See No Evil, Speak No Evil

Hello Fanfiction readers! This is my first ghost hunt story so I really hope you all like it. The idea's been floating around my head for a while now but I finally got the inspiration to actually write it ( Woo Hoo!) It might be a little slow at first but not to worry! (if people like it) the story will start to pick up in the next chapter I promise ;P

For any of you reading my other story, no I'm not abandoning it...just revising a good portion.

I'm only going to be putting the disclaimer in the first chapter cuz I don't feel like copying and pasting it every chapter...

Disclaimer: No I (unfortunately) do not own Ghost Hunt or the lyrics for Phoenix by Fall Out Boy T.T only my original characters and ideas.

"this" =speaking

'this' = thoughts

Edited: 01/23/2020

Chapter 1: Is that...?

To the regular night owls or late-night workers, the sound of sirens bouncing and echoing off the walls of the concrete city held no special meaning or interest. It was a regular occurrence for the heavily populated area of Tokyo so the wails and flashing lights of the Tokyo Police became something that blended into the background of the large city's nightlife.

"This is dispatch calling all available squad cars within Sector 3. We have a report of a possible homicide down off of Yuri Street at the old Atsuko Factory. The ones that found the body are currently onsite and have been instructed to wait in the parking lot until an officer arrives. Detective Noboru will meet responders at the scene."

If one were to really pay attention they may have noticed the sudden increase in law enforcement activity at that given moment but, for most, the sound just faded into the ever noisy and bustling streets at that so many called home.

The sun was high in the sky, warming the earth with its rays. Shining through the glass window of a local high school, these rays of heat fell upon a group of four girls seated at their desks, though they really couldn't be considered girls any longer. All were seniors that year and well on their way to adulthood. The golden streaks illuminated their faces as they laughed and gossiped just like any normal high schooler would.

Well, not entirely normal.

Two members of the group could even be considered largely abnormal to the rest of society. One of the girls had the traditional black hair of the Japanese that reached to about the middle of her back. It was tied off into two braids that hung behind her and she also sported a pair of square, brown-rimmed glasses that covered narrow black eyes.

During her freshman year, she had discovered that she had latent psychic abilities that were frequently affected by her moods. Since then, she had learned to control her emotions so that, even though she couldn't use them at will, her powers wouldn't go haywire and start poltergeisting all over the place like they did two years ago. The tension that used to surround her was gone and left in its wake was a shy but friendly female. Most of her improvement was in part due to the other young woman who shared a secret much like hers.

Instead of the normal dark browns or black of most Japanese this young woman's hair was a much lighter shade of brown that, when hit just right by the sun, also had a red tint to it. Over the years she had let it grow out and currently it reached just past her shoulders. Instead of narrow ones like her friend, the girl had doe-like eyes that were the color of caramel and held a warmth in them that drew others in.

It was also during her freshman year when her abilities began to surface. At first, it happened slowly, but as time crawled on her latent sensitivity just kept getting stronger. While their friendship was still only in its infancy at the time, the black-haired girl was the only one that she could confide since she could understand what she was going through.

Both girls acted as support for the other and together they formed a strong bond and friendship.

"Hey, Mai, Kuroda! Michiru and I were wondering if after school you guys wanted to go to this new cake shop that just opened up in Shibuya this week? It's supposed to be really yumm~y!"

Mai smiled as she watched Keiko practically jump out of her seat in excitement. Her friend had one heck of a sweet tooth that never seemed to be satisfied so she was always on the lookout for new bakeries and cake shops to try out.

"Sure I don't see why not. What about you Kuroda?" Mai cheerfully responded.

"It sounds like a lot of fun," Kuroda replied, a small smile gracing her lips.

Keiko whooped as she threw her fist into the air while her friends just laughed at the excited female sitting with them.

Awhile back, Mai took it upon herself to become friends with Kuroda and help break her out of her shell by inviting her to places with Keiko and Michiru. While it's true the other two weren't as enthusiastic at first, they eventually came around and began to genuinely like the girl, inviting her to places of their own accord.

The group had been inseparable ever since.

Minutes and hours ticked away until finally the bell rang signaling their release from the learning institute. All four quickly gathered their belongings and briskly exited the classroom, heading towards the lockers at the entrance, switching out their shoes, and leaving the building while laughing and joking the whole way.

"Come on guys it's this way!" Keiko eagerly shouted at the girls behind her.

The three followed their excited friend but the closer they got to their destination the more Mai began to recognize the route that they were taking.

'Well, it's certainly been a while.'

Arriving at the bakery the group sat at a table next to the front window of the store. Looking out across the congested street of Dogenzaka, Mai was able to see the building that once housed SPR as well as some of her fondest memories. Since the company's dissolution, Mai had come down to this area less and less. The first couple of weeks were full of extra-long walks home, hoping to catch a glimpse of that oh so familiar black van sitting out front or the window illuminated. Though, as the days grew longer, the less frequently she made her detours to the familiar street until one day she stopped coming altogether.

In the beginning, she had stayed in touch with all the SPR regulars but without her regular paycheck and having not found an employer that paid nearly as well as Naru had, Mai was forced to change quite a few things in her life. She had downsized to a smaller apartment in a less...savory part of the city but the rent was affordable and the landlady was nice enough -even if some of her neighbors were a bit questionable. For a certain amount of time, she had to get rid of her phone as well, not having the money to pay for it, and between both the move and the loss of her way of contacting her friends she had completely lost touch with all the former members.

'That was about a year and a half ago I think.'

Noticing their friend was distracted the three girls all shared a look before all shrugging their shoulders. Only Kuroda had an idea as to what was going through the petite brunette's head but wouldn't think of saying it out loud. SPR was a bit of a sore topic for Mai and the only reason she even knew about this was because of the breakdown that Mai had about a year ago.

It's something they agreed to never bring up again.

Deciding to drag her friend back to the world of the living, Kuroda reached over and gently nudged the brunette eliciting a quick, "Huh?" from her.

Michiru and Keiko just laughed at the lost look splayed across Mai's face. "Welcome back Ms. Space Cadet. Did you enjoy your journey through the universe?" joked Michiru.

Blushing from the embarrassment of being caught while her mind was off in la-la land, Mai quickly grabbed one of the menu's and flipped it in front of her face to hide the heat she could feel burning her cheeks. However, in doing so, she also wound up slapping herself in the face with her temporary shield causing a grunt of pain to slip between her lips.

"Pffftt!"

Looking up Mai could see Keiko holding both hands over her mouth attempting to hold in a laugh that was threatening to escape.

It didn't work.

Soon the whole table was loudly giggling at the scene that their friend had just presented to them making Mai's already red face glow an even deeper shade.

"And the ever graceful Mai strikes again!" laughed a highly amused Michiru.

"Shut up!" growled the embarrassed brunette.

Kuroda just laughed at the girl's misfortune, "Come on, Mai, you know you've done worse, like that one time in the park-"

"Kuroda!"

"Or when she was walking into the classroom-", commented Keiko.

"And that time when you bumped into that gangster-", cut in Michiru.

"Shut up, shut up, shut up! Gah! My friends are turning against me!" wailed Mai as she crossed her arms on the table and quickly hid her face in them.

They just laughed.

By the time their waitress came to take their orders, the girls were all laughed out and Mai was thoroughly embarrassed. After that their conversation turned towards more school-related things such as the new teacher that they had just got, the latest rumors, and relationships going on at the time.

"So Akira and I were walking through the park and-"

Hey young blood
Doesn't it feel like our time is running out?
I'm gonna change you like a remix-

"Ah, sorry Michiru! I need to answer this but I'll be right back." Mai apologized as her gloved hand reached for the ringing electronic while making her way out of the store's front door.

"Moshi moshi? Taniyama speaking."

"Mai, it's me."

"Oh, Kenshin! Hey, how are you?", she asked with a smile on her face.

A soft, deep laugh could be heard through the phone "I'm doing just fine, Mai, thank you for asking, but I'm afraid that checking up on you isn't what I'm calling for today."

Mai emitted a small sigh, leaning back against the store window and out of the way of the busy sidewalk. "I should've known...you never call me up just to say hey -which would be nice every once in a while ya know," she grumbled, a childish pout forming on her lips.

Mai heard a deep chuckle before Kenshin began speaking again. "I'll make sure to remember that. Anyways are you free at the moment?"

Tilting her head back against the window, Mai replied, "Depends on how important whatever you need is."

"At the moment you're the only one that could really give us a hand."

Another, more exaggerated, sigh left her mouth this time, "Fine...I'm free. You going to come pick me up?"

"I'm leaving right now just tell me where you're at."

Mai then proceeded to give Kenshin the address of the bakery.

"Alright, I should be there within 5 minutes or so."

"Cool, I'll see you then. Oh, and Kenshin?"

"Hmm?"

"You owe me a slice of strawberry cake."

"Yes, ma'am." He offhandedly agreed before ending the call.

Pushing herself off the window, Mai strolled back into the shop and made her way towards the table that she was sitting at earlier. "Hey guys, something just came up so I'm going to have to bail out a little early today, sorry!" Mai sheepishly explained while scratching the back of her head.

"What, again? This is like the fifth time this month that it's happened," Michiru pouted.

"Hey, I bet it's that secret boyfriend of hers that she keeps refusing to tell us about." Keiko not-so-quietly whispered to Kuroda.

Mai quickly stuck her hands on her hips in irritation. "How many times do I have to tell you guys, there is no secret boyfriend! Kenshin and I are just friends!"

"Aha!" Keiko exclaimed, pointing a finger at her friend, "So it really is a guy that you keep sneaking off to see!"

Noticing that she was only adding fuel to the fire, Mai gave up on trying to explain her relationship with Kenshin. Seeing the sleek black Nissan pull up to the front of the bakery Mai knew that it was time for her to go.

At this point, the three girls had already huddled together and begun formulating their own ideas as to why she was keeping her "relationship" with this Kenshin a secret.

"Maybe he's some gangster and being seen with him could put her in danger with a rival gang!" Keiko hypothesized.

"What if he's some rich young master that doesn't want to hang around us common folks?" added Michiru.

"Hey, you don't think that he's married and they're having some sort of affair...do you?" Kuroda warily asked.

.

.

.

"That's it!" all three agreed at once.

"Hey, guys my ride's here so I'll catch you later at school, ok? Bye!" Mai waved as she walked towards the exit.

"Mai, we don't care if he's married or not, just remember to use protection!" Keiko shouted over the voices inside the tiny shop.

...

Silence

...

Her friends had no shame.

It was the fastest exit that Mai had ever made in her life.

Rushing up to the vehicle Mai promptly swung the door open, slammed it shut, clicked her seat-belt in place, then shouted at Kenshin to drive. Shocked and confused by the extremely flustered young woman next to him, he did as she instructed.

"Um, is everything alright Mai?" he asked, sounding as though he were speaking to a rabid animal.

Looking over at the man next to her, she silently took in his appearance. Jet black hair about three inches long that parted on the left side of his head, a tall lean body with just enough muscle, slightly tanned skin from being out in the sun, and a pair of piercing gray eyes with a hint of blue in them.

Then she remembered what Keiko said.

Cue blush.

"It's n-nothing! Nothing at all! Ha, ha, ha..." Mai replied nervously.

"Okay...", he gave her a strange look, "Anyway, there's a homicide victim that was found recently that we'd like you to look at," Kenshin stated, breaking the awkward silence.

Coming back to her senses, Mai cleared her head of...unwanted thoughts and relaxed back into her seat, "I'm guessing it's old since you guys are calling me in."

"Seems to be. It's pretty nasty looking too." He stated with a straight face.

"Well, guess I'll be the judge of that", she replied, resting her elbow on the window and placing her chin on a leather-gloved hand.

"We have been stuck in this room for half a day. If I have to listen to one more of the monk's ridiculous jokes I am going to strangle him!"

"Now just calm down, Ayako. I'm sure that as soon as Naru and Lin come back we'll be able to get out of here." the blonde priest reasoned.

"Hey, Yasu, listen to this one! Ok, so what do redheads look forward to in life? Grey hair! Get it?" the monk laughed.

With the light glinting off his glasses and a smile on his face, Yasu pointed to something behind the monk, "Uh, Takigawa...you might want to start running now."

"Huh?" asked the confused monk before he heard an ominous voice coming from behind him.

"Monk...did you just call me OLD?!" shrieked the redheaded priestess.

THUMP!

"Ow woman! What do you keep in that purse, bricks?!"

"Well maybe if I hit you enough times it'll knock some manners into that wrinkled, old thing you call a brain!"

"Hey! I'm not the one that has to hide all their wrinkles under pounds of makeup!"

"WHAT?!"

"There's no purpose in fighting guys, why don't we all just relax?" John attempted at reasoning with the arguing duo.

No such luck.

"Masako any help here?" John asked, turning towards the seated medium that was near the back corner of the deteriorated cement room. All he got in response was a flicker of her grey eyes in his direction before they re-positioned themselves towards the area that they were facing earlier. Ignoring the chaos unfolding around her.

Seeing that John was going to worry himself to death, Yasu decided to go up to the young Australian and help ease his mind. He placed his right hand on the blonds's shoulder in a comforting gesture. "Come now my friend, it's not that bad. They haven't even broken anything. I'm pretty sure it won't get much worse than-"

CRASH!

"Did you just throw a vase at me woman?!" cried Takigawa from his position on the floor against the wall as he stared wide-eyed at the redhead in front of him who had just attempted to smash his head with a heavy piece of porcelain.

Tightening his grip on John's shoulder after seeing the priest go a little pale, Yasu turned John so that he was facing him and not the violent pair. He gave the best advice that he could think of at the moment and, with a smile that would make a con artist proud, he only told John one word, "Pray."

No sooner did the advice leave his mouth when their prison doors -the nickname that the Monk had affectionately given their room's wooden double doors- opened wide and in walked the two missing men from the rowdy group of investigators. Unfortunately, their timing was not the best and right as they walked through the threshold an old screwdriver came flying towards their young boss's face.

Fortunately, it missed by a few inches.

Unfortunately...

He was not amused.

The room grew deathly quiet.

"Are you all so simple-minded that you can't even handle the task of sitting still?" Growled the annoyed young man.

Everyone present swore that the temperature dropped a few degrees at that moment.

Masako decided to ignore the growing tension within the confined space. "Oh, Naru, thank goodness you're back. I tried to stop them but they just wouldn't listen." She bat her eyes at him and pretended to be as innocent as she sounded while walking up to the newly arrived duo.

'Liar,' was the collective thought shared throughout the room.

"Ms. Matsuzaki, Monk." stated the ever stoic Naru.

"H-hai?"

"Yeah?"

"Any damage done to the premises is coming out of your paychecks."

"What?!" they both exclaimed.

"This place is abandoned! No one even cares about the things lying around in here!" Takigawa vehemently protested while rising to his feet.

"For once I agree with the monk," Ayako stated as she too rose from the ground, having dodged the screwdriver that had been flung at her.

"Well then, we're just going to have to find something else for you to do," Naru replied, glaring at them with a small smirk gracing his near-perfect features.

Both adults swallowed audibly at the idea of Naru coming up with a punishment for them. Ever since returning from his stay in England, their boss hadn't really changed much personality-wise. Recently though, they'd been privy to the slightly more...sadistic side that the young business owner had. If they didn't think he was the devil incarnate before they sure did now.

Ignoring the complaining adults -if they could really be called that- in front of him, Naru addressed the rest of the room's occupants. "The police are done with looking through our tapes so we can return to base now."

That got everyone's attention and made them much happier at the prospect of getting out of the desolate room. Late last night they had discovered human remains on the premises and, while they would have notified the police after they inspected the room, their client had made a surprise visit that evening and immediately called the cops after seeing the body. Once Tokyo PD arrived they'd been confined to one of the warehouse's many rooms as the cops went through all the footage that they had gathered so far and swept the building for any evidence they could find.

Them being the ones in charge, Naru and Lin were called out periodically to help operate the equipment and explain some of the things that were picked up on their video and audio. Seeing that he now had everyone's undivided attention, Naru turned and made his way through the open doors, a signal for the rest of the group to follow, before speaking once more. "The detective assigned to this case is going to ask each of us a few questions once we arrive. Do not mention the fact that we were going to wait to report the body, understood?"

Hearing the collective "Yes" from behind him, Naru continued to make his way down the dimly lit grey hallway back to where all his equipment was being kept.

Behind him, another conversation had already started up. Walking with his hands in his pockets, Takigawa decided to voice something that had been bothering him all day. "Anyone else notice how quiet everything has been since the cops showed up?" the monk asked with a pensive look on his face.

"Now that you mention it," began John, "the ghost has been unusually dormant. It was pretty active when we first got here."

Folding her arms across her chest Ayako continued following the group to the base. "That's true. I haven't even sensed anything for a while now."

"That's because it's been gathering strength all morning." Naru blandly stated. All eyes turned to him.

"What do you mean, Naru?" a curious Yasu asked, looking at his boss with puzzled eyes.

"For the last couple hours the police's equipment has been failing, their batteries drained. You all didn't honestly think that it normally took half a day for them to interrogate witnesses did you?" answered the teen while walking further ahead of everyone, somehow making his monotone voice condescending.

Slowly raising a fist into the air, Ayako managed a quick utter of "Little brat" before she was physically restrained from behind by Takigawa with John and Yasu in front attempting to cool the priestess's ire.

Naru, Lin, and Masako just continued walking.

Five minutes -and one piercing glare at the back of Naru's head- later, the team arrived at the hallway containing their base.

Along their way down the dreary hall the group passed by the room containing the corpse as well as a few cops that were hustling about inside, all hard at work on their assigned tasks.

After reaching the base doors they all filed in one at a time. Yasu was the last to reach the entrance but right when he was about to enter a voice that sounded vaguely familiar caught his attention.

"Geez Kenshin, I swear every time you bring me somewhere it just gets more and more run down. Can't you find a body at, oh I don't know, a fancy mansion or something for once?" he heard the voice complain.

A man's chuckle came after the female finished speaking. "Sure, sure, next time I'll remember to tell the killer to make sure he commits his crime at some rich person's house, just for you." said the man, sarcasm heavily lacing his deep voice.

"Jerk."

Hearing the insult along with the voice caused Yasu to quickly flick his head back down the hall in the direction that they had come from, hoping to catch a glimpse of the one that the voice belonged to. By the time he turned though, all he could see was a rather tall, dark-haired man walking next to a young woman and only the back of her body since she was turned to face her companion, standing before the room that the police were currently busy investigating. As the sight of the woman's light brown and red-tinted hair met his eyes he could only recall one person that he'd ever known to have that particular shade of brunette. What really cemented his suspicions though was when she turned around to face the entrance of the room.

'Is that...Mai?'

DONE!

Soooo...what do ya think? Like? Don't like? Suggestions? Let me know!

I'm only going to continue it if people actually want to read it so you know what that means, REVIEWS! I live off of them so let me know if you want the next chapter :)

Adios for now!

shayrulz