Disclaimer: I do not own Ghost Hunt
"As far as I'm concerned," Lin closes his eyes, rubbing his temple, "there's not much information about any members of Sayuri's family having medium-like powers."
"Are you sure?"
Lin and Naru were going over the findings on Sayuri and what they could about her family. Sadly there wasn't much to go on.
"If there was," Lin looks up at Naru, "no one was willing to talk about it."
"Are you sure you managed to find-"
"Naru, the other information I can't get into. It's sealed. Lawyer's warrant."
"Which lawyer is it?"
"Who do you think?" Lin turns around, clicking on a key on the computer, "it's Sayuri's mother, Noriko Natsuma. She put every piece of her family's history under lock and key. Wouldn't surprise me. She probably went through all that trouble so no one could use any of it against her."
"She looks so charming," Naru stares at the cold eyes staring back at him. Sayuri's mother was a very polished looking woman. Her dark hair is always pulled away from her face with dark eyes. Lin pulls up a picture of Sayuri's father Seito. Never of them had grey eyes.
"Both of them are just wonderful people," Lin's tone drips with sarcasm.
"Hmm...pull up a picture of her grandparents...maternal," Naru watches as Lin does so, "wait...see that?"
"Yes," Lin notices that Sayuri's maternal grandfather had grey eyes.
"Coincidence?"
"That grey eyes have something do with seeing spirits?"
"It could be like a mark. Sure there been interesting ones but one eye color appearing with certain family members...it's likely. We'll rule out Sho because he's a child. I wonder how long Sayuri has been able to see spirits."
"Mai told me that she thought her grandparents appeared before her before they crossover. It's likely."
"And then her mother," Naru's eyes narrow on the woman, "goes and ruins it."
"We'll have to hold the investigation on the Konoe family to halt. There would be a way to get the information we need but we need to do it without having Mrs. Natsuma sniffing around us." Naru leaves Lin to his work.
Lin continues to stare at the file that Naru had formed on Sayuri and the Konoe family. Births, deaths, addresses, etc were easy to find but any information about the true history of the Konoe family was hidden. Lin closes out of the file when he stops on Sayuri's picture.
He brings up another photo, one when she is eight-years-old standing with her father while her mother talks with a reporter. Instead of brown, she had red hair with only a black ribbon tied in it. Her grey eyes look sad, staring ahead at nothing while her father holds her hand. Lin looks over at the newest photo of Sayuri. Brown hair and smiling, even in her eyes.
The door to the office opens, to which Lin closes out of the pictures.
"Lin-san," a cheerful voice calls from behind him.
Lin recognizes the voice, turning in his chair to see who he thought it was.
Straight, elbow length platinum blonde hair is pull slightly back by a pair of black shades. Streaks of purple ribbon through the pale blonde. Bright green eyes smile ahead, with one hand leaning on the door knob. She was dresses certainly a lot different from the last time he saw her. An elbow-length gray leather jacket over black turtle-neck top that goes to mid-thigh with purple and gray plaid shorts, black leather bike glove on her left hand, a purple studded leather bracelet on the other, white tights, and knee high gray zip-up suede boots.
"Carmellia," Lin stands only to get the wind knock out of him.
"I missed you and Noll so much!" The blonde hugs him esthetically.
"We missed you too," He places a hand on top of her head, "you look...different."
"Thank you!" The hyper blonde pulls away, giving out a very sweet English accent, "ever since Gene died...I wanted to reinvent myself. I got sick and tired of wearing those stupid wool skirts and blouses."
"So why are you here?"
"First off, it's Tsubaki," she winks. "Second, I'm here to visit my favorite people. Is that so wrong?"
"The last time I talked to you, you were in Hong Kong."
Carmellia aka Tsubaki waves it off with her hand, "So I decided to drop in on Tokyo. What's the problem, Noll?"
"Naru," he corrects through clenched teeth, looking annoyed.
"Naru," A cheeky grin forms on her face, "that's what she calls you, huh?"
Naru doesn't respond, turning away from the bubbly blond. Tsubaki pouts before she leans over Lin's shoulder, "Oooh, who's that pretty one? A little Japanese flower for the stoic China man?"
Lin glances down, realizing Tsubaki's green eyes were locked directly on Sayuri's photo.
"She works with us," Lin doesn't look at her, "and we're checking on her family's history with the paranormal."
"Interesting," Tsubaki turns and starts to poke around the office, opening filing cabinets and folders.
Naru sighs, "just how long do you expect to be here?"
"Long as I want, you prat."
"I'm not a prat, you annoyance."
"Aw love you too Naru."
"Enough," Lin broke in before they could start going off at each other in British slang. "Mai gets out of school soon. She'll be here soon."
"Oooh! I get to finally meet this Mai girl!" Tsubaki's eyes sparkle with excitement. The blonde continues her rant with Naru ready to kick her out any second. It didn't take long for Mai to show up. She looked like she had been running.
"I'm sorry I'm late but there was-" Mai stops in mid sentence at the blonde staring at her.
"You're going to be my sissy!"
Mai felt herself hit the ground with the random blond stranger huggling her to death, confused.
"Uh who is she and why is she hugging me?"
"The name is Chiba Tsubaki! I'm the childhood friend of No - Naru."
"Okay," Mai sweatdrops, "mind telling me why you tackled me and said that I was going to be your sissy?"
"Oh, just a little private joke! No need to dwell on it!" Tsubaki replies cheerfully, shooing Mai over to her desk. "Hey, Naru, got any tea?"
"Of course," Naru shows her where it is while Mai is giving Lin odd looks. Lin just shrugs, before going back to the computer. The door opens again to Sayuri walking in. Her brown hair is pulled back and she looks tired.
"I got those files you wanted," Sayuri yawns, "I hope you and..."
Her voice trails to the blonde making tea.
"What happen to you?" Mai looks at her, worried written across her face.
"Up all night going through my grandparents paperwork," Sayuri grumbles.
Mai frowned, rushing to give her a hug. "I'll get you some tea right away."
"I got it!" Tsubaki presents a cup to Sayuri, "hello."
"Hi, and you are?"
"This is Tsubaki, apparently a childhood friend of Naru's." Mai introduced them.
"Nice to meet you," Sayuri greets only to get a hug from the blonde.
"It is so nice to meet you. I have read some of your books. You are the Queen of Horror. I bow before your excellence and creepiness."
A weird look was passed between Sayuri and Mai. Despite her Japanese name, Tsubaki didn't apply Japanese custom very well. Hugs weren't usually delivered so informally.
"Uh...so...are you Japanese or..."
"She's lived out of the country," Naru interrupts, dragged Tsubaki away from Sayuri.
"Ah, I see." Mai sweatdropped. "Anywhoo... did you guys find anything out?"
"Not much," Lin speaks up. His eyes look at Sayuri.
"Your mother...she has-"
"Control over much of everything," Sayuri's voice grumbles, "I know...and believe me, even I have tried to obtain all that. She won't let up."
Her hand turned into a fist, crumpling the papers within them. Her grey eyes would have put a hole in the floor. She was so sick of it. She was so sick of her mother trying to protect her good name. What was it that was trying so hard to hide? Ghosts? You can't hide ghosts. People had been trying for centuries, but they couldn't keep it up. Not when there were people like Shibuya Kazuya in the world. Not when there were people like her. She heard movement.
Her grey gaze looks up at the Chinese man standing in front of her.
"Sayuri," He whispers, "the papers."
"Oh," Sayuri sees the crumpled pile in her hand, "I'm sorry I just-"
His fingers stroke her face, "It's alright."
Her face felt warm when he touched her. The gesture was gentle. Not one man in her life was that gentle towards her. She felt herself relax, felt calm and the anger vanished without a trace.
"You sure have a way to make a girl feel better, Lin."
Lin steps back and clears his throat, "What about Sho?"
Sayuri freezes, "Crap!" She withdraws her phone to check the time, blinking as she sees a missed call from Monk of all people along with a voicemail. She listens to it, blinking.
"Heeeey, it's Takigawa. Kinda figured you were swamped. I picked up Sho from school. We're out havin' dinner. I'll bring him by the office later. See ya."
"Such a sweet guy," Sayuri groans into her palm, "I'm going to be a horrible mother someday."
"No you won't." Tsubaki interjects. "I bet you this Takigawa planned it."
"Excuse me?" Sayuri stares at Tsubaki with a raised eyebrow.
She smiles and said, "Oh, just a little feeling I had."
"Ohkay then," Sayuri sighs before the door again opens to a panic Ritsuke. He look like he just got off of work. Panicked amber eyes landed on Sayuri. His hair was disheveled and his shirt was unbutton, showing off the t-shirt underneath. He fixes his jacket.
"Did you need me to get Sho?"
"No," Sayuri sweatdrops at the panicking detective, "Takigawa has him."
Ritsuke sweatdrops as well, "I am going to be a horrid papa one day."
"No you won't," Mai reassures him.
"Sorry for bursting in like this but I was worried about..." His voice trails off as a pair of green eyes stare at him.
It was like the world stops turning for a split moment as amber meets green. Sayuri stared at the look between Ritsuke and Tsubaki. She pauses to wave a hand in front of his face but it does nothing. Ritsuke felt his feet move him forward, walking towards the blonde. Mai actually holds her breath, wondering if Ritsuke and Tsubaki were star-crossed lovers that were finally reunited from the intense look between them.
"Hi," He finally makes his mouth move, "I'm Detective Ritsuke Satoru. I'm...a friend of Sayuri's and I help out Shibuya Psychic Research. And you are?"
"I'm Tsubaki Chiba, childhood friend of Kazuya and paranormal researcher from the English division."
"It's nice to meet Miss Chiba," He bows.
Mai looks over to Sayuri, grinning.
Sayuri makes a face.
What just happened? Did I just introduce Ritsuke to his soul mate or something? Oh dear God...
Naru look like he was about to bang his head off a wall at the look Tsubaki was giving to Ritsuke. On top of having to deal with her helping them with cases, she was going to be love struck the whole time as well. Naru sighs before glancing over to Mai who was grinning and whispering something to Sayuri. The poor woman looked confused and stunned at how her detective and Tsubaki was chatting.
"Ah hem," Sayuri interrupts the two talking, "sorry to interrupt but...you can go home now Ritsuke."
"I just remembered," He pulls a folder out of his jacket, "I have a case for you guys. It's a college that has been having paranormal trouble for a couple of years now. Before, it wasn't too bad but the new dean is starting to get worried."
"How so?" Naru is handed the folder.
"A ghost or poltergeist or whatever...it's starting to kill students."
"Actually kill them?" Mai raises her eyebrows.
"Yeah," Ritsuke frowns, "it's gruesome. Before it was usually one student per six months. But recently, it's been more. The new dean just found out about the pattern of deaths occurred there. He came to me, asking for help. I told him about SPR. I said that I tried and see if I could get you to take the case. It's up to you."
"We'll do it," Naru glances at Tsubaki, "you want to help us out?"
"Of course," Tsubaki grins, "you know you could always use the extra pair of hands Naru."
"It's settle," Naru hands the folder over to Lin, "once Takigawa gets here, we'll see if we can have join us on this case."
"I'm coming too," Ritsuke speaks up, causing multiple stares, "I mean...in case this turns out to not be a ghost. If it's some crazy student or teacher doing this, I don't want anyone to end up like those victims."
Though his eyes had scanned the whole room, Sayuri knew he was talking about the pretty blonde standing near him.
Are you actually jealous?
Kyo? Wow, when did you come back?
The other night but you didn't hear me. Is everything alright?
Are you done with your hissy fit?
I'm sorry for that...I...it stirred up memories. I rather not-
Talk about it. I get it. Anyways, we got a case.
I can hear you know. I'm going along. If this spirit is killing off students, then I want to make sure it never does it again.
"Sayuri?" Mai tugging on her jacket sleeve causes the brunette to jump, sending looks from everyone in the room.
"Kyo's back," she sighs, "and I better go too. He wants to kick this things butt, dead or alive."
"Then it's settle," Ritsuke grins, "we got ourselves a case."