Sunday, October 24th 9:44am

"Mai are you feeling alright?" Naru's voice was as flat as ever, but I could still catch a hint of worry in it. I was kind of nice. "I'm fine. I can't stop thinking about last night's dinner. It was like Yukio wasn't even seeing Yume.

That is none of our business Mai. Now I'd like you to focus on the case. Did you call the others like I told you?

Yeah. Masako and Monk should be arriving around noon. John will be coming in tonight and Ayako should be here tomorrow morning.

Good job. Anything new on camera Lin?

Nothing. The only disturbances we got so far are a few temperature drops in the rooms upstairs.

Are you talking about Masako the famous medium? 'I turned around and saw Yume'.

Hi Yume. It's her alright!

Can she really see spirits?

Not just see, she can also sense them." She looked down like she was worried or thinking. Then she asked again: "And your other friends what do they do?

They perform different forms of cleansing or exorcism.

What's the difference?

Cleansing is when you help a spirit find peace. Exorcism is when you force them out.

Whoa! You know so much stuff about it don't you? What can you do Mai?

I'm not a spiritualist. I can't do any of this stuff."

I didn't have much faith in my gift. And I surely didn't want to remind her of her mother's death. It must have been so painful. Miki came in and told us that Masako and Monk had arrived. Yume ran out of the room and went upstairs just like when I told her we were ghost hunters. Miki and I stared at each other in confusion. I opened the front door for Monk and Masako. "Hi, Mai! It's good to see you!" He always acted like a big brother with me. "You too Monk, how are you Masako?" The medium had stumbled and was now on her knees: "What is this? What is going on here? What can cause such a wrath? It makes me sick." I felt like she was about to cry. Fear was visible in her eyes. That was never a good sign. Was the spirit this dangerous? At least now we knew the house really was haunted.

"Miss Hara, tell me what you feel", asked Naru after we had brought Masako to the living room.

I feel wrath and violence. The spirit is unhappy of our presence here. But there is more… behind the wrath I sense a deep sadness. But it is not coming from the spirit itself.

Something like a grudge?

Yes, a strong one." She suddenly gasped. "It's coming."

The whole room started shaking. My heart was ready to explode inside my chest. "Mai, get away from the window!" Yelled Naru a second too late. The window shattered and shards flew everywhere. I protectively put my arms in front of my face and screamed. But something grabbed around the waist and I was thrown to the ground. I opened my eyes and found myself in Daniel's arms. He on the other hand was bleeding from the face. A shard had cut his cheek. "Daniel! Are you alright?!

Yeah, I think.

You're bleeding! Even if it's just a scratch you have to clean it right away!"

I headed to the kitchen with Daniel, but I heard Naru grunt his usual "Tch". I wondered why he had been on edge ever since the beginning of the investigation. It turns out that his whole left arm had been injured by the glass. I disinfected Daniel's wounds, and put a bandage on his cheek. One inch higher and he would have lost his eye. "Thanks Mai."

"I should be the one thanking you. " He looked at me with a smile. I turned my head so he wouldn't see me blush. I felt him take my hand on bring it up to his face. "I'm glad you're not hurt." His lips made contact with the back of my hand. I probably turned crimson. I stood up quickly and laughed nervously.

"Umm well…I should probably join Naru and the others!" I turned and started walking to base. Then Masako came walking towards me. "Mai, have you had any of your dreams? It might help us find the culprit. "

"What do you mean culprit? You think this is a curse?" My voice shook when I said that. Masako just nodded. As we walked to base, I told her about my first dream. "It seems that Yume is linked to the haunting…"

"Hey, don't just jump to conclusion! Yume is just a little girl! How in the world would she know how to curse someone?

"Naru has already made it clear that the cause of the supernatural activity was not human. Therefore someone had to summon the spirit. Are you saying that you do not trust Naru's expertise? Or is it simply because of the lack of self-confidence you have?" And there she went again with the pro-Naru extreme. We both had a crush on Naru. But I never played dirty like her. She always had to look down on me like that. I hated that. We arrived in front of base and were about to go in when Masako froze, starring in fear at the other end of the hallway. I looked. Yume came down the stairs carrying a small porcelain sugar cup in her hands. She quickly glanced in our direction then hurried outside. "What is it Miss Hara asked Naru?"

"This child, she is possessed!" What?

"Monk! Don't let Yume go anywhere!" Naru yelled. Monk dashed out of the room and I followed him. We found Yume outside in the garden with Shion, watering the flowers and taking care of the roses in the garden. Masako and Naru came soon after. "Is something wrong? Shion asked a little worried. "Did Yume do something?" Without answering her Naru asked Masako to look at Yume carefully. She did and shook her head.

"I could've sworn I sensed a fox spirit inside her…" We were back inside. "I believe you, said Naru. I think there is no more doubt that Yume is involved." I sprang up. "That's not true! We're missing too many elements to say that! You said it was possibly a curse, right? If it is, we don't even know who is cursed! For now all the spirit has done was breaking objects!" Everyone was just staring at me, but I couldn't care less. The only one that mattered was Naru. He was the one that needed to hear me. "We can't just drag her into this without any solid proof!"

My boss sighed. "Seeing how this is a ghost hunt, I don't believe 'solid proof' is the correct term for it. But Mai is right. We need to know more. Besides, you usually have good intuition."

Did I just get a compliment from the king of narcissists? That was an achievement. Naru continued. "We are going to need a new approach. Miss Hara, I want you to go around the house and search for the spirit. Monk, go with her and try to exorcise it. Lin will monitor everything from here. Mai, I want you to watch Yume closely. Don't let her out of your sight."

"What about you Naru?"

"I'm going to do a bit more research. Go now." Everyone got up and left. I was about to head upstairs to find Yume when Naru grabbed my wrist. "Be careful Mai, this spirit is not to be taken lightly." I nodded and continued my way.

I looked at the clock. It was 7:30. I was with Yume, Miki and Rina, playing chess in the basement. It was actually a dance studio. There were giant mirrors on the walls, the floor was made of dark wood and there was a piano in a corner. The room was actually very big. Rina was reading, quiet as ever. Yume was monitoring our game. I moved my knight. "Checkmate!" Miki let out a fake sigh and said "I give up, I can't beat you."

"Are you girls having fun?" Shion appeared in the staircase. She walked to the piano and sat. She opened it started playing a familiar melody. Without a word Yume got up and went over to the piano. She sat next to it, closed her eyes and pressed her ear against the instrument. The melody was from an American song called "Just a dream". I was amazed by how Shion could create that melody with just a keyboard and her hands. At the end of the song, Yume let out a small sob. Shion immediately stopped playing and hugged the crying girl. "I'm sorry sweetheart, I didn't mean to stir up those memories."

Miki whispered to me. "Yume's mom played the piano. This must have been one of her songs." We waited a couple minutes as Yume was sobbing on her aunt's shoulder, until she said "I'm okay". Shion herself had started crying. But she looked angry at the same time. "Shion, are you okay?" I asked her.

"I'm fine. We'll soon all be fine. Right, Yume?" The way she'd said that last sentence sent shivers down my spine. Suddenly, we heard the scream of a man. We all rushed upstairs to the second floor... What we saw horrified me: Yukio was being dragged by the leg by something invisible towards a shattered window. His ankle was bleeding. Yume jumped and grabbed her father's other arm. Miki, Rina and I helped her but the force pulling us had so much strength that we could barely slow it down. I was so scared at the thought of falling that I closed my eyes but I knew I couldn't let go.

"Dad, hold on! Let go! Stop it!" Screamed Yume. Her eyes filled up with tears. Someone came running up the stairs and I heard a splash of water and received some on my face and someone reciting the sign of the cross. A second after that, the force disappeared and we all fell to the ground. I looked up and saw John with a bottle of holy water in his hand. "Well that was a close one hey, Mai?" He said with a thick Australian accent. Tears started falling out of my eyes. I tried to rub them off, but they kept coming. John knelt down next to me and patted my back. "There, there Mai. It's over now.

"Thank you John. Thank you so much."

The spirit had finally attacked a human being. And It was Yukio. We now knew who the target of the curse was. His wound looked like a dog bite. "I think your hypothesis about the fox demon is starting to make sense Miss Hara." Said Naru a couple hours later at base. Masako showed no emotion but she glanced at me. Gosh, I wanted to hit her. "I'm almost certain the curser is someone in this house. First we need to figure out how Yukio was cursed.

What are the possibilities Naru? Asked John

"In my opinion, it could either be a Zuzo curse, a summoning by ouijaboard or a shiki."

Couldn't it be a spirit of someone who died here before? I asked. It seemed everything was pointing towards the family, and therefore Yume.

"Think Mai." Said Naru. If it was, it would have attacked sooner. The Kimura have been here for the past six months. A couple years ago, this house belonged Yume's grandmother, but the activity only started recently. The problem comes from the family."

"But couldn't they have summoned it accidentally if they played with ouijaboards? Like that case at Yasu's high school."

"Have you seen what this spirit is capable of? It almost has material substance and directly harm a human being. An amateur cannot summon such a strong spirit."

"But..."

"Enough Mai! None of us wishes for the culprit to be one of them, but it's too obvious!"

Naru's sudden snap made me jump. I lowered my head. But when I looked up again I was in a street.