipment, and she pointed their new Base out to them before heading outside herself. There, she grabbed one of the monitors, and since that was all she could carry at once, returned inside the house.

"Mai-chan..." came the soft voice of a boy.

"Mai-nee..." followed the quiet voice of a girl.

Mai blinked in surprise as she came to an abrupt stop, nearly dropping the monitor she was holding. Those voices again... She frowned, eyes locked on the ground, but unseeing.

Why am I the only one hearing them? And-and why do they sound like-like them? Please don't tell me this case is somehow related to that... Wait! What am I saying!? There's no way they can be involved! I mean, that happened years ago!

"Ow!" Unaware that she had started walking again, Mai once more came to a stop and raised her head, coming face to face with Naru's chest. Oh. Cheeks heating, she quickly looked away. "S-sorry, Naru!"

"You really should be paying attention, Mai. You'll have to pay for that monitor if you break it."

Nope. She wasn't going to fall for that bit again. Instead, she stuck her tongue out at him childishly as she passed by him. "You can't trick me with that again, Naru," she said proudly. "I know all the equipment's insured."

Naru simply smirked. "Glad to see you've finally caught on."

"Hmph!"

Naru couldn't help but smile slightly as he watched Mai walk away, her irritatingly short skirt swishing around her thighs. He sighed. How distracting. No, no, he had to focus. He-

"Naru?"

He snapped out of his thoughts, quickly realizing he had returned to the Base while he hadn't been paying attention, and now it appeared as if everyone was staring at him, Bou-san and Ayako laughing, and Mai standing before him with her hands on her hips and a frown on her face.

"Jeez," she said with a shake of her head. "And you say I space out. Hideki-san's gonna show us to our rooms now. Did you hear him?"

No, he hadn't, though he pretended otherwise, allowing the older man to lead them out of the Base, through the house, and up the stairs. But they had barely reached the second floor's landing, when-

"Ah!"

Mai cried out suddenly, stumbling backwards and nearly off the stairs. The only reason she didn't fall was because Naru, who was right behind her, managed to grab her around the waist, securing her. The force of the stumble however, caused Naru to lose his own balance as well. Fortunately Lin was behind him, and he grabbed hold of both of them, preventing anyone from falling as he himself had a good grip on the banister.

Everyone steadied themselves, taking a moment to catch their breath, and it was only after Naru moved away that Mai realized that his arm had lingered around her for longer than should have been necessary. How strange. She was hardly going to complain about it though.

"Sorry!" she said instead. "I-um, I just tripped." She gave Naru a sidelong glance, silently telling him that there was more to what had just happened than her simply tripping, though she didn't really want to say so in front of their client.

Naru frowned at that, but they continued on following Kiyoshi for half a second longer, at which point they all came to a stop once more, and he turned to them with a smile.

"There are four bedrooms up here that you can use as you'd like. They're all furnished western style, like the rest of the house, so I'm sorry if that isn't to your liking. The main bathroom is that last door right there down the hall, and there's another attached to one of the bedrooms-that one there. My own room is downstairs in the short hall by the stairs.

"Feel free to help yourselves to the kitchen. It's well stocked, but I don't see that lasting for more than a couple of days with all of you here. I'd be happy to show you to the nearest stores if needed. Alright, if that's all, I'll leave you to it. I'll be downstairs if you need me." And with that, he turned and made his way back to the staircase, leaving them where they were.

A bit surprised by their client's sudden rush to get away from them, they chose to put it behind them and settled the room assignments.

"So, eight people, four rooms," said Ayako.

"Seven people," Naru corrected. "Hara-san will be leaving this evening, and will not be returning unless this case takes us an unnaturally long time to solve."

Well, in that case room assignments were simple enough. Naru and Lin were in one room, Bou-san, John, and Yasuhara in the second, and Mai and Ayako had the third.

With an odd number of them, there really wasn't much of a need to use the fourth room, especially if they wanted to avoid an argument about who's room that would end up being in the first place. And knowing Ayako, it would end up being hers, which would also leave Mai in a room of her own, and well, was that really a good idea when she was so...attack prone?

Once all of that was settled and they had put their bags away in their rooms, the team returned to the Base to actually begin talking about their investigation. Although it appeared there was something else they needed to discuss first.

"What happened on the stairs earlier, Mai?" said Naru, his eyes locked on his younger assistant.

"Someone pushed me," said Mai immediately, a concerned frown on her face. "As soon as I reached the top of the stairs, I felt a-a hand on my chest, and it pushed me back pretty hard, hard enough I completely lost my balance."

"Were you able to see what pushed you?"

When Mai shook her head in the negative, Naru turned to Masako instead. "Have you sensed anything yet, Hara-san?"

Masako raised her kimono's sleeve up to her mouth, her brow creasing as she thought and focused. "There is...something here, something negative, but I cannot tell where it is located at this time."

Naru noted all of this down, then said, "Matsuzaki-san, accompany Hara-san on a walkthrough of the property. The quicker we get this done, the better." They didn't have time to waste if Masako was to leave in a few hours. "Mai, tea. Bou-san, go with her."

Those addressed left the room, and Mai and Bou-san found the kitchen, where the girl quickly began her usual duty of tea making. The monk watched her for a moment in silence, wondering how best to voice a particular thought that had been on his mind for a while now.

The way Mai and Naru had been behaving around one another recently had been kind of...odd. Mai had been mostly forcibly casual since Naru had returned from England, though she occasionally slipped up and acted normally by complaining or arguing or muttering about him.

Naru himself had been rather odd too. He still berated Mai, but not as often as he used to before, and it almost sounded...like he was joking. Not mocking, but joking. He watched Mai more now too, and then an expression of pain would cross his face, but only when he seemed to think no one was looking.

"Hey, Mai?"

"Hmm?"

"Is there...something going on between you and Naru-bou?"

Mai froze, then turned and began opening cupboard doors, searching for mugs. "Why would you ask that?"

The man's eyes widened in surprise. Mai's tone when she had spoken just now had sounded so...cold. Cold and uncaring. He had never heard her sound like that before. It was almost kind of alarming.

"Naru doesn't want to have anything to do with me beyond treating me like a slave anyway, so I don't think it matters."

Bou-san frowned. "That's not true," he protested quickly. "The kid's strict with you, sure, but he does it because he worries about you. He wants to protect you. He likes you."

Mai didn't seem to believe him though, because she released a rather bitter sounding laugh. "If he really liked me, he wouldn't have rejected m-" she clapped a hand over her mouth abruptly. Dammit. She hadn't meant to say that out loud. But it was too late anyway.

"He what!?" Bou-san's exclamation was so loud that Mai actually winced. "He-he-that-that-!" That didn't make any sense! It was obvious that Naru had feelings for Mai! That kid wasn't nearly as subtle as he thought he was-everyone knew he liked Mai. And Mai obviously liked him too, so why the hell had he turned her away?

Unfortunately for the monk, but fortunately for his friend, Bou-san didn't have time to ask, because Mai finished the tea up just a moment later, and the two of them made their way back to the Base, just in time to hear an irritated call for them to hurry up. And Mai had only just begun serving the tea when Ayako and Masako returned as well, the latter of the two looking rather pale.

Naru set down his cup and picked up his notebook. "Did you learn anything, Hara-san?"

"…Yes," said Masako with a slow nod. "There is definitely some sort of dark presence in this house. However, it is skilled at concealing itself. Because of that, I am unable to see it clearly. It is most certainly hiding here in this house, but I still cannot say where. I believe it understands my ability to some extent, and concealed itself to avoid me, because it-he, I think, is aware that I have the capability to find him. Aside from that, there are also the spirits of two children here on this property. There is a boy and a girl, though I know little more than that."

"Children?" John repeated, blue eyes wide in surprise. With everything Kiyoshi had told them was happening, none of them had thought to hear that there were child spirits around.

Masako however, nodded and raised her kimono sleeve up, hiding a look of pain. "They were murdered."

That's it for now. Looking forward to reviews! Laterz!