Chapter 1

"Mai-tsche."

Kazuya Shibuya exhaled sharply out of annoyance as a faint chuckle floated from Lin's office next door. He mentally cursed himself for calling out her name for the fourth time that day (yesterday he had done it seven times). It had only been the second day since she took off for her week-long school trip to Okinawa and he was finally forced to admit to himself that he found her absence in the office absolutely unbearable. His mood had been vacillating between depression and irascibility.

"It's only because I suddenly find myself not being served tea whenever I want." He hung his head and pinched the nook of his nose. No, he was doing it again. He was convincing himself of a lie, all in an attempt to mask that gnawing feeling inside of him. He sighed and walked towards the window, raised his arm up above his head and rested it on the pane to support his weight as he leaned against it. He brought his forehead to his clenched knuckles and stared blankly at the people passing by in the streets below.

Contrary to the way he usually presented himself to others, he actually wasn't completely inept at these things. He understood it was natural for most people to fall in love and knew the signs associated with being in love, but he had never considered it would apply to him. He had never seen himself as a typical person. He had always been special, experiencing many things completely outside the realm of what a typical person might go through in their lifetime, making it difficult for him to concede the fact that he, special as he was, may be developing feelings for his younger assistant.

He winced. He was doing it again!

'May be' was a severe understatement. His mind had already been consumed by her, loathe as he was to admit it. When exactly did he begin to see her this way?

He thought back to their very first meeting. He got the idea that her first impression of him was unfavorable. After playing at being nice and introducing himself, he was surprised that he was unable to elicit any response from her, which stung his pride (just a tiny bit) and garnered his curiosity. The two other girls acted just like how others normally would, but Mai was immediately weary of him as if she could easily see behind his facade. At every interaction where he pretended to be a normal human being, he always felt her eyes intensely watching him and she spoke to him almost rudely. Never one to turn away from any challenge, he felt compelled to keep her close to him so that he may study her a bit more. It was lucky that she was a klutz and ended up injuring Lin that fateful day-well perhaps that wasn't a very nice thing to say, but it was Lin's fault for being careless. At any rate, he was able to use that as an excuse to keep her close until he could figure out what made her tick.

After working with her after a few days he began to feel smug at the fact that he can just as easily read her as well. According to his observations, Mai was a kind person who can strongly empathize with people. She was also very volatile. She was quick to anger at the sight of injustice, but she was just as easy to appease with the littlest thing. She was weak in academics, especially English, and was very easy to tease due to her feelings of inadequacy. He derived much pleasure in teasing her, in seeing her flushed face and hearing her pouty, "Well I'm sorry for being so dumb!" retorts. He found it easy to speak with her and at first he attributed it to his superiority, but in the end he realized he actually found some enjoyment in their conversations and little arguments (although he would rather listen and pretend to not care than say something). Before he knew it his feelings for her had grown, but he didn't even know how to express it; he didn't even know if he wanted to acknowledge it. With his rotten, narcissistic personality (of which he was quite aware of), he was sure no one could possible fall in love with him anyway.

"Which turned out to be quite true, afterall," he thought with a slight grimace. Suddenly, memories of that day flooded back.

-000-

It was nearing the end of his stay in Japan. Finding Gene's body was only a matter of hours now. He had just been taking a walk on his own, contemplating how impressive it was of Bou-san to piece together many little clues about his life. He didn't mind it at all at first. He actually encouraged him, in his own way, to explain his reasoning and conclusions, but as Bou-san got closer and closer to the truth he began to feel stifled. Letting the group figure out the secrets he's kept from them for so long was forcing him to face their inevitable goodbyes. Revealing all his secrets doesn't matter now since he was leaving anyway. Eventually he realized that talking like this made him feel quite lonely and he stepped out for some air. After walking around for half an hour, he decided to head back to the hut when he saw a half-dazed Mai leaning against a tree. He thought briefly about what he'd like to say to her before he left but his body had already moved on its own and before he knew it, he was in front of her.

She had been looking frantically around and looked very confused. When he asked her what was wrong, she began insisting she had just been talking to him moments before. It confused him when his line of questioning led her to confess the fact that she had been dreaming about him all this time (turning a dangerously bright shade of red in the meantime), but it didn't take him long to piece together that she had probably been in contact with Gene all along. After clarifying the situation to her, her demeanor saddened as she realized that the smiling, kind Naru in her dream was not even a dream version of her boss, but was actually a completely different person. The reality is that Naru would never smile like that. In spite of all this she ended up blurting, in the typical headstrong Mai fashion, that she had feelings for him.

"I like you," she said.

Those words, said right after their recent discovery of the dream Naru's identity, pierced him painfully. To rebuff her he retaliated by saying he didn't like it when people cared about him, but Mai unknowingly delivered a more severe blow, twisting the knife through his heart when she insisted that she had liked him in a special way. He truly deserved this.

With a sad smile he looked at her and finally asked, "Me? Or Gene?" knowing full well what she would say. As she erupted into tears and lamented the fact that she repeatedly referred to Gene as Naru and how she never had the chance to properly thank him before parting forever, Naru looked away. He didn't know what to do in these situations. What was a good thing to say?

"You'll probably see him again." That was the best thing he could think about even though he wasn't sure if he even believed it himself. Thankfully it worked and they were able to crack a joke about it, though at Mai's expense.

"I would always feel so happy in my dreams because Naru was always smiling there. I thought maybe that one day I will get to see it in real life even though I knew that there was no way that would happen. Now that I know the truth that you were two completely different people, I feel happy-sorry. Sorry for being mean."

"It's okay, I'm used to it. Two identical people-same face, same power. One has a good personality the other one has a bad personality." He paused before continuing, "Which would you choose?"

Without skipping a beat, Mai had replied, "The one with the good personality."

Naru felt the air drain from his lungs and he found himself unable to look her in the eyes. She was truly in love with Gene after all. Everyone always fell in love with Gene but he never really cared like this before. Romantic confessions were an inconvenience to him back then and having them realize that Gene was the better twin in that regard worked out for him the best. But somehow, right now was different. His chest ached. "Exactly," was all the could muster up to say.

A couple of days later after finding Gene's body, Naru and Lin left for England with plans to stay indefinitely. In their absence, Madoka took over as acting director of the SPR office and would always call him on a monthly basis with a complete report, updating him here and there about how the others were doing (useless things like when Matsuzaki and Takigawa started dating, or how John had eventually shed his Kansai dialect). As time went on and he got busy with things, he asked her to keep their correspondence shorter and less frequent. Eventually she only phoned when interesting cases came up or when she needed his opinion on something. He tried to not dwell too much on the life he left behind, preoccupied as he was with other pressing matters, and had made up his mind that there was no need for him to go back since he had closed that chapter in his life.

He spent the entire year focusing on writing an ambitious paper: a compendium of legitimate paranormal activities in Japan with in-depth analysis on proper methodologies and exposition on applying logical reasoning based on gathered evidence. He even cited some of his very own experiences. It was easy for him to lose himself over his work and soon he even began to cease much contact with Lin and his parents. Afraid for his health, both Martin and Luella Davis suddenly sat down with him at dinner and recommended for him to travel back to Japan, citing his need for a change of pace and their company's lack of active researchers in that section of the world. This surprised him, but although he saw it as an inconvenience to himself, he simply nodded in affirmation without so much of a complaint. He could never turn down a request from his adoptive parents. In two months he managed to straighten his affairs all related to his work, while Lin took care of their personal necessities and made the final preparations for their stay abroad.

The entire group was there to greet them in the SPR office upon their arrival and to Naru's horror, saw an alarming amount of balloons and confetti littered all over the floor (most likely Takigawa and Madoka's idea of how a Western party should look like), and multiple banners hanging on the walls in a nauseating juxtaposition of colors and sizes with the words, "Welcome back! We missed you!". Somewhere off to the side, Yasuhara and Mai started blowing on their party tooters and Matsuzaki-san and John popped more confetti. He just stared at them. "What do you people think you're doing at somebody's office? Isn't it a workday? This is no time for nonsense."

Madoka laughed. "Professor Davis let me know that starting tomorrow you can take over the office again, but today I am still technically the boss, so yay we still get to party!" There was no arguing against that logic.

They immediately assaulted him with unending questions but he was too tired and uninterested to reply so he made his way toward the sofa, leaving Lin by the doorway to answer everything himself. While everyone was partaking in their festivities and being incessantly loud and obnoxious, Naru quietly observed how everyone except Bou-san seemed to have aged during their time apart. The monk actually still kept his long hair, which most likely meant that he was still very active with his band. John had lost the softness to his face and sure enough, no hint of a Kansai dialect was present in his speech. Hara-san's height was exactly the same, although she was much shorter to him now than she used to (he had grown an inch taller, placing him at six feet tall). From the looks of it, she had finally stopped wearing her kimono everywhere and was currently wearing a modest dress. Matsuzaki-san had cut her hair a bit shorter and seemed to be a bit more mellow now, although occasionally Bou-san would tease her and immediately her rambunctious personality would resurface. Yasuhara had also gotten taller, his face narrower, and had traded his glasses for contact lenses, but otherwise he still exuded the same 'Echigoya' aura about him.

And then there was Mai. He had unconsciously averted her eyes when he entered, but he figured she was bound to come bother him soon anyway. Sure enough when he looked up, although she had been listening intently to Lin's answers, she turned to face him and immediately beamed him a smile before making her way towards him. She had definitely transformed the most.

Her short, auburn hair was now waist-length, loosely tied and draped over her shoulder. Her clothes, a simple white-laced tunic and jeans, were unlike the casual, tomboyish clothes she used to wear back then. Now she seemed more mature, more demure in the way she carried herself. She sat down next to him.

"Welcome back, Naru. It's really been a while."

"You seemed to have grown up in the time I've been gone."

Mai laughed. "What is this, you sound like an old man! Of course I'd grow-I had just turned seventeen and was still developing when you left! You have grown too, you know. By a few centimeters it seems." Finding her enthusiasm was still the same as ever made him smile, which in turn made her blush. He checked himself as he realized that the gesture probably reminded her of Gene.

"Well since you're back, will we be taking intense cases as an entire group again? Madoka had her hands full when she was acting director. It seemed like she was also doing some sort of research on her own so it felt like we were taking the lighter cases."

"You know that I only take cases which interest me so naturally they should be the more difficult ones. As to whether the others will be joining, that will be on a case by case basis and if they are willing to accept consultations."

Mai playfully tapped him on the shoulder. "What are you talking about? Of course they would! Can't you just feel their excitement? They would jump at the opportunity to solve cases together again!"

He shrugged. Then, he turned to her and asked seriously, "Would you be interested in joining again? I am in need of an assistant and it would be best if it was someone who was already familiar with the equipment."

Her grin widened as she chirped, "I wasn't aware I've been fired as your assistant that you'd need to ask me to be one again. Although Madoka was a much nicer and friendlier boss, you were the one who initially hired me so I have a bit of bias to be loyal to you."

Naru smirked. "Good."

-000-

So where was this assistant now? Apart from his repulsive sentiment of missing the damn woman, it was highly disruptive to his routine to not have a proper assistant who would bring him good tea. Didn't she know how difficult it was for him to suddenly go cold-turkey* when he first left for England? And now after having her around for two whole months since his return she suddenly goes on a week-long leave, forcing him to go through another withdrawal. He tried ordering Lin to prepare some, but Lin's tastes tended towards milder flavors. Naru liked them bold, almost bitter, just the way Mai did it (who probably intentionally did it that way initially as a jab at his unpleasant personality, but joke's on her she actually got it right).

"Lin. Tea!" he barked, severely irritated now. "Steep it longer than you think it should be steeped." Five more days. Just five more days until she gets back and then he will no longer allow her to take any unnecessary vacations.

Cold-turkey* means stopping suddenly (just in case there are non-native speakers who aren't familiar with the slang.

Notes: More to come. My intention is to write a full blown light novel that will eventually hit M-rating, so fingers crossed I get to update on a timely basis. Please review to help me keep going and many thanks for taking the time to read this chapter.