Disclaimer: I don't own Shaman King…

Chapter 7: The Aftermath

Manta Oyamada glanced worriedly at Yoh for the hundredth time. Ever since he had come down for breakfast that morning, he had been as silent as a statue.

His silent demeanor worried Manta. That and the fact that Yoh was emanating an aura of bitterness that could be felt by everyone around him.

Manta heard a small cough and he turned to the person next to him. Ren's eyes bored down on him.

What? Manta thought, confused. He looked around. Actually, everyone was looking at him right now, with the exception of Yoh, of course. Suddenly, realization dawned on him. They wanted him to ask Yoh what was wrong.

Great, he thought, just great.

Once again, he glanced at Yoh, whose head still hung low. Manta cleared his throat, rather loudly.

"Uh, Yoh?"

He didn't answer, just continued to stare at the cup in front of him. The cup that, up to now, he still hasn't touched, Manta observed. He tried again.

"Yoh, are you alright?"

Yoh grunted in response. Was that a yes or a no? Manta wondered. He looked at the others and shrugged.

At that moment, the girls came in. Manta sighed in relief as Utsumi sat beside Yoh. If anyone could shake him out of this, it would have to be her.

Utsumi looked at Yoh, then the others and quickly realized that something was not quite right. Gently, she touched Yoh's shoulder.

"Yoh, is something wrong?"

Just like Manta, she got no response. She frowned. This has been going on for two days now. He usually told her if he had a problem. Apparently, this time, it would not be the case.

Out of frustration, she began to shake him. This seemed to have worked for Yoh suddenly looked liked he had been splashed by a bucket of cold water, all wide-eyed and confused.

"Wha–? What are you doing, Utsumi?" he asked.

"Shaking you out of your miserable state, that's what." Ren had risen from his chair. "You look terrible, by the way."

"Yeah, man," Horo-horo joined, "what did you do? Got drunk last night?"

"What are you guys talking about? I feel fine," Yoh said in utter bewilderment.

"Yoh, you have bags under your eyes the size of Mt. Fuji," Utsumi pointed out.

Yoh rubbed his eyes, they did ache. Suddenly, he was acutely aware that everyone was staring at him worriedly, as if he would collapse or even explode any minute. He tried to shake them off.

"I'm alright, really."

Everyone looked at him, disbelievingly.

"Okay, maybe a little tired," he conceded.

Utsumi touched his arm, "Are you sure that's all?" she asked.

"Yes," he lied and instantly felt guilty. He didn't like to lie. But telling the truth right now just felt…inappropriate.

"Maybe you should get some rest."

He lowered himself onto his bed and momentarily tried to sleep. He discarded the idea right away of course. He had not been able to sleep for two days now. Sure, a couple of little drifts into the dream world but a fully-fledged slumber? No, that was out of the question.

Yoh wished Manta and the others had just left him alone. He already felt bad as it was and besides, he didn't want them to join him in his misery. He closed his eyes for a moment before abruptly opening them again. Dammit! He jumped up from the bed. He had to something about this.

He sighed. He did try to do something. Unfortunately, Anna was the one who didn't want anything to be done. Ever since the night of the dinner, he tried everything for them to talk again. He looked for her everywhere, but Anna avoided him somehow. He even asked Silva to see what room she was staying. Incredibly, she wasn't listed.

Yoh groaned in frustration. He wished he did punch that guy…what was his name? Keiji? Yeah, that's right. He gave himself a momentary pleasure of imagining Keiji underneath his fist.

In his mind, he was already giving him the uppercut when Silva entered the room. Reluctantly, he let go of his little daydream.

"How come you guys never knock when you enter a room?" Yoh asked dully.

"We do knock. I just forget from time to time." Silva took in Yoh's appearance. "You better take a bath."

Yoh ran his hand through his hair, "Yes, I know I look terrible. I'll take a shower later."

"You should probably do it now."

Looking curiously at him Yoh asked, "Why?"

"Because you're going to meet an important shaman in half an hour," Silva responded.

Yoh frowned, obviously not pleased, "I'm not in the mood to meet anyone right now."

"Is that so?"

"Yes."

For some reason, Silva was very amused, "Are you sure? Like I said, he's very important."

"I don't care," Yoh said bitterly. He threw himself back into the bed.

"Alright, I'll tell him but I think Master Shotoku will be very disappointed." Silva began to move towards the door.

Master Shotoku? Something inside Yoh's head clicked. He turned his head and asked Silva, "What's his name, again?"

Silva stopped and faced Yoh, his amusement now very evident. "I was wondering when you were going to ask that question," he said, "His name is Morihiro Shotoku. He's called 'Master' by many."

Yoh mentally shook his head. Where had he heard that name before?

"Anna arrived with him, as well as the boy you had mentioned."

Suddenly, Yoh's mind went back their encounter in the hallway, that guy, Keiji, had said Master Shotoku's already in our rooms, he wants to talk to you.

Yoh felt like he had just been electrocuted. "He knows Anna?" he asked the obvious.

"Yes. I assume he does."

Yoh practically skipped towards the bathroom. "How much time did you say I had?" he asked as removed his shirt.

Silva almost laughed at him, "I thought you said you didn't want to meet him?"

Yoh looked at him as if he was crazy. This time Silva did laugh. "Thirty minutes, but we already spent ten minutes talking so­–"

"Twenty minutes. Got it."

He didn't realize he was hungry after all. It took all his effort not to wolf down everything in front of him. Instead, Yoh observed the man in front of him. Funny, he expected someone older, with lots of white hair and even balding, like his grandfather. But Master Shotoku still had his hair and only a few white ones at that.

"So… what did you want to talk about?"

Shotoku looked up from his teacup, his eyes twinkling. "Nothing, really. I just thought we could have a nice little chat. How are you holding up?"

Yoh was taken aback, "What do you mean?"

Shotoku began buttering a roll, "How are you holding up as Shaman King?"

Yoh took a drink from his own cup before answering, "Fine, I guess." He drummed his fingers against the wooden table. Finally, he decided not to beat around the bush any further.

"Look, you may have come here for a chat but I didn't."

Shotoku smiled at him, "I knew that," he said.

Yoh was confused for a second, "You did?"

"Yes, of course. I'm not stupid."

"I'm not saying you are," Yoh said quickly, "Sorry, though."

Shotoku laughed, "You, by far, are the most amusing Shaman King this world has ever had."

"Thanks, I guess." Yoh said wryly.

"Oh, right, right," Shotoku said, wiping his eyes, "let's go down to business, shall we? What did you want to talk about?"

Yoh took a deep breath, "Anna."

Shotoku poured himself and Yoh another cup of tea, "Oh yes, I'm very fond of that girl, you know."

"Is she alright?"

Stirring his tea, Shotoku said, "Of course she is, why wouldn't she be?"

Yoh watched the circular motion Shotoku was making with his hand, "We talked about two nights ago and–"

"Oh, that's right, Anna told me about your little talk."

I wouldn't call our talk 'little', Yoh thought, "She told you about that?"

"Yes."

Yoh waited, but he did not supply any more information. "And?" he prompted.

"There is no 'and'."

Leaning back against his chair, Yoh sighed. This was going to take some work, not to mention a lot of patience. Either Anna spent too much time with this guy, or vice-versa, he thought. Out loud, he said, "I need to talk to her."

Shotoku fixed him with a look. "I'm afraid she doesn't want to talk to you," he said.

"I thought you said there was no 'and'," Yoh uttered.

"I didn't think this qualified as an 'and'."

"Yes, it does," Yoh said exasperatedly.

"Very well, then." Shotoku wiped his hands with his tablecloth and folded them in front of him, "Anna told me about your talk two nights ago and didn't want to talk to you again." His eyes were twinkling; he was obviously playing with him.

Under normal circumstances, Yoh would have laughed. But the situation right now was far from normal. He was tired, he hadn't slept for two days and his stomach wanted some attention. Actually, he was barely functioning at all.

"If Anna's mad at me then can't she give me the chance to say I'm sorry?" Yoh asked, almost pleadingly.

"She's not mad at you, my boy," Shotoku's eyes were now more serious, it even lost some of its twinkle. But Yoh wasn't really paying attention to that; he was more interested in what he was saying.

"She's not?" Yoh found that hard to believe. She looked pretty mad. Furthermore, if she wasn't, then why didn't she want to talk to him?

However, Shotoku confirmed his answer with a nod. "You shouldn't think much about it, she thinks this is for your own good. Frankly, I do, too."

"My own good?" Yoh repeated in disbelief. Somehow, that was also hard to believe. "So, telling me my friends and I are unimportant even though we went through a lot together is for my own good, huh?" he said sarcastically. Shotoku looked at him blankly.

"That's what she said. She said that was the reason she came here in the first place." Yoh said in a resigned tone.

"What on earth made you think that you were the reason she came to the Shaman Convention?"

Yoh looked up, meeting Shotoku squarely in the eye. "What?" he asked, now more confused than ever.

Shotoku sighed, as if a task was before him and he didn't want to do it. "Anna didn't come here for you; a more important reason presented itself for her to come. As much as possible, she didn't want to see you at all. You presented too many complications."

The Shaman King was silent. For a while all that could be heard from the room was the soft clinking of china as Shotoku busied himself with the drinks and avoided Yoh's eyes. When he offered Yoh his drink, he took it, stirring it in an almost robotic function.

"You won't tell me why, would you?" Yoh asked, although he already knew the answer.

"No, I'm afraid."

Yoh proceeded to stare at the clock right above Shotoku's head. He concentrated on timing the beating of his heart to that of the clock. It could help him calm down. But his head was already starting to hurt so he gave it up.

"So, who's that Keiji guy?"

If Shotoku noticed the abrupt change in the subject, he did not voice any objections. He would have done the same, anyway.

"One of my closest, well, I won't say disciple, but he's been with me for a long time," he explained, "I have trained him since he was a child. Amazing, isn't it?"

"I guess," Yoh said listlessly, "he and Anna seem very, uh, close."

"Keiji cares very much for Anna. I suppose it's she's one of the few persons in my place that's his age. Nevertheless, he's very protective." Shotoku said wistfully, "You have a girlfriend, I'm sure you know the feeling."

"No offense, but I think he's a jerk," Yoh said, without thinking.

"Well, if you give him a reason to, he could be one."

Yoh thought about it. Actually he did give him a reason. He touched his precious Anna. I guess that did it.

Shotoku turned around his chair to look at the clock Yoh had been staring at earlier.

"My, my, we've been here a little too long, haven't we? Very sorry, I don't want to keep you from your other duties," he said cheerfully. Yoh wondered if he did have other things to do today. He had cleared everything with Silva as far as he knew.

"Now tell me, how are your security measures?"

Now that question, Yoh wasn't expecting. "I'm sorry, what was that?" he wondered if he had heard right.

Shotoku was dusting the crumbs off his clothes as he repeated quite casually, "Your security measures, how are they?"

"Fine, I suppose. Silva would have told me if anything was wrong." Yoh answered.

Shotoku stood up from his chair. Apparently, he was already leaving. As he passed Yoh's chair, he leaned beside him and whispered, "Always be careful, do you understand?"

He didn't give time for Yoh to answer as he swept the room towards the door and opened it. "Well, it was a nice chat, wasn't it? I'm glad you agreed to it. We should repeat it sometime. I'll see you later." Shotoku waved gleefully and left.

Yoh, however didn't leave right away. He remained frozen in his seat, thinking that it hadn't been a 'little chat' after all. No, it was far from it.

a/n: Hey guys, thanks for all those reviews. I really appreciate it! I'm sorry if I'm only updating one chapter at a time. I was supposed to do it by two, but I got real busy. Really sorry about that. Anyway, this is my new longest chapter ever! I just wanted to ask if its okay for you guys that the chapters are getting a lot longer, I'll cut it of you have a problem with that. Oh yeah, please answer this one, is there a Shaman King Movie? I really want to know so I can buy it…