Hikaru No Go Fan Fiction ❯ Unfinished Game ❯ Unfinished Game ( Chapter 1 )
[ A - All Readers ]
By: Rykatu 
May 5th. Akari finds an unfinished game in Hikaru's room, but Hikaru is nowhere to be found. When she plays a single move, she finds she must play the game to the end.
Anime/Manga: Hikaru No Go Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Suspense / Mystery | Type: One Shot | Uploaded On: 09.28.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 4.5K | Visits: 1.2K | Status: Completed
May 5th. Akari finds an unfinished game in Hikaru's room, but Hikaru is nowhere to be found. When she plays a single move, she finds she must play the game to the end.
Anime/Manga: Hikaru No Go Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Suspense / Mystery | Type: One Shot | Uploaded On: 09.28.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 4.5K | Visits: 1.2K | Status: Completed
Unfinished Game
by Lucathia
Disclaimer: I do not own Hikaru no Go.
Word count: ~3710
-----
"Hikaru?" The girl called out at the foot of the stairs. "Your mother said that I'd find you in your room."
She called out his name again, but still, there was no response.
"I'm coming up then! Don't say I didn't warn you!" The lavender-haired girl took to the steps, holding onto the handrails for support.
"Hika-"
When she opened the door, a cold breeze blew past her.
The name died on her lips.
On May 5th, four years after their junior high school graduation when they had officially parted their ways, Fujisaki Akari found herself staring at an empty room, curtains billowing, go stones scattered, and an unfinished go game in the midst of it all.
Hikaru was nowhere in sight.
-----
Once upon a time, Fujisaki Akari could have claimed that she knew Shindou Hikaru the best. They were childhood friends who had met because of their mothers, and despite one being a girl and one being a boy, it hadn’t mattered when the other choice had been boring adult talk. Hikaru often pulled her to places to explore and she followed. The time when he decided to dig through his grandfather’s attic to find something to sell had been no different. Except, soon afterwards, Hikaru found a world that she couldn't follow into even though she tried.
"Fujisaki-san," murmured a sudden voice from behind her.
She jumped, her heart beating fast, but she tried to calm herself down when she saw who it was. She almost chuckled as a sudden thought seized her.
"Touya-san! I'm glad to see you,” exclaimed Akari. “Seems like Hikaru was right about the fact that you always appear out of nowhere."
The boy behind her blinked and laughed softly. "I suppose I do." Then, his eyes hardened. "Actually, I came here to ask you about Shindou."
Akari frowned, her hands tightened around her purse. She had hoped, after all, that at least Touya would have known Hikaru's whereabouts. But from his question, it didn't seem likely. If so, where had Hikaru gone?
"I..." began Akari. She didn't know what she wanted to say, or what she could ask to help the situation.
Touya just continued.
"Shindou hasn't been to any of his scheduled games. He hasn't shown up at any of the study sessions with his study group. He hasn't come to my father's salon even once, despite the fact that he agreed to play me on Monday." His eyes fired up. "Where did he disappear off to?"
That was what she wanted to know too.
"I've checked a few places at Hiroshima among other places where he was likely to turn up, but he wasn't there."
Akari gulped, her eyes downcast. "And why..." She glanced up. "Why do you think I'd know where he is?"
Touya gazed at her, his eyes sharp. "You know about the incident five years ago when Shindou stopped playing go." It wasn't a question, but rather a fact. "It happened around this time of the year too. You saw the effects on him."
She nodded.
"Is the same thing happening to him now? Did he run away from go again?"
Akari shook her head, her pigtails swinging about. "I-I don't know. Why would I know?"
Touya gripped her shoulders so hard that it hurt. She was about to tell him to stop it when his eyes locked onto hers, demanding an answer.
"Then tell me. Why did you remove his go board from his room?"
-----
She didn't quite remember what the first thing she did was. She might have gone to the window to peer down, somehow having the nagging feeling that Hikaru might have jumped out of the window, though she didn't have it in her to believe that Hikaru was suicidal. Why would he be? Though, to be honest, she didn't have a clue about what Hikaru was like nowadays. She might have knelt down to pick up the scattered go stones to put them back in their goke since the containers for the white and black stones had been knocked over. She might have tried to clean off the unfinished game, though she must have paused to study it beforehand.
She didn't quite remember. She only remembered feeling numb, and for no reason whatsoever. Hikaru just wasn't in his room, right? His mother must have been wrong about Hikaru’s being in his room. Just because the go stones where scattered all over the place didn't mean that anything was wrong. She was only shivering because of the opened window.
That was it. The opened window. She remembered that she did indeed walk over to the window, and perhaps she did look out tentatively, but she closed it quickly after seeing nothing out of the ordinary, just some decorations on the streets and fluttering flags on the buildings for Children's Day.
Then, she put the scattered go stones back in their goke. Afterwards, she studied the go board a bit, though she couldn't make much out of it. The game didn't look exactly finished, but she wasn't good enough at reading it to tell which side had been winning. She was able to notice, however, that there was one spot where black was in atari.
She didn't know what possessed her at that moment to pick up one of the white stones that she had been putting away. She held it between her index finger and her middle finger, and raised her hand to put it down.
The stone connected with the board with a resonating patchi.
And then, the entire board seemed to glow.
Akari's eyes widened. She backed away from the table as she again felt the cool breeze from before. Her eyes darted to the window, but she was sure that it was closed. Her glance confirmed it. Her eyes darted back to the go board, noticing that the glow seemed to have dimmed.
The pulse of light had been triggered when she put the go stone down.
She wasn't about to try it again. Her hands trembled. This was an unfinished game after all, and it wasn't hers to play. She reached out, determined to take that stone back, to return the game back to its former state.
However, when she touched the stone, she found out that no matter how much she pulled, the stone just wouldn't come off the board.
She couldn't remove it!
Horrified, she grabbed the go board by the sides.
It...the go board...the...it was just magnetic, right? That would explain why it'd be so hard to pull the stone off the board...but...
She started panicking again.
It didn't explain why it was impossible to pull the go stone off. Besides, she was pretty sure that the stone she had been holding before wasn't magnetic.
She gulped, trying to calm herself down. She stared at the go board. In the next moment, she flipped the entire thing over.
Plink.
She stared.
Only one black stone fell from the board.
It was the stone that she had just captured.
-----
"L-let go of me. You're hurting me," she whispered, wincing at his iron grip. She glanced at his fathomless eyes, frightened by his look of intensity. She didn't know that he could look like that outside of playing go.
And, like the gentleman that he was, he let go of her as she asked without shaking her further, trying to regain his composure.
"Please," was his last word before he closed his eyes, letting his long bangs shadow his face.
She rubbed her shoulders. "It's true that I don't know where Hikaru is," she murmured. "I have no idea what's going on. I don't know how this connects with his reluctance to play go five years ago. I don't know if he's doing the same thing again. I don't know anything of importance." Her voice was distressed.
She paused.
"The only thing I do know..."
She glanced at Touya, whose sharp eyes opened to stare at her, waiting.
"The only thing I do know is that there is something wrong with the game that I found unfinished on Hikaru's go board."
-----
She asked Hikaru's mom several times if she were sure that Hikaru had been in his room before revealing that she hadn't been able to find him there. Hikaru's mom was confused, though she quickly assumed that maybe he did walk out without her noticing. Akari pursed her lips before deciding to ask Hikaru's mom if she could borrow Hikaru's go board.
"Oh, go right ahead. I'm sorry that he skipped out on your lesson. Perhaps he headed back to his own apartment after finding what he needed. You came here for some tutoring, right dear?"
Akari nodded. "I've thought about joining the college go club, and thought that I could use some more practice. And, I wanted to invite Hikaru to our mini go club reunion."
At the thought of their junior high school go club, Mitani and Tsutsui's images came to mind. Her helplessness immediately seized upon the idea of asking them for help, even though they weren’t meeting until two days later.
She bowed. "Sorry for troubling you, Shindou-san. I'll be leaving now."
"Oh, you weren't a trouble at all. You're welcome here anytime."
Akari went back upstairs, steadying herself along the rails, almost not wanting to see that deserted scene again. She picked up the two goke and placed them in her bag. Then she glanced at the go board, at the unfinished game laid out mockingly before her.
Her hand reached towards it, barely touching it before she retracted her touch, as if the barest touch could get her shocked with electricity.
She put a clamp on her nervousness, grabbing the go board and bounding off the stairs in a hurry.
"Bye, Shindou-san! Thanks for having me over!"
Hikaru's mom looked up, confused at Akari's sudden rush to leave.
-----
"This way," Akari murmured, guiding Touya towards Haze Junior High, which was uncharacteristically deserted due to Golden Week. None of the students had class this week, hence why the old go club had decided it was fine to meet there for their reunion since they wouldn't be disrupting the other students.
Touya paused at the threshold, glancing around.
"This is, if I remember correctly, Shindou's junior high school. Why are you bringing me here, of all places?"
Akari continued walking, not pausing at all as she answered his question.
"I've brought the go board here, that's why. We planned to have a mini reunion for the go club, so I brought it here. I thought, the more opinions, the better."
She spun around, her hair trailing around behind her, as she smiled wryly.
"If you hadn't come to find me, you know, I would have gone to find you."
-----
She showed Touya into the old science classroom, and quietly headed over to the cabinets. Sliding the cabinets open, she took out the board, her eyes roaming over the stones worriedly once again.
A voice from behind sounded over her shoulders. “That’s the game?”
Akari nodded and scooted over to where there was more open space. She placed the goban between them. She waved a hand over the board and spoke.
“This was what I found in Hikaru’s room. I noticed that black was in atari here.” She leaned over a bit to point to the right side of the board. “I don’t know why I did it, but I played white and captured the black stone without thinking.”
Touya nodded, his eyes still scanning over the game. “White was most likely in atari two hands earlier. This is a ko situation, actually.”Akari blinked. "Oh."
“I recognize black’s style,” murmured Touya, his expression thoughtful. “And I shouldn’t be wrong about this, since you did find this in Shindou’s room. Shindou played black here, though this style isn’t as mature as his is at the moment. Perhaps Shindou was replaying an old game.”
She nodded. Touya’s musings made sense. “But who played white then?” she asked.
Touya frowned. “That…style I recognize too. It’s none other than…”
Touya broke his gaze away from the game, never finishing his sentence.
-----
They sat in near silence, Akari quietly murmuring to herself what she knew of the situation.
“When I captured the black stone, I was able to remove it," she said to herself. "But the rest, I couldn’t remove the rest of the stones.”
His eyes, on the other hand, slid over the game once more. “This is quite…extraordinary.”
His hand moved suddenly, taking a black stone out of the goke. It resounded soundly throughout the room as it made contact with the goban.
Once again, the temperature fell a few degrees, and they were blinded by light.
Akari stared at him and he in turn stared at his hand, then at the board. When their eyes met, they were wide with confusion and a dash of fear.
-----
When Mitani and Tsutsui found them an hour later, Akari and Touya were still kneeled next to the goban in very much the same position as before.
Akari quickly explained what had happened, though her voice was shaky.
Next to them, Mitani took a white stone and tried to place it on the board.
The stone repelled from the board and hit Tsutsui on the head.
And they had no choice but to believe that something was indeed horribly wrong.
“It’s cursed,” was their first thought.
Tsutsui, though often unconfident, was actually a reliable senpai, one who anyone would turn to in times of despair. He straightened his glasses and found in himself a thread of courage and voiced what no one else wanted to say, or perhaps, hadn’t noticed yet.
“It seems that Akari is the only one who can play white because she already played with white. If I’m assuming correctly, the same goes for black, so only Touya-san can play black.”
He looked at the two.
“I don’t know and don’t understand what’s going on, but only you two can finish the game.”
-----
What would finishing the game entail?
Akari didn’t know.
But where else would they find the clue to Hikaru’s disappearance?
The game was key.
The dark, piercing eyes across the board from her agreed.
-----
"Onegaishimasu."
-----
Th ey found out quickly that Touya could not advise Akari at all. Whenever he even tried to help her, he’d start coughing and coughing. So, Touya stopped trying to advise her, instead focusing his entire attention on his own moves.
Akari was at a lost. Touya was a 9-dan. She, on the other hand, was a mere amateur. She couldn’t even read the game, so had actually no idea what was going on and who was winning. She couldn’t even fathom what move she should’ve made next.
Next to her, Tsutsui flipped madly through his rule book and his collection of kifu, his glasses glinting as he searched for help. Mitani quietly stood next to her, his eyes intent on the game.
Why did Akari feel that Hikaru’s life was on the line? Why did Akari feel that there was absolutely no room for failure?
Anyone else would have done better in her position. One of Hikaru's professional go friends. Anyone.
But Hikaru was her childhood friend, and since she, along with Touya, who were the only ones who could play this game, she was determined to get to the bottom of this mystery. She grasped a cool white stone in her hands, and listened to the murmurings of all those who supported her with her eyes closed. Tsutsui advised her to strengthen the right hand side, while Mitani whispered to her about the danger the bottom right hand cluster was in. Another whisper told her in a soft but strong voice, 13-10, and her hand reached over, extending the three white stones by one, cutting off the advance of the black stones in the middle.
She heard a gasp from across from her, and she opened her eyes to see a shocked Touya. He gripped a black stone in his hand, shaking hand, corrected Akari in her mind, almost surprised at her own observation, and his face was pale. He glanced up at her, his eyes full of questions, but he made no comment as he placed his stone on 19-14, capturing her white stone that had been in atari, the ko fight on the right forever in a battle that wouldn't end, one atari following the other. Touya slowly reached over. All of them held their breath in, waiting as he took the captured white stone, dropping it onto his lid.
Plink.
Another stone removed.
They released their breaths. The game continued.
16-19, said the assuring voice, and Akari followed. Tsutsui's eyes widened at the brilliance of the move, the connected white stones stronger than ever. Mitani was likewise surprised, as the upper right hand side was now almost completely white's territory.
Touya only stared in amazement, his fear and nervousness still present, but overcome by his awe.
"Sai," he whispered, and Akari stared at him in incomprehension.
"He said he'd tell me someday," Touya continued, though it didn't explain a thing to Akari. "But he never did. When exactly is someday?" he wondered and placed his stone on 19-12, forming an eye on the right.
19-15, whispered the voice, and Akari placed another stone in the very place that she had placed the first stone, the stone that had roped her into the game. The ko fight continued. "Why haven't you asked him?" asked Akari as she gingerly took the captured black stone, dropping it into the lid of her goke.
Plink.
"Someday," he repeated, "I'm waiting for that someday."
Touya chose to play on 1-5 as his ko threat, connecting the black stones on the left.
Tsutsui and Mitani were on her side, and even though they weren't pros, thought Akari, at least they knew more than she did, and so she followed their advice. 1-6, came the whisper, and Akari noticed that she had made a move right above Touya's previous move. She supposed that it had something to do with strengthening her own stones on the bottom left.
Touya looked grim, though his eyes were intent, and once again he returned to the never-ending ko battle on the upper right. With 19-14 he took another white stone as his prisoner.
Plink.
18-13, she played. 18-5, he countered.
19-15. The ko battle continued. She had put herself in atari once again with that move, she noted. She dropped another black stone in her lid.
Plink.
8-14, and the black stones connected, the lone stone and the three on the right becoming one. But it was merely another mild ko threat.
8-16, said the voice. Akari noted that an attack to that formidable wall formed by the black stones was probably a good thing. She dropped the captured black stone in her lid, another strong eye formed in the midst of the enemy.
Plink.
"And so it continues," whispered Touya as he played on 19-14, neither of them wishing to let the other win the ko fight. Another white stone captured, and yet the game was still in white's favor.
Plink.
16-2. The bottom right was all black's territory, but white was heading in.
14-3, countered black, Touya's expression hard. He wasn't letting go of the bottom without a fight.
A pattern formed. Two moves, and then a battle for the stones forever stuck in ko.
19-15. The white stone resounded heavily on the board, and Akari's trembling hands once again reached over to take the black stone prisoner.
Repeat and repeat.
Plink.
6-11. The black stones on the left connected, threatening white's territory.
7-10. Seven white stones connected.
19-14. Touya dropped another white stone in his lid.
Plink.
10-8. It was all going so fast, Akari found it hard to follow.
9-6. Another white prisoner.
Plink.
19-15 continued the never-ending ko battle. Akari at least knew that much. She took the black stone.
Plink.
6-7, was Touya's move, 6-6, was Akari's as she placed her stone right below Touya's and took another black stone as prisoner.
Plink.
Touya returned to the right hand side, not letting go of the ko battle.
With 19-14, he took another white stone. Slowly, he dropped the captured stone in his lid.
Plink.
And he raised his eyes to look at Akari.
-----
Akari hadn't noticed it, but they had been well into the endgame quite a few moves back.
Their moves were fast and smooth, back and forth. Akari never noticed it either that while she had been focused entirely on the game, playing like a person possessed, more people had showed up. All of them--Kaneko, Natsume, Koike, Kumiko, and even Kaga--were staring at the game in awe. Tsutsui tried to explain, but none of them really knew what was actually going on, especially not Akari.
19-6, another challenge to the black stones on the bottom, a weak ko threat, easily defeated by black's next move at 19-5, and the white stone was immediately taken.
Plink.
19-15. Akari was a bit exasperated with the ongoing ko battle. It felt a bit childish to her actually, that both of them kept going for the same spot, never letting the other conquer the territory, and yet, both were unwilling to end the ko fight with a simple move.
Another black stone was gone from the board.
She dropped it onto her lid.
Plink.
The sound resounded throughout the entire room.
Akari waited for Touya's next move, but when none came, she raised her gaze only to stare at Touya who had his face covered with one hand.
"Wha-" she began but stopped when she noticed that Touya was shaking.
"What do you think will happen if I resign?" he murmured quietly. "Why do I have a feeling that it'll all be over if I lose?"
Akari blinked, shocked at his words, until a cold wind made her shiver and look away from him.
Thank you, came the whisper, and Akari spun around, for now that she wasn't concentrated on the game anymore, she noticed that the voice didn't belong to Mitani or Tsutsui at all. She was surprised to find all of the club members behind her, but the voice didn't belong to them either. It was a deep but soft voice, one that she had never heard before.
Her vision was invaded by purple in that bright light, and for a moment she thought she saw a tall figure behind her, but when the light faded, she tried to convince herself that all that purple she had just seen must have been her own hair blinding her as she spun around.
Akari-chan, let Hikaru return.
And suddenly, Akari opened her mouth, knowing exactly what she needed to do.
"I resign."
-----
"Why Akari? When you could've had Sai?"
------
The curtains fluttered, a gentle breeze flowing through the classroom, warm sunlight streaming into the room now and then. The captured stones lay peacefully in the two lids next to the goban, the go stones finally released from the interlocked battle splayed across the board.
Thank you. Kami-sama, thank you for letting me finish my last game.
-----the end-----
*game based on the semi-finals for the 17th NEC Cup played by Cho Chikun (white) and Kobayashi Satoru (black), both 9-dan. This is the game that the beginning moves played in volume fifteen chapter 124 (when Sai disappears) is modeled after, but of course, I took liberties with it.
*I don't know how to play go very well, so there may be errors with my descriptions the game.
*written for the blind_go livejournal community
*comments, reviews, criticism all greatly appreciated!
by Lucathia
Disclaimer: I do not own Hikaru no Go.
Word count: ~3710
-----
"Hikaru?" The girl called out at the foot of the stairs. "Your mother said that I'd find you in your room."
She called out his name again, but still, there was no response.
"I'm coming up then! Don't say I didn't warn you!" The lavender-haired girl took to the steps, holding onto the handrails for support.
"Hika-"
When she opened the door, a cold breeze blew past her.
The name died on her lips.
On May 5th, four years after their junior high school graduation when they had officially parted their ways, Fujisaki Akari found herself staring at an empty room, curtains billowing, go stones scattered, and an unfinished go game in the midst of it all.
Hikaru was nowhere in sight.
-----
Once upon a time, Fujisaki Akari could have claimed that she knew Shindou Hikaru the best. They were childhood friends who had met because of their mothers, and despite one being a girl and one being a boy, it hadn’t mattered when the other choice had been boring adult talk. Hikaru often pulled her to places to explore and she followed. The time when he decided to dig through his grandfather’s attic to find something to sell had been no different. Except, soon afterwards, Hikaru found a world that she couldn't follow into even though she tried.
"Fujisaki-san," murmured a sudden voice from behind her.
She jumped, her heart beating fast, but she tried to calm herself down when she saw who it was. She almost chuckled as a sudden thought seized her.
"Touya-san! I'm glad to see you,” exclaimed Akari. “Seems like Hikaru was right about the fact that you always appear out of nowhere."
The boy behind her blinked and laughed softly. "I suppose I do." Then, his eyes hardened. "Actually, I came here to ask you about Shindou."
Akari frowned, her hands tightened around her purse. She had hoped, after all, that at least Touya would have known Hikaru's whereabouts. But from his question, it didn't seem likely. If so, where had Hikaru gone?
"I..." began Akari. She didn't know what she wanted to say, or what she could ask to help the situation.
Touya just continued.
"Shindou hasn't been to any of his scheduled games. He hasn't shown up at any of the study sessions with his study group. He hasn't come to my father's salon even once, despite the fact that he agreed to play me on Monday." His eyes fired up. "Where did he disappear off to?"
That was what she wanted to know too.
"I've checked a few places at Hiroshima among other places where he was likely to turn up, but he wasn't there."
Akari gulped, her eyes downcast. "And why..." She glanced up. "Why do you think I'd know where he is?"
Touya gazed at her, his eyes sharp. "You know about the incident five years ago when Shindou stopped playing go." It wasn't a question, but rather a fact. "It happened around this time of the year too. You saw the effects on him."
She nodded.
"Is the same thing happening to him now? Did he run away from go again?"
Akari shook her head, her pigtails swinging about. "I-I don't know. Why would I know?"
Touya gripped her shoulders so hard that it hurt. She was about to tell him to stop it when his eyes locked onto hers, demanding an answer.
"Then tell me. Why did you remove his go board from his room?"
-----
She didn't quite remember what the first thing she did was. She might have gone to the window to peer down, somehow having the nagging feeling that Hikaru might have jumped out of the window, though she didn't have it in her to believe that Hikaru was suicidal. Why would he be? Though, to be honest, she didn't have a clue about what Hikaru was like nowadays. She might have knelt down to pick up the scattered go stones to put them back in their goke since the containers for the white and black stones had been knocked over. She might have tried to clean off the unfinished game, though she must have paused to study it beforehand.
She didn't quite remember. She only remembered feeling numb, and for no reason whatsoever. Hikaru just wasn't in his room, right? His mother must have been wrong about Hikaru’s being in his room. Just because the go stones where scattered all over the place didn't mean that anything was wrong. She was only shivering because of the opened window.
That was it. The opened window. She remembered that she did indeed walk over to the window, and perhaps she did look out tentatively, but she closed it quickly after seeing nothing out of the ordinary, just some decorations on the streets and fluttering flags on the buildings for Children's Day.
Then, she put the scattered go stones back in their goke. Afterwards, she studied the go board a bit, though she couldn't make much out of it. The game didn't look exactly finished, but she wasn't good enough at reading it to tell which side had been winning. She was able to notice, however, that there was one spot where black was in atari.
She didn't know what possessed her at that moment to pick up one of the white stones that she had been putting away. She held it between her index finger and her middle finger, and raised her hand to put it down.
The stone connected with the board with a resonating patchi.
And then, the entire board seemed to glow.
Akari's eyes widened. She backed away from the table as she again felt the cool breeze from before. Her eyes darted to the window, but she was sure that it was closed. Her glance confirmed it. Her eyes darted back to the go board, noticing that the glow seemed to have dimmed.
The pulse of light had been triggered when she put the go stone down.
She wasn't about to try it again. Her hands trembled. This was an unfinished game after all, and it wasn't hers to play. She reached out, determined to take that stone back, to return the game back to its former state.
However, when she touched the stone, she found out that no matter how much she pulled, the stone just wouldn't come off the board.
She couldn't remove it!
Horrified, she grabbed the go board by the sides.
It...the go board...the...it was just magnetic, right? That would explain why it'd be so hard to pull the stone off the board...but...
She started panicking again.
It didn't explain why it was impossible to pull the go stone off. Besides, she was pretty sure that the stone she had been holding before wasn't magnetic.
She gulped, trying to calm herself down. She stared at the go board. In the next moment, she flipped the entire thing over.
Plink.
She stared.
Only one black stone fell from the board.
It was the stone that she had just captured.
-----
"L-let go of me. You're hurting me," she whispered, wincing at his iron grip. She glanced at his fathomless eyes, frightened by his look of intensity. She didn't know that he could look like that outside of playing go.
And, like the gentleman that he was, he let go of her as she asked without shaking her further, trying to regain his composure.
"Please," was his last word before he closed his eyes, letting his long bangs shadow his face.
She rubbed her shoulders. "It's true that I don't know where Hikaru is," she murmured. "I have no idea what's going on. I don't know how this connects with his reluctance to play go five years ago. I don't know if he's doing the same thing again. I don't know anything of importance." Her voice was distressed.
She paused.
"The only thing I do know..."
She glanced at Touya, whose sharp eyes opened to stare at her, waiting.
"The only thing I do know is that there is something wrong with the game that I found unfinished on Hikaru's go board."
-----
She asked Hikaru's mom several times if she were sure that Hikaru had been in his room before revealing that she hadn't been able to find him there. Hikaru's mom was confused, though she quickly assumed that maybe he did walk out without her noticing. Akari pursed her lips before deciding to ask Hikaru's mom if she could borrow Hikaru's go board.
"Oh, go right ahead. I'm sorry that he skipped out on your lesson. Perhaps he headed back to his own apartment after finding what he needed. You came here for some tutoring, right dear?"
Akari nodded. "I've thought about joining the college go club, and thought that I could use some more practice. And, I wanted to invite Hikaru to our mini go club reunion."
At the thought of their junior high school go club, Mitani and Tsutsui's images came to mind. Her helplessness immediately seized upon the idea of asking them for help, even though they weren’t meeting until two days later.
She bowed. "Sorry for troubling you, Shindou-san. I'll be leaving now."
"Oh, you weren't a trouble at all. You're welcome here anytime."
Akari went back upstairs, steadying herself along the rails, almost not wanting to see that deserted scene again. She picked up the two goke and placed them in her bag. Then she glanced at the go board, at the unfinished game laid out mockingly before her.
Her hand reached towards it, barely touching it before she retracted her touch, as if the barest touch could get her shocked with electricity.
She put a clamp on her nervousness, grabbing the go board and bounding off the stairs in a hurry.
"Bye, Shindou-san! Thanks for having me over!"
Hikaru's mom looked up, confused at Akari's sudden rush to leave.
-----
"This way," Akari murmured, guiding Touya towards Haze Junior High, which was uncharacteristically deserted due to Golden Week. None of the students had class this week, hence why the old go club had decided it was fine to meet there for their reunion since they wouldn't be disrupting the other students.
Touya paused at the threshold, glancing around.
"This is, if I remember correctly, Shindou's junior high school. Why are you bringing me here, of all places?"
Akari continued walking, not pausing at all as she answered his question.
"I've brought the go board here, that's why. We planned to have a mini reunion for the go club, so I brought it here. I thought, the more opinions, the better."
She spun around, her hair trailing around behind her, as she smiled wryly.
"If you hadn't come to find me, you know, I would have gone to find you."
-----
She showed Touya into the old science classroom, and quietly headed over to the cabinets. Sliding the cabinets open, she took out the board, her eyes roaming over the stones worriedly once again.
A voice from behind sounded over her shoulders. “That’s the game?”
Akari nodded and scooted over to where there was more open space. She placed the goban between them. She waved a hand over the board and spoke.
“This was what I found in Hikaru’s room. I noticed that black was in atari here.” She leaned over a bit to point to the right side of the board. “I don’t know why I did it, but I played white and captured the black stone without thinking.”
Touya nodded, his eyes still scanning over the game. “White was most likely in atari two hands earlier. This is a ko situation, actually.”Akari blinked. "Oh."
“I recognize black’s style,” murmured Touya, his expression thoughtful. “And I shouldn’t be wrong about this, since you did find this in Shindou’s room. Shindou played black here, though this style isn’t as mature as his is at the moment. Perhaps Shindou was replaying an old game.”
She nodded. Touya’s musings made sense. “But who played white then?” she asked.
Touya frowned. “That…style I recognize too. It’s none other than…”
Touya broke his gaze away from the game, never finishing his sentence.
-----
They sat in near silence, Akari quietly murmuring to herself what she knew of the situation.
“When I captured the black stone, I was able to remove it," she said to herself. "But the rest, I couldn’t remove the rest of the stones.”
His eyes, on the other hand, slid over the game once more. “This is quite…extraordinary.”
His hand moved suddenly, taking a black stone out of the goke. It resounded soundly throughout the room as it made contact with the goban.
Once again, the temperature fell a few degrees, and they were blinded by light.
Akari stared at him and he in turn stared at his hand, then at the board. When their eyes met, they were wide with confusion and a dash of fear.
-----
When Mitani and Tsutsui found them an hour later, Akari and Touya were still kneeled next to the goban in very much the same position as before.
Akari quickly explained what had happened, though her voice was shaky.
Next to them, Mitani took a white stone and tried to place it on the board.
The stone repelled from the board and hit Tsutsui on the head.
And they had no choice but to believe that something was indeed horribly wrong.
“It’s cursed,” was their first thought.
Tsutsui, though often unconfident, was actually a reliable senpai, one who anyone would turn to in times of despair. He straightened his glasses and found in himself a thread of courage and voiced what no one else wanted to say, or perhaps, hadn’t noticed yet.
“It seems that Akari is the only one who can play white because she already played with white. If I’m assuming correctly, the same goes for black, so only Touya-san can play black.”
He looked at the two.
“I don’t know and don’t understand what’s going on, but only you two can finish the game.”
-----
What would finishing the game entail?
Akari didn’t know.
But where else would they find the clue to Hikaru’s disappearance?
The game was key.
The dark, piercing eyes across the board from her agreed.
-----
"Onegaishimasu."
-----
Th ey found out quickly that Touya could not advise Akari at all. Whenever he even tried to help her, he’d start coughing and coughing. So, Touya stopped trying to advise her, instead focusing his entire attention on his own moves.
Akari was at a lost. Touya was a 9-dan. She, on the other hand, was a mere amateur. She couldn’t even read the game, so had actually no idea what was going on and who was winning. She couldn’t even fathom what move she should’ve made next.
Next to her, Tsutsui flipped madly through his rule book and his collection of kifu, his glasses glinting as he searched for help. Mitani quietly stood next to her, his eyes intent on the game.
Why did Akari feel that Hikaru’s life was on the line? Why did Akari feel that there was absolutely no room for failure?
Anyone else would have done better in her position. One of Hikaru's professional go friends. Anyone.
But Hikaru was her childhood friend, and since she, along with Touya, who were the only ones who could play this game, she was determined to get to the bottom of this mystery. She grasped a cool white stone in her hands, and listened to the murmurings of all those who supported her with her eyes closed. Tsutsui advised her to strengthen the right hand side, while Mitani whispered to her about the danger the bottom right hand cluster was in. Another whisper told her in a soft but strong voice, 13-10, and her hand reached over, extending the three white stones by one, cutting off the advance of the black stones in the middle.
She heard a gasp from across from her, and she opened her eyes to see a shocked Touya. He gripped a black stone in his hand, shaking hand, corrected Akari in her mind, almost surprised at her own observation, and his face was pale. He glanced up at her, his eyes full of questions, but he made no comment as he placed his stone on 19-14, capturing her white stone that had been in atari, the ko fight on the right forever in a battle that wouldn't end, one atari following the other. Touya slowly reached over. All of them held their breath in, waiting as he took the captured white stone, dropping it onto his lid.
Plink.
Another stone removed.
They released their breaths. The game continued.
16-19, said the assuring voice, and Akari followed. Tsutsui's eyes widened at the brilliance of the move, the connected white stones stronger than ever. Mitani was likewise surprised, as the upper right hand side was now almost completely white's territory.
Touya only stared in amazement, his fear and nervousness still present, but overcome by his awe.
"Sai," he whispered, and Akari stared at him in incomprehension.
"He said he'd tell me someday," Touya continued, though it didn't explain a thing to Akari. "But he never did. When exactly is someday?" he wondered and placed his stone on 19-12, forming an eye on the right.
19-15, whispered the voice, and Akari placed another stone in the very place that she had placed the first stone, the stone that had roped her into the game. The ko fight continued. "Why haven't you asked him?" asked Akari as she gingerly took the captured black stone, dropping it into the lid of her goke.
Plink.
"Someday," he repeated, "I'm waiting for that someday."
Touya chose to play on 1-5 as his ko threat, connecting the black stones on the left.
Tsutsui and Mitani were on her side, and even though they weren't pros, thought Akari, at least they knew more than she did, and so she followed their advice. 1-6, came the whisper, and Akari noticed that she had made a move right above Touya's previous move. She supposed that it had something to do with strengthening her own stones on the bottom left.
Touya looked grim, though his eyes were intent, and once again he returned to the never-ending ko battle on the upper right. With 19-14 he took another white stone as his prisoner.
Plink.
18-13, she played. 18-5, he countered.
19-15. The ko battle continued. She had put herself in atari once again with that move, she noted. She dropped another black stone in her lid.
Plink.
8-14, and the black stones connected, the lone stone and the three on the right becoming one. But it was merely another mild ko threat.
8-16, said the voice. Akari noted that an attack to that formidable wall formed by the black stones was probably a good thing. She dropped the captured black stone in her lid, another strong eye formed in the midst of the enemy.
Plink.
"And so it continues," whispered Touya as he played on 19-14, neither of them wishing to let the other win the ko fight. Another white stone captured, and yet the game was still in white's favor.
Plink.
16-2. The bottom right was all black's territory, but white was heading in.
14-3, countered black, Touya's expression hard. He wasn't letting go of the bottom without a fight.
A pattern formed. Two moves, and then a battle for the stones forever stuck in ko.
19-15. The white stone resounded heavily on the board, and Akari's trembling hands once again reached over to take the black stone prisoner.
Repeat and repeat.
Plink.
6-11. The black stones on the left connected, threatening white's territory.
7-10. Seven white stones connected.
19-14. Touya dropped another white stone in his lid.
Plink.
10-8. It was all going so fast, Akari found it hard to follow.
9-6. Another white prisoner.
Plink.
19-15 continued the never-ending ko battle. Akari at least knew that much. She took the black stone.
Plink.
6-7, was Touya's move, 6-6, was Akari's as she placed her stone right below Touya's and took another black stone as prisoner.
Plink.
Touya returned to the right hand side, not letting go of the ko battle.
With 19-14, he took another white stone. Slowly, he dropped the captured stone in his lid.
Plink.
And he raised his eyes to look at Akari.
-----
Akari hadn't noticed it, but they had been well into the endgame quite a few moves back.
Their moves were fast and smooth, back and forth. Akari never noticed it either that while she had been focused entirely on the game, playing like a person possessed, more people had showed up. All of them--Kaneko, Natsume, Koike, Kumiko, and even Kaga--were staring at the game in awe. Tsutsui tried to explain, but none of them really knew what was actually going on, especially not Akari.
19-6, another challenge to the black stones on the bottom, a weak ko threat, easily defeated by black's next move at 19-5, and the white stone was immediately taken.
Plink.
19-15. Akari was a bit exasperated with the ongoing ko battle. It felt a bit childish to her actually, that both of them kept going for the same spot, never letting the other conquer the territory, and yet, both were unwilling to end the ko fight with a simple move.
Another black stone was gone from the board.
She dropped it onto her lid.
Plink.
The sound resounded throughout the entire room.
Akari waited for Touya's next move, but when none came, she raised her gaze only to stare at Touya who had his face covered with one hand.
"Wha-" she began but stopped when she noticed that Touya was shaking.
"What do you think will happen if I resign?" he murmured quietly. "Why do I have a feeling that it'll all be over if I lose?"
Akari blinked, shocked at his words, until a cold wind made her shiver and look away from him.
Thank you, came the whisper, and Akari spun around, for now that she wasn't concentrated on the game anymore, she noticed that the voice didn't belong to Mitani or Tsutsui at all. She was surprised to find all of the club members behind her, but the voice didn't belong to them either. It was a deep but soft voice, one that she had never heard before.
Her vision was invaded by purple in that bright light, and for a moment she thought she saw a tall figure behind her, but when the light faded, she tried to convince herself that all that purple she had just seen must have been her own hair blinding her as she spun around.
Akari-chan, let Hikaru return.
And suddenly, Akari opened her mouth, knowing exactly what she needed to do.
"I resign."
-----
"Why Akari? When you could've had Sai?"
------
The curtains fluttered, a gentle breeze flowing through the classroom, warm sunlight streaming into the room now and then. The captured stones lay peacefully in the two lids next to the goban, the go stones finally released from the interlocked battle splayed across the board.
Thank you. Kami-sama, thank you for letting me finish my last game.
-----the end-----
*game based on the semi-finals for the 17th NEC Cup played by Cho Chikun (white) and Kobayashi Satoru (black), both 9-dan. This is the game that the beginning moves played in volume fifteen chapter 124 (when Sai disappears) is modeled after, but of course, I took liberties with it.
*I don't know how to play go very well, so there may be errors with my descriptions the game.
*written for the blind_go livejournal community
*comments, reviews, criticism all greatly appreciated!