Authors note: Ok so this is the first piece of fan fiction that I've ever published by myself so please be kind and leave a review if you wish as I would love to hear what people think of this so I can improve my writing style.

I would also like to thank Kovou (as she is known on here) for proof reading this for me and helping me edit it. I would also like to wish her luck with the rest of her own Shaman King fict The lust for Power, you should seriously check it out as it is really good.

I don't own Shaman King, as much as I wish I did.

Chapter 1: Noise, Clouds and Pain.

Hectic. That was one way of describing things. Pandemonium was another. Chaotic worked well too. So did frenzied. Either way regardless of which word one chose to use they all amounted to the same thing. The train station was busy. Everywhere you looked there were people and where there are people, there is almost certainly noise. As a general rule the more people you have gathered together in one place the more noise is generated as a result. This observation should come as no surprise to anyone as human beings as a species are a noisy one. Take for example a single human. On his (or her) own a single human makes relatively little noise when going about their day to day business. However add another human to the mix and the amount of noise generated increases exponential the reason? The vibration of ones vocal chords resulting in the propagation of sound waves from ones mouth or as humans themselves would refer to it, talking. Human beings like to talk, proven fact. Ask anyone and you will soon see what I mean. Either way regardless of whether it's a simple good morning greeting or a full blown argument, humans like to talk and talking leads to noise.

At this present moment in time Morty Oyamada was hearing a lot of noise. Sure there was the sound of foot steps rushing this way and that, the sound of trains coming and going, hell there was even a dog barking for no reason other than the fact that it could, however above all of that was the sound of people talking to one another.

"Which way's the toilet?" Morty would occasionally hear one traveler say to another as they made their through the crowds. "Have you all got your tickets?" was another common phrase Morty had heard this morning as he waited for his train. By far the most popular this morning though had been "Where the hell is the train?"

Where the hell is the train, that was what most of the passengers who were congregated on platform two of the train station were thinking, including Morty. Trains in Japan had a reputation for being the most efficient in the world and for good reason. The service was run so effectively that it was more of a surprise to passengers when a train was late than when it was on time. Irrespective of this however the situation for the passengers was thus, they were here and the train was not. Looking up Morty Oyamada turned his head as did everyone else who was gathered on the platform, towards the source of a new noise, one that made itself heard above all the others.

"Your attention please" the woman on the intercom said. "The 10:30 train to Funbari Hill has broken down and will be unable to complete its journey. A replacement train from the depot has been dispatched and will arrive here in 30 minuets. We apologies again for any inconvenience that this may have caused and thank you again for your patience." As the announcement ended Morty, along with almost everyone on the platform let out a groan. Now he was going to be late for sure. He was supposed to be meeting his best friends Yoh and Anna at 11:00am and now thanks to the delay was going to be late. Sighing he pulled out his mobile phone to text Yoh and tell him he would be late only to find that Yoh had beat him too it and sent a text of his own. Cursing his ringtone for not being loud enough to make itself heard over the noise of the station Morty read the text message then let out a low grumble.

Today was going from bad to worse he thought as he began composing a text of his own. The content of Yohs text meant one thing and one thing only. Anna was not going to be in a good mood when he finally met her in Funbari Hill.

##

The sun was reaching towards its peek in the cloudless sky, casting its warm rays down over the grateful residents of Funbari Hill who were taking full advantage of its generosity, to spend sometime out doors. March had been wet. The rain had only ever let up on a handful of occasions and when it had the clouds had still persisted as though not wanting to relinquish there hold over the sky, even if they had momentarily ran out of rain. April had started much the same, probably worse. It was as though the clouds had decided to become vindictive as well as persistent, quite possibly going as far as to think that it was the residents of Funbari Hill themselves that had been responsible for them being short on water during the few aforementioned dry days in March. Today however the sun seamed to have finally had enough of the mass sheet of grey that had covered the sky for over a month and had promptly for want of a better phrase, kicked it out. Now it was gone, not even a small white wisp remained to tell anyone who had just arrived in town, or just hadn't bothered to look out of a window that it had ever been in the first place.

Standing on the corner of one of the few quiet streets left in town was a teenage girl wearing a short black dress, a pair of dark sunglasses and a rather pissed off expression. Given the look on the girls face it was not inconceivable that the sun had not in fact kicked the storm clouds out of the sky, but rather that they had taken one look at the girls expression and decided that if she was here then it would be a lot safer for them not to be, for Anna Kyoyama was not in a good mood.

Standing on a street corner while, say waiting for a bus may occasionally tip ones mood towards the not so good side of the mood spectrum. Standing on a street corner in the rain while waiting for a bus may tip the scales slightly further. Standing on a street corner in the rain and having the bus you have been waiting on drive past you will most defiantly tip the scale into the "bad mood" part of the spectrum. Standing on a street corner with the sun splitting the pavement, while not requiring the service of a bus should not put one in a bad mood. Unless of course you've been standing on the same street corner for over an hour because your lazy fiancé found his bed more attractive this morning than you may just about have the same effect on ones mood as having waited for a bus in the pouring rain for an hour and then having it splash you with a large amount of icy cold water as it drives past. This was exactly how Anna Kyoyama was feeling at this present moment in time, only a bit less wet. Yoh, Morty and herself were all supposed to have met here an hour ago, that was until Morty had text her saying that Yohs his alarm clock hadn't woken him up and that he had only just stumbled into the bathroom.

Liar she had thought when she read it. She had bought that alarm clock for him specifically because it sounded like a ships fog horn when it went off. Hell it even woke all the neighbors in a 4 block radius when it went off. The fact that Yoh had slept in again was only a minor annoyance, the real annoyance was fact that he hadn't even bothered to text her himself, instead choosing to foist the job of telling her onto Morty, in the hope that she would use up all her rage on Morty and let him off with a much lighter punishment. Sadly though, for Yoh at any rate, she had not bitten Mortys head of, rather sent him a quick text telling him that it did not matter that he himself would be late, that he needn't hurry and that to tell Yoh that he had better get his butt here within the hour or that he would cease to have one.

So there she was. Left on a street corner like something that had been absent mindedly thrown out of some ones pocket. Her thoughts mulled over the many possibilities of how she might punish Yoh once she got her hands on him. Maybe she would punish Morty as well as he had been an accessory in the transition of her mood from relatively happy to uber pissed. From somewhere down the street a voice called out to her, drawing her mind away from images of Yoh and Morty doing her latest version of the electric chair, which now involved them holding a pair of very heavy weights at arms length while trying to keep their backsides high enough above the flame that was lit underneath them so as not to get burned. As the voice called out to her again she added a final mental note to her image, perhaps 5 hours was slightly too harsh for Mortys crime.

"Hey Anna" the voice called to her a third time as she turned her head to see a boy running towards her from down the street. It was Morty.

##

Yoh glanced at the time that was displayed in bright orange digits on his Oracle bell. Even though the shaman fight had been postponed indefinitely he'd grown so accustomed to wearing it that it was now a force of habit to place it on his wrist when he got dressed in the morning. Besides it has handy to have around as aside from being a way for the Patch to communicate with the tournaments combatants it also functioned as a wrist watch, a calculator, a map, a compass and many other things that he nor any of his friends had quite managed to figure out. It was even waterproof and had an addictive video game for those long bus rides.

Not that Yoh ever used the bus; if he did he would probably get off only to find Anna standing at the bus stop glaring at him for being lazy. Then he would probably find himself being made to run all the way back to where he had come from and then back to where he wanted to be, via the longest possible route of course. No it was better to be on the safe side and just walk everywhere lest he have to face the wrath of Anna. The wrath of Anna. That was something he would soon be facing no doubt about it. Not only had he decided to switch off his alarm clock before it woke him and the whole neighborhood up, he had also had the bright idea of getting Morty to text Anna to tell her he would be late instead of doing it himself. He really didn't think well when he was half asleep Yoh thought.

Having eventually woken up and realizing what time it was he had had to dive into the shower, get dressed, skip breakfast and hurriedly say goodbye to Amidamaru and Mosuke as he ran out of the door, the two ghosts preferring to spend the day fondly remembering old times while not being made to do house work by Anna. Realizing that the hour deadline that Anna had given him via Morty was fast running out Yoh quickened his pace, wondering whether or not even the Great Spirit itself would be able to foresee the amount of torture that Anna was undoubtedly planning on putting him through this time. Another glance at his oracle bell told him that he had a mere five minuets to make it to the corner outside the video arcade where they had all agreed to meet. Needless to say the chances of Anna actually letting him step foot inside the Arcade today were less than the amount of furyoku he was going to be left with once she had finished punishing him.

Placing his hand on the metal railing of the park fence Yoh vaulted it in one swift movement. As he landed on the other side his feet hit the ground running as he began to make his way across the park. By the time he had crossed to the other side of the park he was down to just two and a half minuets. Now almost sprinting Yoh exited the park and made his way round the corner onto the long road which contained amongst other things, the video arcade. As he made his way towards the arcade he could begin to make out the figures of his best friend and his fiancé. Even from here he could tell that Anna looked pissed.

"Hey guys" he shouted, still a good distance away from them. "Sorry I'm late…"

##

At about the same time as Morty had brought Annas attention away from her thoughts about extreme punishment and torture a white van had turned the very same corner that Yoh Asakura was soon to come round, onto the long road where the video arcade resided. The vans occupants consisted of three tall and rather well built men, two in the front and one in the back.

The one in the back of the van was currently surprising his comrades with snippets from the newspaper her was reading. The surprise for them being not so much the content of the article, as they had both skimmed over it themselves that morning but rather the fact that their associate was reading it, because as far as they were both concerned he didn't have enough brain cells to tie his shoe laces let alone read something.

"It says here that the share price in Oyamada Electronics has dropped as a result of the current investigation. Apparently Oyamada himself was involved in a series of dodgy dealings with some rather unsavoury Chinese characters…" the man in the back of the van said.

As he read on, sounding out the bigger words under his breath, the man in the front passenger seat signalled to the driver to pull over. The driver acknowledged his hand gesture and parked the van close to the kerb about five meters away from the intersection outside the video arcade.

"What are we stopping for" the man in the back said, abandoning his newspaper onto the dirty floor of the van as he moved himself from where he was sitting into a position where he could put his head between the seats in the front.

. "We've located the target" said the driver

"However there's a problem" added the man in the passenger seat. "They're not alone."

"So what's the problem?" the man in the back asked his companions.

"The problem Chao is that there are two of them" the driver responded.

"We should phone the boss. Let him decide how we should proceed" the front passenger ventured.

"Good idea Zhang. Let the boss make the decision" replied the driver.

"Why waste time lets just grab the both of them and be done with it" the one named Chao barked.

"No the boss said if there were any complications to contact him at once. Make the call Zhang" the driver said. The decision apparently made Zhang pulled out his mobile and scrolled through his contact list until he found the number he was looking for. Putting the phone to his ear Zhang waited on an answer.

After a few moments the familiar sound of his bosses' voice filled his ear. After a brief conversation Zhang hung up and put his phone back in his pocket. "Well…" the driver asked expectantly.

"The boss reckons we won't get a better chance than this. We take both of them and deal with the other one later" Zhang replied.

"Ok let's go. Masks on boys" the driver said as he pulled a black mask over his face and started the engine.

##

Anna turned towards the sound of her fiancés voice as a white van pulled in behind her and Morty, she gave it no notice. As far as she was concerned the only that mattered right now was which hand was going to slap him with once he was in range. Beside her Morty stood with a grin or his face as his best friend came into view

"Hey Yo…." Morty never got to finish his sentence as at that moment a gloved hand, holding a soft white cloth came from behind him and clamed it's self around his mouth, muffling his voice. He struggled then began to go limp as a sickly sweet smell filled his nose and coated his tongue. The next second Morty had been hoisted off the ground the hand still holding the cloth in place for good measure.

Seeing Morty being forcefully grabbed out of the corner of her eye Anna spun round and in one swift movement caught the man who had grabbed Morty on his left cheek with one of her trademark super painful slaps. As the blow connected the man stumbled backwards towards the van from the sheer force of it, never releasing his grip on the boy he held in his arms.

The back doors of the van swung open as Anna advanced on the Man "LET MORTY GO RIGHT NOW OR I'M GONNA…." Anna stopped dead in her tracks as she suddenly found herself facing a second man who was holding a gun pointed directly at her chest.

The man with the gun didn't even stop to breathe as his fingers twitched, squeezing the trigger of his gun. Anna let out a high pitched scream as the taser hit her, her body going into a spasm. The electric charge that flowed through her made her feel like every inch of her skin was on fire before the ground came rushing up to meet her.

Watching in horror Yoh began sprinting towards his friends. The sound of Annas scream only intensified the speed at which he tried to make up the distance his feet pounding on the tarmac. As he reached them the man who had taken hold of Morty had already entered the back of the van while the one who had tasered Anna now had a hold of her limp form and was climbing in after him. Not knowing what to do Yoh threw himself towards the man grabbed him round the shoulders. The man let go of Anna and stumbled backwards trying to shake Yoh off.

As they continued to struggle the Man inside the van, who was still holding a limp Morty like a rag doll in one hand, pulled Anna into the van with his other. Yoh fought to hold on as the man began thrashing around. Eventually the man managed to get hold of one of Yoh's arms and threw him roughly to the ground, Yoh's free hand catching his face mask and ripping it off as he went.

Severely winded Yoh looked up from where he had landed and saw clearly the face of the man who had tasered his fiancée. He was of Chinese origin with black hair, brown eyes and a tattoo of a Snake eating its own tail on his neck. Struggling to his feet Yoh could only watch as the doors to the van closed and the driver hit the gas peddle. He started running stumbling the first few steps as the van sped off down the street, trying in vain to catch up to it until it rounded a corner a vanished from sight.

"ANNNNAAAAA!" Yoh screamed in anguish as he fell to his knees. "Morty" he said softly as tears began to make their way down his cheeks. "NO!" he screamed out again as his fists came down hard on the cold road surface. It was his fault. It was all his fault. If he had just gotten up when he was supposed to none of this would have happened. If he hadn't been so lazy this morning he would probably have been sitting in a café somewhere right about now, eating ice cream and having a laugh with his friends. Not here on a cold piece of tarmac with no idea of where his friends were now being taken.

Letting out a final moan Yoh picked himself up off the ground trying to think, one thing was certain, he swore to himself, he would do whatever it took to find Anna and Morty and once he had he would ensure that whoever was responsible paid for kidnapping his friends. Especially for hurting Anna the way they had.