Chapter 17: Old Acquaintances

"I hate the desert" muttered Haru, he had been walking for about four hours through the hot scorching sands and had nearly no idea where he was going. The temperature was well above 100 degrees and Haru's clothes were drenched in sweat yet he refused to take off his weighted training coat and instead had taken off his shirt.

"Zhou remind me to hurt Hao when we get to patch village" Haru told his faithful spirit darkly as he remembered why he was out here.

Flashback

After having spent the better part of an hour arguing and debating with Opacho the kid had finally told him where to find Macchi and Mari, after he discovered their whereabouts he went to visit Luca quickly before heading out of the hotel.

As Haru was making his way out of the city he got the feeling that he was being followed, so he started walking more quickly while at the same time staying alert for a sign of whoever or whatever was following him.

"Where are you going in such a hurry?" Haru stopped but he didn't turn round; he knew that voice.

"Go to hell Hao" he said in a dull monotone as he started to walk away

"Been there, done that" Hao replied cheerfully, Hao teleported in front of Haru forcing him to stop, Hao looked at Haru's bleached hair and shaved eyebrows, "I see that the girls had some fun last night, so where are you going?"

"Where do you think? I am going to inform your little fan girls exactly how I feel about their prank and then well, lets just say the punishment will fit the crime…" Haru let his voice tail off and a slight grin made it's way onto his features as he thought about how exactly he was going to pay Macchi and Mari back.

"As interesting as that sounds, I'm afraid I need you to do something else" Hao informed the now blond haired shaman. Haru's smile vanished as he looked at Hao.

"It will have to wait" Haru said darkly "I have to retrieve something first"

"You wouldn't by any chance be talking about your golden trinket would you?" Hao said this a little too innocently

"Where is it Hao?" Haru asked in a low voice.

"Your quite attached to it aren't you? Why is it so special to you?" Hao responded in an inquisitive voice

"It's all I have left of my parents, now where is it?" Haru repeated his question.

"Ah, emotional value, I should have guessed, you know you really should take better care of it if it means that much to you" Hao paused for a moment as he realised that Haru was staring at him with a rather ugly look in his eyes. "Don't worry, you'll get it back after you finish my task"

"Hao I've already said that I am willing to work for you, you don't need to blackmail me" Haru said this slowly and deliberately.

"That is where our opinions differ, you see normally I would believe you, however for this task I would like some insurance. You see my brother Yoh is not progressing as fast as I would hope. He has managed to obtain information about Patch village but does not know how to use it. Unfortunately it seems I need someone to guide him to Patch village otherwise he will arrive there too late for the third round."

"Let me guess you want me to play tour guide" Haru replied bitterly

Hao smiled at this, "Very astute, you are the one they are most likely to listen too, if one of my other followers were to try to guide them, they would be… resistant to say the least, however as they have already met you it shouldn't be a problem. However you task is more than just to 'play tour guide' as you so adequately put it. The X-Laws are up to something and until I know what it is you shall also assume the role of bodyguard for my brother"

"That's quite a lot of responsibility, you sure you want to trust me with it?" Haru said in an effort to persuade Hao.

"That is why I have taken the precaution of having some insurance, besides you will get help in due course; I have someone with Anna at this very moment in time so you will not be alone once you complete the first part of your task"

"For some reason your words fail to inspire me with confidence" Haru said sourly, then a thought struck him," you don't think the fact that I have spent nearly a month in your company will cause Yoh and his friends to doubt me in any way?" Haru told Hao sarcastically

Hao frowned slightly, "Obviously I do not wish for you to tell them that you are working for me"

"So exactly how do I explain where I've been all this time?" Haru asked

"Oh I'm sure you'll think of something, oh and you'll need this" Hao tossed Haru a scroll of paper which turned out to be a map which revealed the exact location of patch village, however something else caught Haru's eye; there were two different coloured markers on the map and both of them were moving. Both markers were labelled one said "Asakura" and the other was "Chou Senji Ryakketsu" (A/N I have no idea if I spelled this correctly).

"What is the Chou Senji Ryakketsu?" Haru asked in a slightly puzzled tone.

Hao smiled, "That is another part of your task. Anna, my brothers' fiancé is currently travelling with a book that was written over 1000 years ago; it contains information on various shamanic skills and techniques that I perfected, you need to ensure that my brother receives it before he reaches Patch village, now I suggest you start moving"

End Flashback

Hao had then teleported Haru into the middle of the desert and he had spent the rest of the day looking for Yoh and the others. So far he had yet to find so much as a footprint. Haru paused and took out the map that Hao had given him. The reason why it was taking him so long to find Yoh and the others was because they were moving as well, so Haru had to move faster to catch up and according to the map he was still an hour behind, he sighed and rolled up the map and was about to continue when he noticed a figure approaching ahead of him, as the figure got closer Haru saw that it was a man who appeared to be in his thirties but Haru couldn't be sure because he was wearing a mask that resembled a bird.

"Hi there, remember me?"

"Lousy, no good, rotten Hao, I bet he knew this was going to happen" Mia mumbled under her breath as she staggered under the weight of several various suitcases and bags.

Hao had given her her first mission today, Mia had been reluctant at first because after hanging around Hao and his followers and seeing how strong they were she had started to doubt her own abilities. However Hao had quickly assured her that she was strong enough for the task and that afterwards she would be stronger than ever before. Mia had been sceptical at first; she was old enough to know that nothing in life came easy and even though she came from a pretty well off family she had grown up with three older brothers, and as all younger siblings will know older brothers or sisters have a habit of picking on their younger siblings and generally making their lives miserable. Mia had had to fight and argue for anything she wanted because her brothers would almost always try and prevent her from getting anything she desired.

However Mia gave as good as she got and once she had turned 15 and got Kira as her guardian spirit they had decided to leave her alone because only one of the brothers was a shaman as well and had not yet picked a guardian spirit. Also Mia's mother had gotten sick at around this time and there were more important things for them to consider.

Hao saw that Mia was sceptical about what he was telling her but did not try to change her mind and instead changed tact, telling her that she had nothing to lose and if it did work then she would be strong enough to beat Haru, that had worked and Mia had agreed to do what Hao wanted, which consisted of helping Anna find someone called Yoh so that she could give him the 'Chou Senji Ryakketsu' whatever that was, Hao had said that she was best suited to do this because she had met Anna and the others before. When Mia pointed out that Haru had also met them and probably new them better than her Hao had just said that Haru was busy but that she would get some help later on.

Mia had found Anna and the others easy enough; they had gotten lost trying to find Santa Fey but had ended up in Yanta Fey instead. Mia had found them arguing over whose fault it was that they were lost, or to be more precise Anna telling everyone that it was their fault and not hers. Mia had unwisely chosen this moment to reintroduce herself and point out that Anna was the one with a map in her hand. This explains why Mia was now trudging along behind the group and struggling to balance the various suitcases that had been piled ontop of her.

They had stopped for the moment at a bus stop, which would eventually provide a bus that would lead them out of town, but for the moment they just had to wait.

"Pailong why don't you help her out" Mia heard someone say, almost immediately Mia felt some of the suitcases being lifted off of her by the deceased martial artist. Now that Mia was able to see where she was going she juggled around the various bags she was still carrying and turned to Lee Pailong and thanked him.

"Don't mention it miss I was glad to help" the bodyguard replied politely before he fell back behind Jun, who came up to speak to Mia.

"How are you holding up?" Jun asked with an inquisitive smile

"Uh fine now, the hardest part was balancing them" Mia replied as she looked at the various suitcases with loathing.

"I was actually surprised that you could carry all of them, some of them were the same size as you" Jun remarked.

"Your not the only one who was surprised I thought my back was going to give out" Mia responded, she was about to say something else but was stopped when someone poked her leg, she looked down and saw what appeared to be a 2foot high doll with blond hair and a relatively big head, Mia was almost instantly reminded of Opacho.

"Hey, your names Manta right?" Mia asked, she had been introduced to the little kid quickly but hadn't really had a chance to talk with anyone.

"Yeah that's right, uh listen I think I should warn you not to get on Anna's bad side" Manta indicated to the icy Ikato who was at the head of the group, "Anna's not exactly known for her charm…"

"I heard that shorty, you have clean up duty for the next two weeks" Anna remarked coldly over her shoulder.

"No…" Manta moaned as anime tears came streaming out of his eyes.

"And that's another week for moaning about it" Anna responded

"Hey don't pick on him, it's not his fault you don't know how to be nice" Mia told the female Ikato.

Anna stopped in her tracks and turned on Mia very slowly, everyone else retreated out of the way and several strangers turned around and started whistling while walking away very quickly. Anna started to walk up to Mia b but just before she got close enough to reply the bus pulled up and a guy who looked a lot like the truck driver Billy leaned out.

"Alright this is the number 33 bus going out of town you kids getting on or what?"

Anna glared coldly at the driver for a moment and then confirmed that they were getting on, the driver then got out of the bus to help the load their suitcases onto the bus and after a few minutes they were on their way out of town.

Mia chose a seat next to Jun and was soon joined by Manta who still looked slightly crestfallen that he had extra clean up duty but didn't dwell on it and instead turned to Mia.

"Were you actually listening to what I said about not getting on Anna's bad side?" he asked, "because if you were then you have a really strange way of making friends"

"Hey I was trying to help you" Mia protested

"I know you meant well but you really shouldn't argue with Anna, she is use to being in charge and doesn't react well to people arguing with her or criticising her" Jun remarked.

"Well who died and put her in charge?" Mia asked somewhat testily; all she had done was try to help the little guy out.

Manta shook his head at her question, "You don't get it do you? No one puts Anna in charge she just is in charge; it's been like that ever since I've met her. Don't get the wrong idea though; Anna's not completely heartless. She's actually worried right now because she needs to find Yoh before he gets into the third round of the tournament.

"Whose Yoh?" Mia asked, she remembered Hao mentioning him but she didn't know who he was.

"He's Anna's fiancé" Jun answered, "Anna is determined that Yoh will win the tournament and become Shaman King so she has set herself the task of training him"

"Yeah, even if it kills him" Manta added with a slight grin, Manta then proceeded to tell Mia about Anna's training regime and how about how it was actually a good thing she had come along because Yoh was too lazy to do anything vaguely related to training by himself.

Mia listened to all this in silence; she had thought training with Kanna and Peyote had been bad, but Manta made Anna sound about ten times worse, Mia silently hoped that Hao had not been talking about Anna when he said that she would be a lot stronger after she was done with her task.

This conversation eventually died out and everyone was silent for a while each of them thinking different thoughts.

'I wonder how Yoh and the others are doing?'

'I hope Ren is alright'

'Yoh had better still be training'

'I wonder how moms doing?' as Mia thought this she saw Manta's laptop for the first time, "Hey Manta is that yours?"

Manta followed Mia's gaze to the laptop at his feet, "Uh yeah why?"

"Can it go online?" Mia asked

"Yeah it's got one of the fastest modem speeds on the market, why do you ask?" Manta said slowly not getting her point.

"Do you mind if I use it?" Mia asked eagerly; she hadn't been in contact with her family for a while now and wanted to check up on how they were doing.

She quickly logged onto the machine and activated the web browser before accessing her email accountant. It was flooded with messages from her father mainly; it looked like he'd tried to contact her everyday, there were also a few from her brothers as well. Mia read the most recent letter from her father and her face grew serious as she read how things were going; her mother had been diagnosed with a type of cancer and her family were struggling to pay for the treatment, which wasn't exactly cheap. That was one of the reasons why Mia had decided to enter the Shaman tournament; if she won she would be able to heal her mother.

As Mia continued to read she let out a breath of relief, her mothers condition had stabilized for the moment but her father didn't know how long she would stay that way, Mia hoped that her mother would be able to hold out for a while longer, until the shaman tournament finished there was nothing she could do.

Mia then proceeded to go through the emails sent from her brothers, they had all sent her at least one, mostly they repeated much of what was said in her fathers letters but being her brothers they also threw in the occasional odd insult as well. Reading through their letters Mia realised that she actually missed her brothers.

First there was Simon, the oldest out of the three, he was probably the main cause of most of Mia's misery when she had been home. He had done everything from feeding her homework to their pet dog Pepper, to somehow moving her bed outside when she was still sleeping in it so that she woke up in the front garden when the sprinklers turned on.

Next was Richard, the middle brother, while he may not have picked on Mia as often as Simon, whenever he had decided to pull something it was usually one of the most embarrassing experiences of her life. Like the time when she had most of her friends round for a party and Richard had thought that the house should be redecorated with poster sized pictures from the family photo album which consisted mostly of Mia's baby pictures (A/N: I don't need to explain to you why this is embarrassing do I?).

Lastly there was Alex, the youngest of the three he was, strangely, the most mature, although that's not saying much. He was also more cunning than the other two in that when he pulled a prank or inconvenienced Mia in some way he made sure that he wouldn't get in trouble for it. Like the time when he had convinced Mia to play poker with him; he had managed to relieve Mia of nearly every penny she owned and Mia hadn't been able to anything about it because her parents were dead against gambling. Although to be fair Alex had given half of the money back to her, although that was after she had taught Pepper what "sick'em" meant.

Alex was also the one that constantly teased her; normally he would make fun of her choice of music but mainly he found a way to poke fun at her height because he knew that those topics would always get her angry the last one especially; Mia may have been slightly on small side for her age but she hated it when people still treated her like a child because of it, the ironic thing was whenever someone did comment on her height or treat her like she was still a child she would instantly start acting like one and this amused her brothers to no end.

Alex was also the other shaman of the family and usually the one who warned the other two whenever Kira had been about so that she wasn't able to spy on them when they were plotting.

"Are you alright?"

Mia head jerked up; she had gotten lost in her own thoughts and had forgotten about the others. She turned to see Jun who staring at her with what looked like concern in her eyes.

"hmm what did you say" Mia questioned Jun

"I asked whether you were all right, you seemed rather depressed" the older girl commented.

"I'm fine, I was just going through some of the letters my family sent me, I haven't seen them for a while and just reading about how they're doing, I kinda wish I was back home with them" Mia lapsed into silence.

"Ah, your homesick" Jun remarked

"I guess so" Mia gave a weak laugh and then continued, "I never thought that I'd miss my brothers; I mean they made my life a living hell, I never had a chance to be by myself and I was always fighting with them but…" Mia's voice trailed off

"Sounds like they really cared about you" Jun commented, at Mia's incredulous expression Jun explained, "take it from some one who knows, brothers have a hard time expressing their feelings. If they didn't care about you at all they would just ignore you, but they don't, even though I haven't met them I believe that their actions are just a way of showing that they care for you."

Mia still had the same incredulous look on her face when she spoke, "No offence but that's the worst excuse I've ever heard, there is no way my brothers made me live through hell for most of my life just because they cared about me"

Jun sighed, "Have it your way then, they're your evil older brothers who are out to get you, happy?"

"Very" Mia replied with a slight smile.

"So I can't convince you?" Mikihisa said with a tone of disappointment

"Not unless you can tell me who ordered my parents death" Haru replied

"Even if I knew I wouldn't tell you, you should not let yourself be fuelled by revenge" Miki said sadly, "but have you considered that it might have been Hao who killed your parents? You could be working with your parents murderer"

"I'm not that naïve any more Miki, I'm not the same boy you found in the woods 10 years ago, I've grown up. I checked the dates, when my parents were killed Hao was in England trying to recruit someone called Liam Diethyl, besides Hao wouldn't hire humans to do his dirty work for him that much I know" Haru replied emotionlessly

"I see, in that case I'm afraid I will have to…" Miki halted his speech as Haru raised his hand for silence.

"Just because I'm working for Hao doesn't mean I won't try to help you, I don't have anything against your son or his friends and I will help them in whatever way I can. I will also agree to your other request. I owe you that much at least." Haru finished speaking and stared levelly at Mikihisa.

Miki thought about this for a moment; what Haru was virtually offering was to spy on Hao, any extra information he could get would be vital. Miki nodded his head in agreement, "very well I suppose that will have to do" Miki then started to walk away but Haru called him back.

"Miki I have one favour to ask; don't tell Yoh or his friends that I've sided with Hao" Haru said

Although Haru couldn't see it Miki raised an eyebrow, "you don't think they have the right to know that you've to chosen to work for one of the most evil shaman ever to walk the planet?"

"Evil is a perspective Miki, I have already had this argument with you, besides they will find out in eventually but for the moment it would make everything a lot easier if you didn't tell them."

"Very well I will not tell them, but that doesn't mean they won't be able to figure it out by themselves" Miki replied.

Author: firstly major apologies for not updating but I have had a lot to do, what with college homework/coursework and also having to apply to university and as I'm applying to some US university's as well as UK ones I have twice as much to do as I normally would, but anyway excuses over I hope you liked the chapter; I was trying to develop Mia a bit so that she more likeable and that seemed to take up most of the chapter so sorry for their not being any action I will try to fit some in next chapter but you may have to wait a while for that though…

To my Reviewer(s)

I only got two reviews for my last chapter, was it that bad? Or have you all just forgotten about me? Suppose that would be my fault then really. If I'm doing something wrong here you gotta tell me I'm not physic, besides that's what reviews are for; constructive criticism so if there is anything you think is really wrong with the story or if there is something you didn't like tell me! Put it an anonymous review if you want to, I do accept them.

Mikauzoran: well I have finally updated! I hope it was worth the wait. Please tell me what you think, as you are one of my most loyal reviewers your responses are greatly appreciated. Glad you liked the last chapter (that seems like ages ago doesn't it?) I really wasn't too sure about it but your review put my fears to rest. Anyway your story is going quite well, that last chapter really shed a lot of light on things as I said in my review. I hope you don't get too snowed under with work because patience is not one of my virtues and I cannot wait for the next chapter!

Zeke Yoh Asakura: thank you for the review my friend I always appreciate whenever my readers take the time to tell me what they think. I agree about the Hao fight with Macro it wasn't really all that action packed but I wasn't really at my best that day however I will strive to add some better fight scenes into the next chapter. My story is basically a rewrite of the Shaman King story but with a few twists so Hao and Yoh will not be facing each other for a while yet I'm afraid, but I will get there in the end.

To all my other readers please REVIEW!