I don't own Inu Yasha, or Ghost Hunt. This was not written with the intention of the making money, this was made for the pleasure of sharing.

Don't yell kay? I'm mildly thinking about putting Souta with Yasaharu or Naru…dunno which…I just have a firm belief that love is love, that the body doesn't matter and we have no right to comment on others hearts. (I was totally writing this to Nickelback, which might be why I was feeling a bit sappy.)

This has not been beta-ed, feel free to point out issues but if you are not specific I'm not going to hunt for them. I do my best to make corrections by re-reading what I have written hopefully I've caught some if not most of my mistakes. If any one feels up to being a beta, I have MANY chapters you can fix up for me.

On another note I have a question for everyone who's reading, what do you prefer in a chapter? Dialogue, action, description? What makes a story come alive for you?

Chapter 4

Kagome could only sigh, she hated imbuing small pieces of paper with power to create a shield. Paper was the easiest medium that a spirit could mess with, stone or wood was better to work with as those two mediums were harder to meddle with than paper and ink. Thankfully Souta was helping her in the only ways that he could, writing the sutra's out before jamming them full of holy energy.

It was now past dark and everyone had paper charms or talismans for protection, while John had managed to perform the exorcism around the house there was something that seemed to cling to the air and was waiting to swallow them whole. Souta seemed to be more jumpy than normal and Kagome could readily admit that something about this entire affair was off. Their hosts seem to jump and skitter at every little sound, and it was obvious that they were on their last nerve.

Several mics as well as video feeds had been set up most of them would be hitting the bed for a long nights sleep. For once Kagome would be sleeping, at the moment Lin and John would be staying up for the night, it was undecided as to who would be staying up the next night. Kagome just sighed, Mai was already in bed she'd gotten into another argument with Naru and the older woman was beginning to wonder what the English man actually knew about his employees.

Naru in some ways was painfully ignorant of society's expectations, but that might be a good thing. If he understood he world better it would just give him ammunition to verbally attack those he considered to be of an inferior class. Kagome simply sighed, before getting up there was just something about the night that wasn't allowing her to sleep. Slipping into a large pair or war sweat pants as well as a thick t-shirt, Kagome found herself making way to the base connection. John blinked at her before a small smile lit across his face, and he returned to the monitors before him.

"Ah, Kagome-san, what brings you here?" John smiled softly, at the Japanese woman. Blue eyes studied the woman, she looked tired but she also seemed very awake as if something was bothering her.

"I just couldn't sleep I suppose. Sometimes it happens and I can't sleep a wink, something about this place is making me paranoid." Kagome replied, before slipping into one of the seat in front of the monitors. Opening the secondary laptop, Kagome found herself working through one of the cases that she'd brought with her. This was for her own personal files and something that had slowly being categorized and helped her work out payment for money owed herself and the shrine. Between the extra income from working with the Shibuya company, the selling of charms and money owed for the services that hadn't been paid during her individual work, the shrine was slowly coming back into the black and for that she was thankful. The fact that she was working with a British and Chinese man had many of the patrons in her area speculating and spreading rumors. It was embarrassing for her, and if she didn't have the support of others in Tokyo Kagome wasn't certain what she would do.

A quiet seemed to settle over the three of them, Kagome happily working on filing away her own case work while John and Lin looked over what was happening on screen. The quiet seemed to fill the room, that was when things began to get a bit strange. Shadows began to appear on the on the screen and a strange tapping surrounded them. The room that the equipment was in was heavily warded with both sutra and several blessings that John had made, nothing should have been able to get inside. The strange scratching sounds seemed to come from outside the house as if they couldn't get in and seemed to come from the roof and sides of the building

The quiet between the three of them seemed to amplify the sound of whatever was happening, none of them made a move to leave the room. Eventually the rat-tat-tat tapping sound stopped only to be followed by soft whispery hisses and then the world seemed to open up, ghostly illusions rose up inside and outside the house. Some of them were young, some were rather old all of them looked like they were in perfect health like they had on the last day of their death.

Not one of them really knew what to do or say, this wasn't a phenomenon that was caused by another spirit whatever these things were. "These aren't spirits." Kagome finally spoke watching as a woman that looked very similar to their host wondered the room cleaning, she seemed to be humming but there wasn't any noise and it was strange at the way the woman wavered and shudders. The image of the illusion wasn't able to hold up, instead it flickered much like a when ones television was on the blitz.

An hour passed Kagome followed the strange illusion around the house, while Lin copied information down from the monitors and John kept up a steady chant. Over that hour, they would again hear the rat-tat-tat across the roof of the house almost as if whatever it was seemed to be following the movement of Kagome about the house. The Higurashi woman had asked over the headset they had supplied her, if he or John were hearing the strange tapping sound, and the Chinese man replied with a negative.

By the time that morning came the three of them were completely overwhelmed at all the information they had gathered, so when the rest of their group walked in that morning they were all a bit surprised by the extremely tired expressions they were met with. All three of them knew one thing, the three of them would be sleeping very well or be so paranoid that none of them would sleep on this trip unless it was day light.

"What in the world happened last night?" Mai asked, a concerned look on her face as if this wasn't something that she had expected. The three of them looked ready to collapse onto any nearby surface, Kagome and John had at least been able to sleep on the drive up. Lin had driven the entire time, only to take the first night shift as well.

Naru didn't have to say anything the look on his face stated that they had better report in short order, the three of them could only glance between them. It had been such an odd experience. None of them could say anything for a few moments, they were all still ill at ease from the night before.

"It started a little after nine, I had gotten up because I couldn't sleep. I came and sat with John and Lin, a short time after that we began to hear an odd noise on the roof and against the walls and window. Eventually it petered off, to be followed by the odd illusion that the Namimakis' spoke about. The illusion wasn't complete though, it flickered constantly as if it couldn't hold its connection, there was also no noise. I couldn't feel any spirits, but I do believe that there are several spirits in this area. I just don't think that they come to the houses…. Either way I followed the illusion to see what they were doing and it seems to mimic what the person might had been doing while they were alive. While I was going from room to room following the illusion, the tapping began…it followed me through the roof from room to room." Kagome shivered and easily welcomed the hug Souta engulfed her with. Something about that following tapping sent terror down her spine, there was an ominous air in this town.

"Whatever it is it cannot come in, but it wanted to get our attention. It tapped on the windows for a long time before the illusions began to occur. I think it wants us to come outside, or at least to a place that is easily assessable." John paused, he didn't know what else to say.

"I want the three of you to sleep. Mai, Souta and I can handle anything that comes up, don't argue with me Lin. The three of you will be useless to us if you can't function, the three of us will stay in the house and work through the papers and bits of information that was dug up yesterday at the library. We will also be having another talk with the Namimakis'," Naru glared at all three of them as if daring them to argue. It was bright in the morning and he wasn't terribly worried about being attacked, hopefully the monk and Masako would be there in the morning.

John and she shared soft laughter as the protest died on Lin's lips. Once the nightshifters left, Mai and Souta began to snicker it couldn't be helped. Lin's expression when Naru out maneuvered him was priceless. Eventually the two of them got over their amusement, Souta tuned the two of them relatively quickly by pulling out a set of head phones and literally diving into the work.

Naru frowned, he really didn't understand all the oddities that built up to create one Higurashi Souta, the boy was younger than him but seemed to be relatively mature save for his age. Souta on the other side of the spectrum was a total potty mouth, and wasn't willing to hold anything back when he got something into his head. He was a hard worker and didn't allow himself to get distracted like some young girls…. Shaking the thought from his head, he returned to the information in front of him, the information was astounding in just the large amounts of it.

Mai looking on in utter surprise as the boys seemed to set about ignoring her, Souta seemed to really be into this sort of thing. It was something she expected from Naru, but not from someone she'd known for most of her middle school life. It was hard seeing Souta as this relatively mature person, but for all his posturing Souta still had his very defensive swearing that was something that had developed after his mother and grandfather were killed.

Sighing, Mai simply shook her head before heading to the kitchen everyone who worked in SPR happened to be Tea addicts except perhaps Lin and that was because he was a coffee addict. "Oh! Haruhi-san, you know Naru wants to talk to you and Hatsuharu…"

The woman studied the teenage girl before her with something of a frown, she didn't like that they had brought so many young people with them. Haruhi sighed, "I can speak with him later this afternoon after work."

Mai wanted to comment but didn't, there wasn't any work to be done. No one was staying at the inn besides themselves because it had become known that you might go missing on your vacation if you decided to stay in this particular town, and as many Japanese put off the idea of "legends and fairy tales" not one of them actually wanted to take the chance to meet such beings. Nodding to the woman, Mai simply watched the older woman go before returning to what she'd started earlier, the water boiled allowing the tea to steep.

It took a good fifteen minutes before she finished the tea, pouring it into one of the many pitchers that were available. Mai grabbed several cups before having something of a balancing act and taking the things back to the room they were being allowed to use. When the door to the room opened, Mai could only blink to find Hatsuharu looking down at her with something of a curious expression on his face. This was quickly followed by the older man taking the serving tray in her hands and placing it on the table.

"Haruhi didn't help you with that?" The older man asked a disapproving frown on the man's face. For some reason Haruhi had begun to act very strangely, she would act out and in some cases be very rude to the people of the village and himself.

Mai simply shook her head, "She pretty much took off after I went into the kitchen. I told her that Naru wanted to speak with her, and she said that there were other things that needed to be done."

Hatsuharu could only frown, before sighing "I'll try to answer whatever questions he might have then."

Mai sighed, before rolling her eyes at the two boys they were so absorbed in what they were doing that they didn't seem to be hearing anything that was said around them. Normally, at least Naru was more alert but this time it seemed he was completely focused on what he was doing that he didn't even seem to realize that he was out of tea. Waving at their host, the cinnamon haired girl could only watch in amusement as Hatsuharu placed the tea on one of the work tables then replaced the two empty tea cups with new ones.

Naru finally seemed to waken from the information induced stupor he'd managed to get into. Those steady blue eyes seemed to bore into the older man, as if trying to discover his every secret "I see. Please take a set."

Hatsuharu glanced at Mai, and the cinnamon haired girl rolled her eyes before sitting rather ungracefully into one of the chairs. The other boy had looked up and taken his ear phones off, he happened to be looking at him with a very curious expression on his face. The three of them were now all looking at Naru with varying looks of curiosity.

Dark blue eyes rolled in slight annoyance, "Why weren't we informed that the majority of the people that go missing are those who are….spiritually gifted?"

Hatsuharu grimaced, "I'm not really sure. Haruhi was the one who decided on this particular method of getting help, I thought that we should have worked it out on our own. If it had been left in my hands you would have been told something."

Naru's eyes seemed to sharpen, to narrow and focus on the man before him. Hatsuharu seemed extremely uncomfortable with holding onto information that could help them. "What do you want to tell us that your sister wants to keep quiet?"

"The only reason Haruhi has been acting this way, and has gone so far is because she's angry. She wants some sort of closure, something to help. Both our parents had small amounts of strange abilities, my father always knew who was calling. My mother always knew what the weather was going to be like and they were always aware of who was coming to the inn before they arrived. It always came in small spurts, and they seemed to go dormant about the same time that people went missing. Finally they went missing to, Haruhi just can't seem to get passed it." Hatsuharu was looking at them a sharp look on his face. His fingers where laced while a sharp chin seemed to rest on the tied fingers. The was a look of worry and compassion on the older man's face seemed to cause a quit to roll over them.

"I see." Naru paused, he seemed to be trying to absorb the information before trying to sort out the ideas that came with it. Souta on the other had had a very heavy frown on his face, this was just one of those things that didn't really make sense to him, withholding information like that often times caused them to take a much longer time to figure out what was happening.

As the silence passed, a generalized knocking on the door caught the attention of those in the small room surrounded by electronics. Hatsuharu bowed slightly, before standing and hurrying to the door. The three teenagers could hear the older man murmuring softly, before the whine of the door followed by the click of being shut and footsteps coming their way indicated the rest of them had arrived.

"Heey!" Takigawa grinned at them, even though he was carrying several bags most of which were obviously not his. Masako followed behind him in a sedate pace, a long Kimono sleeve covering the lower portion of her mouth as if to keep from being sick. The young girl was looking rather sick at what was going on around her, but she was also looking very determined.

"What do you see, Hara-san?" Naru finally asked, studying the delicately raised teenager. Hara Masako had been raised in a very gentle setting and because of it many of the teens considered her to be naïve and rather ignorant of the normal society at large and in all honesty they would more than likely right. The snotty attitude that she sometimes exuded did nothing to endear the young girl to the rest of the team, but Naru would be the first to admit that she was the best in her field. At least here in Japan that was, there were several in America and the European area's like England or France that were just as good that didn't have such an attitude problem.

"There are several spirits here. They don't mind coming near me, but none of them are extremely angry either. I don't understand. None of them are angry they are not causing the things that have been occurring here," Masako looked so confused and just a bit more than a little lost with the amount of souls that were simply floating around the town. She had noticed them along the road as they entered and had seen several on the mountain road within a mile around the town.

"Are you saying the spirits aren't causing all these weird things to happen?" Mai asked, her jaw seemed to drop just a bit in disbelief. There were so many different reports and it wasn't just in Okamori it seemed to be in little towns or villages all over the mountain area. It just seemed odd for them to all gather there for no reason.

Masako managed to refrain from rolling her eyes at the other teenager, "Something about their death is keeping them from moving on. Most of them would accept a proper exorcism and would simply go onto the correct plane of existence, others are angry but don't know how to fix what they considered to be wrong."

"Either way the best thing to do in this case is find out what is making all these ghost and then waiting to see how many of the spirits remain behind. Sometime in cases like this once things are resolved, the spirits move on naturally unless they become earth bound and then they need a little help." Souta finished, looking at the lot of them.

"Hey, were are John, Lin and Kagome?" The monk finally asked, he'd found a place to put the luggage and he was had no intention of moving it after bringing it into the house. He wasn't Masako's maid and the young medium needed to learn to bring smaller amounts of things because no one else would be willing to carry her things.

"Asleep." Naru stated simply before turning back to work on what he'd been focusing on. This was one of those cases that didn't really make any sense to him, there was no reason to go missing nor was there any reason to have this sort of thing happen. The cases were all the same, for a day or two the person in question would act a bit off before simply disappearing into the wilderness. This was the case within the last ten years, before that people would simply walk into the wooded area and never return. On occasion a set of mingled bones would be found, most of them would be gnawed on by the carnivorous or scavenging animals but other than that nothing was really gave a hint as to what was causing them to disappear. It couldn't be a person, the first time someone was pronounced missing had been in the early twenties. A human would be dead or so decrepit he or she wouldn't be able to handle the stronger young members of their species.

"So we are dealing with some sort of crazy spirit or other," Souta replied, a frown covered his face. This didn't really sound like a spirit at all, many people didn't believe in demon's or other things that went bump in the night. He'd grown up with his family learning about the stories and they weren't very clear, it had been years sense a low level demon had come into Tokyo. Never mind the fact that Tai Youkai generally kept the population under control even they could be killed by guns.

"What do you mean other?" Mai asked, staring at Souta as if he had lost his mind. She'd never heard of something other than what they dealt with on most cases. Usually it involved a spirit doing something that they wanted or in some cases like the one where she met Naru it was caused by a human. Though some of the people didn't appreciate the confirmation that it wasn't a spirit haunting them, others had been and it would eventually come out that so and so down the street got a slap on the wrist for slapping their neighbors or in a lot of trouble for vandalism.

"Well for one, there are living spirit and then there are dead spirits. Hara sees the dead ones and more than likely the living ones, living spirits are usually spiritually blessed themes of nature that have gained a sort of consciousness. These beings are not blessed by human's but spirits that are higher than that of a human, we call them Kamis' but it's a mix up to those outside of Japan if they are simply spirits or gods." Souta paused slightly amused at the hidden disbelieving look he was getting from Naru and one of consideration from Mai. Takigawa was nodding, while Masako was looking at him with something akin to curiosity.

"I've never seen or spoken to a living spirit, Higurashi-san. Most of the trees of blessed places in the areas of Japan I've been to are dead. They rarely come out to speak to one such as I, anyway." Masako replied, slightly embarrassed. Living spirits were rare, and it took a great deal of ability to lure them outside their places of living. Certain spirits didn't live long just months or a few years, while others could last several millenniums like some camphor trees.

"Living spirits would be like Lin's Shiki, Naru." Souta replied off hand, and saw the look close off with a simple nod. That was about all the concession he would get out of Naru, the older boy probably didn't believe in holy spirits or gods. Though that wasn't surprising many people had lost faith in the world around them, so why would they believe in omnipotent beings that looked down on them ready to smite people?

"So what are you thinking Souta?" The golden haired monk was looking at him with a curious expression.

The younger Higurashi simply shook his head, "I don't know enough to help. Kagome should wake up in an hour or to. They stayed up all night, something happened last night that kept all three of them up."

After that they returned to going through papers while Takigawa walked with Masako through the village, it was decided they would have to see if Masako could get more details from the certain spirits. Some of them didn't come near her, on the other hand many floated around the girl with something akin to morbid curiosity. Not many of them were willing to speak with her about what happened. The ones that did told a disturbing tale, that didn't sound anything like a living or dead spirit at all. It came to weight so heavily on her mind that she was almost clinging to her escort by the time they headed back toward the small inn.

O o O o O o O

Kagome yawned loudly, looking over at the clock to her left she could only frown it was roughly twelve in the afternoon. Her sleep schedule when they returned to Tokyo was going to be shot to help, even with the several hours of rest under her belt it didn't make her feel much better. Though forcing herself to get up even when she was tired would ensure she got some sleep during the night. The noise outside seemed to be getting louder from yelling which was then followed by the twinkling sound of breaking china or something perhaps made of glass.

Stretching out, Kagome surveyed the room that she'd slept in. It was relatively calming with simply light blue walls and a soft very light brown comforter that reminded the Higurashi woman of a spa like atmosphere. In all honesty it would take the people of this village years to overcome whatever it was that happened to be causing so much trouble. Standing the dark haired woman quickly dressed before making her way back out toward base. She had no idea why there had been close to four bags of clothing in the room she shared with Mai but in a good frame of mind she ignored it.

Kagome didn't expect to find Haruhi yelling in a very ugly manner at her brother as the blue eyed woman could only frown before deciding it wasn't any of her business and made her way down to the main floor. What she didn't expect was the massive amounts of paper that seemed to be covering everything. Souta and Naru were quietly chatting while Masako was sitting in a corner watching the lot of them quietly. Mai seemed to be dozing off, Monk on the other hand was looking over the monitors and making notes every once in a while.

"What in the world has happened since we went to sleep? Why is Haruhi yelling like that?" Kagome could honestly say that she was confused about what was happening. Haruhi's demeanor didn't seem like the person that had greeted them in the office, and even though she didn't know the woman very well something about what was happening seemed to rub her the wrong way

Souta simply shook his head, "It's weird. Hatsuharu seems to be the most responsive. Haruhi on the other end of it seems like she's trying to get us out of the house. Masako said she wasn't possessed though so I really don't know what has happened."

Masako paused before repeated what she had found, buy this point both John and Lin were behind Kagome and the dark haired woman moved allowing the two of them in to listen to the rest of the findings.

"Did anyone actually get on the roof, or check around the building?" Kagome asked, she couldn't help but ask. The strange sounds from the night before sounded more like a physical thing than something spiritual being. It seemed odd that there was such a difference but Kagome believed that there was, it didn't sound like a hollow echo that usually came with spirits.

"No. Mai, could you go get Hatsuharu I have another question for him." Naru frowned. There was something that was digging at the back of his mind, instead of speaking his mind the young man waited as the younger girl disappeared out of the room. What none of them suspected was the loud masculine cry for help followed by several thumps and the shattering of something which caused the lot of them to rush toward the door.

Mai was lying across the stairwell with several bumps on her body, Hatsuharu was holding the small girl up with a look of horror on his face. There was a darkening bruise on his cheek as well as several cuts all along both his and Mai's arms. It was obvious from the way Haruhi was standing over them with a blank expression on her face that something was very wrong. Kagome moved up the stairs toward the girl and wasn't surprised when the Namimaki female began to move away, what the Higurashi woman didn't expect was to see the small sliver of thread-like silver that seemed to be attached to the woman's neck.

The others looked up with surprise, Lin and Naru were high enough to watch in surprise as a bright glow seemed to cover Kagome's finger tips. When Kagome's hand finally connected with Haruhi, the woman began to scream like nobody's business, and just as quickly the dark haired woman began to pinch something on the back of the woman's neck. The screaming stopped rather abruptly, within minutes the brown haired woman went limp forcing Kagome to catch her with part of her body and one arm as she continued to pinch whatever it was in her hand.

Lin moved two help the woman gathering the taller woman into his arms, before with a simply gesture everything changed. Eventually things once more calmed down, Haruhi and Mai were put to bed. Kagome had quickly moved to her room to remove something from a bag before coming back downstairs to meet with the others. When she returned they were all waiting with something to abated breath. Just what was it that Kagome had managed to get off of Haruhi? How was it going to help them with everything that was happening in this town?