I do Not own the Anime/Manga Ghost Hunt, or its characters.

Set before the team learns about Naru's PK.

The few students who had stayed on campus were beginning to head home; their families had lived too far away to get there before this afternoon and they were still packing up to go. The teachers, though, had decided to stay - most of them, anyway. School wouldn't re-open until our investigation was complete, and pending our outcome. After eating, I went to my jeep, Monk trailing behind me on the phone, and grabbed the few books I had kept under the back seat. They all contained information on varying types of demons.

I began researching, sitting in a corner of the library with books spread out around me with my laptop, cross referencing materials and trying to figure out what kind of deal the spirit had made - and if there was a way to stop it. This curse - what else could I call it? - could last up to ten years, depending on the circumstances. Perhaps longer, if the demon's part of the deal wasn't fulfilled.

"John, I'm making some tea. Do you want some?" Mai called from across the room. I had gone into one of the book aisles so that I was closer to some of the books I'd need. That way, I wasn't up and running back and fourth. It was easier and quicker...and a bit darker.

What I needed was a cig.

"No thanks." I looked up and smiled, "Maybe later."

She slowly nodded, then scampered off.

Scampered. What a weird word.

-X-

I hadn't found much, if anything at all. A person's debt can be repaid by another person's soul; a demon has to extend the contract if the wants and wishes of their debtor is not satisfied in the time allotted. But I already knew that. Several books were stacked, high enough to be level with my head, beside me. I could hear Mai bouncing from conversation to conversation, and Lin's occasional demand, "Mai, I'm working. Bother someone else."

Only there really wasn't anyone else she could bother.

Naru and Ayako went to the police station to gather details on Tamari's death. He had said we could gain a lot of insight on the spirit - because there was absolutely no doubt that she had not killed herself - and that we could use every lead, every possible advantage.

Monk would glance down the aisle on occasion, while Mai would periodically ask if I needed anything. I turned my thoughts back to my work, after the sixth time he glance at me. It was like he was keeping tabs on me; I appreciated the gesture, I really did, but it was getting on my nerves. How was I suppose to concentrate when he was being such a...mother hen.

What I hadn't known was that hell hounds had a demonic master, and that they'd shred apart anyone else trying to control them. It left me to wonder how this human spirit was in command of one. Then, unbidden, a hazy voice from my childhood flashed in my mind's ear:

"Just believe you can, Johnny. That's it. Picture it, feel it, live it. That's it! You got it!"

Picture it...feel it...live it.

I felt my head cock slight. I was sitting Indian style, computer sitting on my lap. I brought my hand to cup my chin before I started a new search, suddenly inspired - but feeling as though my stomach had dropped, because if what I was thinking was true...

My searches led me through multiple sites, through passages of priests and religious figures in other regions, through video recordings and testimonies. The next few hours blurred past as I made notes on a yellow tablet next to me. Monk would come over and watch me for a bit, before quietly leaving me to my own devices again. I grabbed more and more books off the shelves, adding more notes and my own scribbled theories. In the end, it all interlinked; in the end, it all made sense.

In a twisted sort of way.

-X-

"PK can be used to bend spoons, to throwing things against the walls; we know this to be fact," I began. They were all sitting on the other side of the table - Naru and Ayako having returned moments before I finalized my discovery. "But there have been unconfirmed instances where PK can be used to lure demons and creatures from Hell with the help of black magic. Magic is a relative term - it only has power because we believe it does."

"You mean like our chants and your prayers," Mai exclaimed, an index finger tapping her cheek in thought

As much as I wanted to deny that our religions had power only because of a collected belief, "Yes. The PK a person had in life is transferred into their sprit's strength; that's why some spirits are stronger then others. It also can prevent the spread of diseases, such as cancer, in one's life."

I could see the gears churning in Naru's head, him quickly making the dots form a picture. "So what you're saying is that this spirit made a demon's pact, and in exchange for her PK from her spiritual abilities, she'd have control over one hell hound?"

Again, I nodded. "Not only that, but if she were smart, she wouldn't have handed over the full extent of her PK until after the bargain was complete. It's the only way to explain Tamari's death."

"So we have a demonic creature, a PK wielding spirit and a demon lurking about this place." Naru stood up, hand in his back pocket and other hand cupped on his chin. "Interesting. Unusual, but interesting." He spared Mai a glance, "Perhaps you should go home."

"No way!" She jumped to her feet, head shaking rapidly. "I'm not leaving now! I'm not abandoning you guys - family sticks together, no matter what!"

Naru smirked at her reaction, only to quickly turn serious again. "Good work, John. This information should be very useful."

There was nothing good about it.

-X-

Lin's research into the school's past had come up squeaky clean. It was startling because of what Masako had said, about the girl spirit. I was only able to draw one conclusion from what she had babbled about, and I knew by the ways the others had glanced at one another uneasily that they were thinking the same thing. It made me sick to my stomach, thinking about how cruel others could, about how sick they acted.

But a fact of life, one I had learned young, was that you couldn't save everyone, and that you couldn't protect everyone.

Bad things happened to good people. Bad people had a way of disappearing, only to resurface years later. But to have your abuser, your attacker, live in the same community - let alone to live in the same house, at points in your life - was horrible and terrifying and sickening. And to have everyone you know - even your friends - defend them, instead of you? The only thing lower than that is being blamed for it; a thing she and I had in common.

But that still didn't tell us who she was.

-X-

When twilight settled in around us, we decided to try and draw out the spirit and hell hound. By this point, the case was at a stand still. We needed something to analyze, something to go on. We needed more clues before we could find the right answers. I looked out the library window before we began; dark clouds were rolling in.

That's what landed Monk, Ayako and myself in the Tamari's office.

We had set up a camera on the balcony where she had died, in hopes of finding something - anything - but her office wasn't hooked up; we simply did not have enough cameras. The office was circular and spacious. Shelves lined one half of the room, and bay windows overlooked the reception area. Pictures hung from the wall behind her large oak desk and leather padded chair. Pictures of her with students, with who seemed to be family and with those I guessed to be her friends.

We found nothing, and nothing happened.

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