It was a warm summer’s night and Willow hadn’t expected to find much beyond a few little creepy crawlies and random bugs. She’d managed to commandeer permission to explore an older victorian style house alone, in the name of ghost hunting. Which, was disappointing because it’s always way more fun to hunt ghosties with a bestie, or at least with a pal of some sort; even a talking cat if she’d managed it.

The teen couldn’t believe she’d managed to graduate from Crystal High, the school was a huge challenge and often got in the way of what she actually wanted to do. Between the senshi thing, trying to make a living as a psychic when she wasn’t taking general education classes, and working as a zookeeper on the weekends she barely had any time for herself. Well, to do fun things like hang out with friends. Or make many friends for that matter that wanted to hang out outside of school.

“I really need to fix that. . . . “ Willow mumbled as she looked around the dusty old house. It had been left unoccupied for a few years now, and it showed. Though someone had started doing renovations on it and recently stopped because something ‘weird’ was going on. While Willow wanted to believe that ghosts exist, she also had a duty to prove or disprove they existed and why so these guys could get back to work.

She’d heard about them having issues which is why she went to convince them to let her investigate and see if she could find any strange beings, or unexplainable phenomena. Granted, she could also just come across a youma or some other easily explainable monster, well okay easily explainable to anyone that knew about the senshi, negaverse and this whole war going on. Willow’s nose wrinkled as she thought about that; disappointing herself as she continued to think on the possibility it was something of that nature.

Luckily she kept her henshin pen close by just in case that was the problem. “That would be disappointing . . . . wouldn’t it?”

She asked herself as she finally found an old chair and table. Setting her camera a top the table, after dusting it off a bit with a rag she’d brought and the same with the chair. Giving a small sneeze after she stirred up so much dust. The house gave a small creek and the girl looked around curiously and alert to see if anything else happened. She’d set up cameras in a few of the main rooms of interest, and carried a personal one with her, alongside her camera she also made sure she had a voice recorder. She left her geothermal rader and other equipment in her mobile office, which wasn’t all that impressive, it was a battered old hearse that she kept running. It wasn’t even anything classic; but it was what she let herself afford.

“Who’s there?” She finally asked after what seemed like minutes of waiting with baited breath to see if anything would move or make the floor squeak again. She wouldn’t find any luck though, as nothing seemed to create the noise. When she gave it a little bit of time, she started moving softly taking her foot steps lightly so she didn’t cause too much noise. She was listening to see if the boards caused what sounded like creeks in the floor from someone walking in another part of the room. As she moved, the teen nodded when she finally hit the same spot she’d hit right before she had sneezed. There, again the floor creaked. “Well that’s solved.” She said disappointed as she settled herself down into the chair. Which was fairly comfortable for being such an old dilapidated piece of furniture.

Minutes felt like they stretched out into hours, though every time Willow had no proof of anything, and she was about to give up. When something stirred up in the attic, her head did an automatic jerk of surprise it sounded fairly large. Whatever it was, and the girl couldn’t help but grin from ear to ear as she followed the noise. “Okay so it could be anything though, bats; raccoons, I didn’t see evidence of raccoons but it could totally be a raccoon. Or well, I guess it could be a youma. It better be a small one so I could dust it quick if it is so we can settle this. I don’t want to play and waste the rest of my night . . . “

She walked past a bedroom that had an open window as she crept closer to the attic when an owl outside the window gave a loud hoot, causing the girl to jump and clutch her chest for a moment.

“Ugh, shoo owl, shoo.” She said moving to shut the window and run the creature off to another tree for giving her a fright.

With the cameras pointed towards her she didn’t feel like powering up just in case things got ugly, yet. She could always run to the nearest bathroom to hide from her own cameras and she knew where she’d put her blind spots. Granted, it’d still catch probably the effects of powering up if it was all as bright as it often seemed.

Willow pondered, and gave a small laugh at herself, “Well . . . that wouldn’t be a good idea.”

She mused softly to herself on what sort of schemes crossed her mind, dealing with the camera and powering up. She was lost in thought when she realized she’d managed to make it into the attic and everything seemed. . . still and quiet. Maybe too quiet.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are” Something told Willow she was trying to invite trouble by doing this as she called out softly into the dark abyss that was the attic. Though nothing still stirred.

“Must be mice.” She muttered. Diving further into the darkness with her trusty camera and voice recorder. “It has to be mice.”

She started looking under the sheets that covered random belongs in the attic, being mindful of where she stepped in case a floor board was compromised. She didn’t want to be falling through the ceiling. While the house was in rough shape, it luckily wasn’t completely structurally compromised.

Slowly she started hearing the noise again. She froze on the spot, looking around, it was coming from a corner, with a little light casted from a round window to let some natural light into the attic, though it was dusty and the light coming from it was just eerie enough.

When Willow lifted the sheet just a tiny bit, there was a hiss and growl while two tiny demonic looking eyes stared at her; in fear. Willow yelped a little and backed up. “Okay, cool. Mystery solved.”

She took her leave from the attic as fast as she could. Luckily for her that thing in the attic didn’t scream youma. As she left there were the flapping of wings and a high pitched noise. “Oh great. . . . they’ll be thrilled to know what’s going on in here.”

Willow gathered her stuff and booked it out the of the house. It was time to let the guys finish working and after all she’d killed most of the night hunting for ghost hauntings. Overall, it was a disappointment, but if she helped the guys be able to do their job without worry that was the better part of the night.

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