The Holes in Our Hearts

Chapter 9: Cries in the Night

It was about five in the evening when a group of very disgruntled travelers arrived at their intended destination. Upon several pokes and prods to the members that had fallen asleep during the commute, everyone assembled on the front porch of the estate that was to be the site of their next case.

Among the crew there was a variety of powers and people that possessed them. A red headed priest who specialized in forestry magic stood with a hip cocked and a glare on her face that was directed at a punk rocker monk who leaned casually against the railing. A priest stood next to the pair, eyes darting quickly back and forth showing his readiness to jump between them should the glaring match evolve into something more violent. A tall man with half his face covered in hair had several watchful eyes under his command circling the group and surveying the estate for any immediate threats. Beside him, a boy with unfathomable spiritual potential stood dressed all in black gazing at the scene before him as though planning a battle. Beside him, a boy with blazing green eyes that was so alike and yet so different from his counterpart stood feet apart and eyes darting prepared to lead into action should the slightest threat present itself. And finally, one small little girl stood on the stairs below where the rest of the group was waiting. Some claimed she was the savior of a band of warriors, others believed her to be nothing more than a perky assistant capable of healing the hearts of all those around her. Regardless of what the truth behind her power was, one thing was for certain: she would never again be the same.

The priestess and the monk were in the middle of a heated argument. "How could you be so stupid, old man? I can understand getting lost in an unfamiliar place, but going the opposite direction of where we need to go on the highway? That's just plain stupid! Are you getting senile in your old age?" Her temper was flaring just as brightly as her red hair.

"Well your one to talk hag. I didn't see you trying to correct me. No all you did is sit there like the old bump on a log you are!" Monk evidently had no real reason to want to live. He had just dug himself a very deep grave, as was proven by Ayako's throttling with a handbag.

With the courage and tenacity that could only be present in a full-fledged narcissist, Naru pushed through the crowd stood in front of the door. With the tiniest of breaths to steady himself, he lifted his hand to the lion door knocker that showed the wear and tear only present in something that had been well used. The sound of his two consecutive knocks vibrated throughout the large mansion, using the mahogany of the door as a spring board as a spring board with which to dart into the space ahead.

Almost immediately the door was opened by a very disgruntled woman in her early thirties. Her clothes, normally considered to be of a very fitted style, hung off of her frame, and her cheeks were drawn showing signs of malnutrition. Her hair, once a vibrant caramel color, had faded to the color of a frayed haystack. Her grey eyes, bloodshot and sunken, darted around between all the members of the group in front of her frantically. A voice that sounded like it had been used to scream one time to many hashed out, "Are you the members from SPR?"

"Yes ma'am." Naru allowed the sight of the woman who had obviously been under serious duress to simply slide off of him as he addressed her. "My name is Kazuya Shibuya and these are my team members. I humbly apologize for our tardiness. Due to some extenuating circumstances we were forced to place a driver with absolutely no sense of direction in the lead and wound up following him in the wrong direction for quite a long time. I know this is no excuse so please tell us how we can make this up to you."

The woman didn't even seem to care about what the young man in front of her said. It seemed as though she didn't even register half of it. Usually people reacted to the idea of a teenager being the boss of a company, but this woman didn't even flinch. 'Something truly dreadful has happened at this house.' Mai thought to herself. It was the only way to explain how the woman had withdrawn from the world so completely.

"My name is Yuki Kawamura." The woman's voice still broke and came out in a harsh whisper. "Please feel free to call me Yuki. In this cursed place, no formalities are needed. As for your tardiness, you can make it up by ending my torment as fast as humanly possible. For almost a year I have been stuck in this place. Tormented time, after time, after time again. There is no escape for me. If you cannot help, I will be doomed to spend the rest of my life like this. I am going to be frank. You are not the first specialists that I have brought to this location. All the others have either disappeared or fled in fear. I hope you do not do the same. Would you care to come in? We may discuss the rest of this in the room I have set aside for your base."

With a brief glance from coworker to coworker, boss to employee, and friend to friend everyone nodded. There would be no backing away from a woman who was obviously in need of assistance. Everyone went in the door and followed the woman through a set of hallways that appeared to have seen better days. There was dust everywhere. All the furnishings, the walls, ceiling, and floor; they were all covered in dust and spider webs. That was not the disturbing part. That lay in the fact that there were deep gashes in the walls. Something with very sharp claws had made deep indented scratches in neat rows of five all through the walls. Each member of the group looked at those walls with the same horror and shock at what was right in front of them. That is, all except one. Grim followed behind the group at the very end. His green eyes taking in every detail, the hunter was already gathering what he could from the state of the woman and her house.

Finally, the group arrived at a room in a secluded corner of the mansion. There was a lovely set of French doors, which like the rest of the house had seen better days, that lead into the little corner room where it was obvious that Yuki had tried to prepare for their arrival. Unlike the rest of the house there were several tables set off that were at least less dusty than the rest of the house was and a stack of futons had been placed in the corner.

"I hope you will find this to be suitable." Yuki's voice wavered and she seemed to have lost a fair amount of strength just showing them to the room.

"Of course." Mai said, offering a small pat on the back to the frail woman in front of her. "Thank you for all the trouble you went through for us."

"Alright. Yuki, would you mind taking a seat. If you give us a few moments to get set up, I have some questions I would like to ask you. Lin, Monk, Ayako, John, and Grim would you go unload the van. Mai come with me." Naru wasted no time in getting to moving forward with the case.

"But where are we going Naru?" Mai asked, questioning as always.

"To the kitchen of course. Before this is over, we are all going to be in need of a lot of tea." Naru's grin as he waited for Mai's normal response could only be concealed by the fact that he had turned his back on the rest of the group and was heading out to where he had noticed a kitchen on the way in.

"Why you little tea addict!" Mai fumed right along behind her boss.

A little while later…

"Whew… That's the last of it." Monk's sigh of relief was echoed by all the rest of the unloading team with the exception of Ayako who was ranting to herself about a broken nail.

The weary group trouped back into the base where the others were waiting. "Alright," Naru began as everyone got seated and as Mai passed tea around, "Yuki, would you mind giving us a detailed account of what has been going on here?"

"Of course. Please bear with my voice. I'm sure you noticed that my vocal cords have taken significant damage. That is part of my story, but perhaps it would be best to start from the beginning."

"It's alright," Mai said as she refilled Yuki's tea cup. "Take all the time that you need." Mai's exercising of her ability to help people immediately drew the attention of Grim and Naru. Both of them were drawn to her because she alone was like a light that could never go out in the dark lives. Both had endured terrible hardship, and the light that was Mai gave them both one small spark of comfort.

It was then that Yuki began her tale. "Almost a year ago I moved into this house. It used to belong to my grandmother. I remember coming here as a child. The house was beautiful and everything was perfect. I loved it here as a little girl. When I lost my daughter in a tragic accident, this house and the few comforting memories it held drew me to come live here again as I waited out my grief. Unfortunately, this house has brought me no comfort. It has only brought me pain and misery."

"About a month after the death of my daughter I started hearing these dreadful screams and howls. There had never been wolves on the property when I was a little girl so I had no idea what was going on. At first they were very distant and I only heard them every once in a while. I asked the people in town and they assured me that nothing was in the woods that extend behind this house. But it only got worse from there. After about four months, I was beginning to get used to the noise. That is, until everything changed."

"The howls were no longer distant. They were in the house with me. They were accompanied by the most terrifying screams. Often times at night, I would wake up in bed screaming in some kind strange harmony with them. This went on for about a month. I thought it was merely some kind of bad dream so I went to the doctor, but they said I had perfectly normal sleeping patterns. No one knew what was wrong with me. By that time I had amassed so much debt from seeing the doctors that I was forced to stay in the house despite the fact that I was beginning to see it as the place of my torment. You see, I couldn't afford to leave."

"These nightmares continued for months. I woke up screaming so many times that I have permanently damaged my vocal cords. I don't believe that they will ever recover. Around three months ago, those horrifying scratches appeared on my walls. Finally, I had some proof that it wasn't all in my head. But what was I to think. That somehow a dog of wolf had gotten into the house and was tormenting me? No, I believed that it was something far worse than that. So I called team after team of paranormal investigators with what little money I had left. None could find anything. You are the last team I can afford. After that, there will be no hope for me. Please...I beg you. Set me free of this curse."

All through her story, Mai sat next to the woman, offering words of comfort when it seemed as though Yuki had lost the courage to go on.

"I see. Yuki, may I ask you a question. This may be very important to the investigation. How did your child die?" Naru's bluntness and monotone voice almost pushed Yuki over the edge.

"Yuki…Yuki. It's okay. You don't have to. We understand that the memory must be incredibly painful for you." Mai's last statement was directed at Naru. 'God…sometimes he can just be so callous to what other people have been through.'

"It's okay. Thank you though dear. You are truly a comfort. In answer to your question, my daughter died in the woods. She was playing in a playground just by the edge of the woods in a town that I used to live in. I turned my back for just a second and she crawled into the woods. I searched for her frantically, and then I heard a scream. A mother knows when her child is trouble, and I knew even before her scream that something was dreadfully wrong. I ran and found her in a small clearing. A huge animal, God only knows what it was, had killed…" Yuki's voice broke as tears streamed rampantly down her face. She paused for a moment and then took a deep breath before continuing. "…had killed my baby. I went mad. I ran at it, and don't remember much after that. I woke up in the hospital covered in bites and scratches. The man who found me said that I was lucky to be alive. He had never seen a creature with the same ferocity as that one."

"Thank you so much for your time. Yuki, please go rest. My team will handle it from here and contact you if there is anything else." Naru at least tried to use a little sympathy for the sake of the crying woman in front of him.

"Yes thank you. Good day." With a bow and a quick sniffle, Yuki shuffled out of the room and headed off into the house that had become her prison.

Grim, unobserved by the rest, had come up behind Naru and whispered quickly, "You are in way over your head. I know what is tormenting that woman and now I understand Ash's connection. You need to get those other three out of here now. Then I can explain and hopefully we can act before it's too late."

Naru hated taking orders from the one who was his rival, but what choice did he have. The details the woman had described sounded like nothing Naru had ever heard before. And with Mai's safety on the line, at least Naru could trust him to protect her.

With the calmness and acting worthy of an Oscar, Naru directed John, Ayako and Monk to go set up cameras. Once they were safely out of hearing range he turned, looked at Mai, looked at Lin, and finally gave a nod to Grim signaling he could proceed. But even in so doing, Naru knew that this was a war council for fighting an enemy that he had never believed to have existed.

Disclaimer: I don't own Ghost Hunt. This is only for my enjoyment and hopefully for the enjoyment of others.

Author's Note: Thank you so much to the people who left reviews or follows or favorites. It means a lot. In answer to the questions that I have gotten about the conclusion to this wonderful little love triangle, well, I can't give that away or it would spoil a happy ending for Mai and one of our beloved boys, that is assuming they both live in the end. I still need to work that part out. Look for another chapter coming soon!