[Yozen]
by hkfoot
Greetings in the Name of God
Dear Mr. Shindou Hikaru,
Greetings in the name of God. In recognition of your achievements, you are cordially invited to participate in the Divine Cup taking place in the Great Go Salon in the Sky. The cup will run for one week beginning on the twenty-ninth day of April. We are pleased to announce that the winner of this tournament shall come away with the Hand of God.
If you choose to participate, transportation to the tournament site will be arranged for the evening of the twenty-eighth of April. Any and all material needs will be provided for, as well as a foolproof alibi for your absence from life.
Please fill out the attached form to reserve your spot in this once-in-a-millennium tournament and leave it in your mailbox by the twenty-seventh of April.
We hope to see you soon.
Sincerely,
Divine Cup Organizational Committee
~*~
“The Divine Cup? The Hand of God as the prize?” Touya snorted. “Shindou, surely you’re not taking this seriously.” His humor faded when Hikaru remained thoughtful. “Shindou, listen to me. This is clearly a tasteless joke. The Great Go Salon in the Sky? Come on! Even I could come up with something better.”
“Yeah, but-”
“And the Hand of God!” Touya rushed on. “You know it’s not a tournament prize to be given away! It’s the ultimate divine move!”
Touya's voice had risen, and Hikaru was glad that they had met up at Touya’s apartment instead of the go salon. Recently, Ichikawa-san had made clear that she had even less tolerance for their grade school arguments than before. Particularly because they were both title-holders now, she said, and it was high time they thought about the public image they were broadcasting. They were in Touya’s living room, seated across from each other at the goban out of habit. But papers, instead of stones, were strewn across the board.
“I know!” Hikaru answered defensively. “But if you read closely, it doesn’t say that they’re giving away the Hand of God as a prize. Just that the winner will get the Hand of God, somehow or other.”
“Big difference.”
“Look, Touya. This isn’t just any tournament. It’s the Divine Cup. Held only once every thousand years, according to this.” He jabbed at the invitation letter to prove his point. “Besides, even if we don’t reach the Hand of God there, there might be other things to see. I mean, if it really is the Great Go Salon in the Sky as they claim, and it means what I think it means, then maybe …” He trailed off and swallowed. “Anyway, I already filled out my response form. You’d better fill out yours too.”
“There are limits to stupidity, Shindou, and you’ve just exceeded them,” Touya said crossly. But somehow, he couldn’t snap at Hikaru when his rival got that haunted, hopeful look in his eyes. “Fine. I’ll answer this invitation. It’s not like they’re asking for my bank account number, anyway.”
While Touya filled out his reply form, Hikaru’s eyes fell upon the small family alter and incense bowl sitting on the shelf above the television on the opposite side of the room. Touya had grown up under the very roof of tradition, but the shelf decorations hadn’t appeared until his father had passed away a few years ago from a sudden heart attack.
If the Great Go Salon in the Sky really was the great go salon in the sky, then maybe Touya’s dad would be there too.
“He’s probably playing go now, wherever he is,” Hikaru had said after the former Meijin’s funeral. “With Sai,” he added quietly, because he’d felt that it had been the right thing to say. Touya had turned at the mention of that name, but Hikaru couldn’t bring himself to say any more, and Touya, too deep in grief, had let it slide.
“Hey, what did you fill out for ‘Preferred Excuse’?” Touya asked.
“Trip to Innoshima,” Hikaru answered, eyes still fixed on Touya’s family alter. “It’ll be Golden Week then, so no one should ask.”
“Of course.” Hikaru went there every May fifth, if he didn’t have a game scheduled, every May fifth since they’d become too old to qualify for the Hokuto Cup. “Do you mind if I put that too? You did promise to take me with you at some point, and you still haven’t.”
“Sure.”
Touya caught Hikaru staring at his memorial shelf again when he had completed the form. He wondered at it when a thought struck to him. “Hey, I’m done,” he said.
Hikaru came back to himself. “Good.” His brow wrinkled in confusion when Touya leaned forward across the goban.
“Shindou, this isn’t about the Hand of God at all, is it?” Touya asked seriously.
“Huh?” It took Hikaru a second to process, so startled was he by his rival’s proximity. “Well, it could be. I mean, of course it is. That’s what the tournament is for.”
“What I mean is, the Hand of God isn’t all you’re expecting to find there,” Touya clarified, sitting back and watching his rival closely. “It’s not the only reason you’re going out on a limb and taking this invitation so stupidly serious.”
“I am not!”
Touya raised an eyebrow, and Hikaru flushed. “Fine. I just thought it just sounds like fun, so I figured, why not? It’ll be Golden Week so I’ve got nothing scheduled for a change, and like you said, it’s not like they’re asking for your bank account information or anything. Might as well, right?” He topped his babbling off with a nervous chuckle, and Touya sat back, satisfied.
So it wasn’t about the Hand of God, not really. It didn’t matter if the first line of the invitation sounded like something lifted straight from a piece of solicitous spam mail. It was about the things that went unspoken and the things that had not yet been told. It was about the still-mysterious Sai, and it was about all the great players that had gone before them, including, he thought, finally daring to entertain his own feather-light wisps of hope, his father.
“Shindou, for your sake, you’re lucky you’re not this easy to read on the goban.” Touya sealed the envelope as Hikaru sputtered in indignation. “So I just leave this in my mailbox?”
“Oh, you’re done?”
“I told you that a whole minute ago.”
“Cool.” Hikaru grinned disarmingly, and Touya felt that their positions had reversed-he was the one unbalanced now. “Yeah, just leave it in your mailbox.”
~*~
On the night of April twenty-eighth, after wondering for hours if Touya had been right after all and he had been too gullible, Hikaru went to bed. As soon as he fell asleep, though, he was wide awake and on his feet, fully dressed in a loud yellow t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. The world was a blank, unobtrusive white. There was no question of where he was. “So this is it, huh?” He couldn’t even tell if he was indoors or outdoors. The whiteness spread all around him, save for a single doorway that shone with light, beckoning to him. This was it. Hikaru breathed deeply, then entered the Great Go Salon in the Sky.
“Welcome, Hikaru-san,” a voice chirped promptly. The room seemed almost dim after the glaring expanse of white outside, and it took a second for his eyes to adjust. It smelled of freshly cut roses and lavender. To his immediate left was a reception counter, where a young girl with pigtails sat on a tall stool. He guessed her to be in elementary school.
“Er, hello,” he said, taking a moment to glance around. The room was very much like any reputable go salon-clean, well-lit, with a faithful clientele filling its seats. The only difference was the size of the room itself. It was big. Hugely big. There might have been a hundred individual tables, all comfortably spaced. It seemed as much a tournament hall as it was a go salon.
“If you’re interested, I can show you some of our more traditional rooms in the back, down the hall,” the girl said when Hikaru had stared too long without saying anything. She pointed to a far passage guarded by a pair of potted ferns. “There’s a game in progress that you’ll definitely be interested in.”
“Uh, sure. But who are you? How come you knew who I was?”
“I’m the God of Go,” the girl informed him proudly. He stared at her. “It’s true,” she insisted. “I’ll even show you around.”
She slid off the high stool and motioned for Hikaru to follow. He felt a bit overwhelmed-but this was the Great Go Salon in the Sky, after all-as he trailed behind her through the array of tables and down the passage. He searched for faces he could recognize as they passed, but none of them were familiar. “Hey, um…God? Do you know if Touya’s here yet? Touya Akira?”
“Kouyou-san’s son? Of course, I’d forgotten you two were eternal rivals. How very silly of me. He arrived about an hour ago, and happily for you, we’re heading to his location right now.” She turned another corner in the passageway, passing several rooms, and Hikaru hurried to keep up.
He was as nonplused about the girl’s casual reference to Touya’s father by his first name as he was by her matter-of-fact acceptance of his rivalry-not just rivalry, even, but his eternal rivalry-with Touya. But this was the Great Go Salon in the Sky, after all. And despite all appearances, maybe she was the God of Go. Though he sincerely hoped not. Some small part of him screamed that this had to be a nightmare. He’d always figured the God of Go, if there were one, to be an old man in Heian period robes. Or maybe, considering that Go originated in China, some old Chinese dude with a pointy beard and moustache. But not a know-it-all grade schooler.
He asked, “So you know Touya-sensei?”
But she hushed him with a wave of her hand and stopped outside a sliding door. “We’re here,” she whispered. “Please remain a silent observer until the end of the game. Can you do that?”
“Sure, why not?” Hikaru agreed, bemused. A split second before she slid the door open, it occurred to him why she might feel it necessary to make such a request of him.
Before him sat Sai, deep in a game with Touya Kouyou in the Yugen no Ma.
His mouth opened and closed soundlessly. The girl elbowed him and hissed, “Quiet.” He might have considered her actions cute if his brain hadn’t just gone into shock. She pointed him a little to the right, where Touya Akira sat watching the board, and Hikaru moved woodenly to sit down next to his rival. The door slid shut with hardly a sound, leaving just the two players and the two observers in the room. The clack of stone on wood brought Hikaru back to his senses.
He couldn’t take his eyes off of Sai. It had been eight years since he had disappeared. Sai looked as well as ever. His white outer jacket had been exchanged for a more elaborately patterned red one, and underneath, a formal black hitoe replaced his former burgundy one. His black eboshi hat, however, was a reassuring constant. The intensity he emanated resonated with some unnamable feeling deep within Hikaru, and he remembered, this was what he had felt during the NetGo game between Sai and Touya-sensei all those years ago. The intensity was much stronger now.
Next to him, Touya nodded at him but said nothing. Hikaru could imagine what he must have felt, seeing his father again. Did he know that the man his father was playing was Sai? He wanted to laugh. Touya, your father is playing Sai, he wanted to say. Sai is right there!
It took all of Hikaru’s self-control to sit quietly and study the board. The game was nearing its end, but the stones and patterns were a blur to him. After losing count twice as he tried to determine each side’s territory, Hikaru allowed his eyes to wander.
The room was not the Yugen no Ma as he had first thought, though such a comparison would bear up under much scrutiny. The floor was tatami, the architecture traditional Japanese, and even the décor on the opposite side of the room featured the same Zen-style stone garden. But where the Yugen no Ma had unobtrusive cameras hanging from the corners of the ceiling and a thermostat on the wall, giving clear hints of modernity, this room had none of that. It was a room brought straight from the castle games of Shuusaku’s time. Tall oil lamps stood in each corner of the room, and a shorter lamp sat closer at hand, lending a solemn light to the game.
His eyes came back to rest on the two players. Touya’s dad appeared healthy too; his concentration was no less than Sai’s. He had less grey in his hair than Hikaru remembered. The former title holder had died three years ago, soon after his son had first won the Meijin title. Had he been playing Sai ever since then? Hikaru fervently hoped so.
“I have lost.” Touya’s father bowed his head.
“Thank you for the game.” Sai bowed deeply in return, and then as though they had been aware all along, he and the elder Touya turned as one to their observers.
“Hikaru!” Sai exclaimed.
“Akira,” the former Meijin said warmly.
“Father. It’s good to see you again.” Touya’s voice broke, but Hikaru had no more time to be concerned as Sai nearly bowled him over with the exuberance of his hug.
“Sai!” Hikaru could say no more as he clutched at the Heian spirit’s red robes, tasting the salt of his tears. This was Sai again, his mind repeated over and over.
“Hikaru,” Sai cried, equally trapped by a similar wave of emotion. He succeeded in being just a bit more articulate: “I’m so glad you’re here.” For a long time, they couldn’t let go of each other. Hikaru marveled at the feeling of silk beneath his fingertips and the warmth from Sai’s hands where they gripped his back. Although he had been tangible to Hikaru as a ghost, Sai had never felt particularly warm or cold, and his clothes, though by all appearances silk, had never felt of the authenticity that they did now.
“You’re so much taller now, Hikaru,” Sai said at last, wiping his eyes.
“Maybe you’ve just gotten shorter,” Hikaru managed to joke lamely. But he saw that it was true-he was just as tall as Sai, if not a centimeter or two taller. It was strange.
“I missed you,” he said. “I wish you hadn’t had to leave.”
“I didn’t want to go either. But my time was over. I had guided you as far as I could, and it was time for your go to grow independently of me.”
Hikaru reached out and tugged at Sai’s sleeve, feeling like a twelve-year-old again. “I should have let you play more,” he apologized.
Sai shook his head gently. “No, you did what was right for you. I was far more selfish than I had any right to be. Besides, you did let me find my own true rival.” He looked toward the reunited Touya father and son, and with a pang, Hikaru realized that it had been a long time since he had seen Sai so happy. For Sai, the final months with Hikaru had been increasingly melancholy ones, filled with upset confusion and fear and sadness as he resisted his inevitable fate. Even allowing for the callowness of youth, Hikaru wondered how he could have been so insensitive of it at the time.
“Hikaru, don’t regret the past. You did nothing wrong.”
Hikaru nodded. “Have you been playing with Touya-sensei a lot?” he asked, changing the subject.
“Every day since he’s come here,” Sai answered sanguinely. “Before that, I…” He looked embarrassed, but continued at Hikaru’s curious stare. “I…moped around a little. Or a lot. I missed you, and for a long time, it just didn’t seem fair that I had to leave when I did.”
Hikaru smiled sadly, recalling clearly his own painful memories. “I did the same. I didn’t think I wanted to play go without you. I looked for you, you know. I kept hoping you’d come back.”
“I know,” Sai said, and it seemed to Hikaru that Sai really did know. They shared a silent moment as the pain of the past transformed into something closer to peace.
“Won’t you introduce me to Akira?” Sai asked.
“Sure.” Hikaru hesitated. “I haven’t told him the truth about you yet though.”
“What better time is there than now?”
Touya was waiting for them with his father, his eyes and nose faintly red. Hikaru was sure he didn’t look much better.
“Kouyou,” Sai said, “You remember Hikaru, of course?”
“Yes,” Touya’s father said. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Shindou-kun.”
Hikaru murmured a polite response, not quite at ease in the elder Touya’s aura of dignified authority.
“Akira.” Touya Kouyou began to introduce Sai, but Hikaru interrupted.
“Please, Touya-sensei, let me.” It seemed vitally important to Hikaru that he should be the one to introduce his once-companion. He saw in Touya’s eyes that he was already certain of Sai’s identity, but that didn’t lessen the significance of the moment. “Touya,” Hikaru said, “this is Sai. Fujiwara no Sai. He taught me how to play go.”
Touya’s eyes widened a fraction, but he nodded and held out a hand. “I’m glad to finally meet you,” he said.
“And I, you,” Sai answered.
There was so much to say, so much telling and explaining to do, that Hikaru hardly noticed when they moved from the Yugen no Ma lookalike room back into the main hall, where the tables had been rearranged for the opening ceremony and banquet. Hikaru had had dinner hours ago, but he felt hungry again. It seemed like the Great Go Salon ran in a different time zone.
“Shindou Kisei,” Sai said proudly as their food was served. “I was wondering which title you’d take first. But ‘Go Saint’ is fitting for you, I think.”
“That’s the honorary title they gave Shuusaku, so I figured, why not aim for that one?” Hikaru shrugged, embarrassed but pleased that Sai had kept up with his progress.
Next to him, Akira snorted. “Like you actually got to choose which title you wanted,” he said in an undertone with a cautious look at Sai. He believed Sai’s story-how could he not, having just watched Sai’s game with his father and seeing Sai with his own eyes?-but as much as it made sense, it still seemed somewhat unbelievable. In contrast, joking with Shindou was second nature.
“Well it is the most prestigious, now that you mention it,” Hikaru answered smugly. He was tempted to add, “Touya Meijin II” for good measure, but feeling the weight of Touya’s father’s gaze on him, good-humored though it was, he stopped himself. Instead, he said, “I did try for Honinbo this year too, but you know, Ogata-sensei spent so many years trying to beat the old geezer for it. Now that he finally has the title, he’s just as bad as Kuwabara was about giving it up.”
“Ogata-kun is still holding onto it, is he?” A wheezing chuckle from behind him, and Hikaru knew, without any sense of extraordinary surprise, that it was the very old man in question. At this point, everything surprising had become natural. The longtime Honinbo title holder had passed away only a few months before Touya Kouyou had. “If he doesn’t defend it until he dies, I have every mind to go back and haunt him.”
“Kuwabara-sensei,” Hikaru and Touya greeted.
“Don’t bother getting up,” the old man said when they made to do so. “I’m just passing through to say hello to you young ones. But I don’t want to disturb this lovely family dinner you’re having, ho ho ho!” He winked at Sai, who grew noticeably flustered.
“Kuwabara-sensei, please,” Touya Kouyou said, warning in his tone.
“Do as you like. I’ll see you youngsters tomorrow.” The old man nodded to them and hobbled away.
“He’s putting on a show for you,” Sai explained, color still in his cheeks. “He doesn’t usually act so old.”
“That reminds me, you look younger than I remember, Father,” Akira said.
His father agreed. “Here, we can be as young or old as we choose, so long as we are ourselves. That, of course, we cannot change.”
The opening ceremony began shortly afterwards. The little girl who had acted as receptionist and guide to Hikaru also acted as the master of ceremonies, welcoming the participants and explaining the rules. It was a straightforward elimination tournament, where a single loss would result in disqualification. There would be one round per day, with a total of six rounds. The sixth and final round would span two days.
“But don’t worry,” the self-proclaimed God of Go announced. “I arranged the pairings myself, so it should be fun and fair for everyone!”
So the matches weren’t even random, like any sensible, unbiased tournament would have them. Hikaru turned to Sai. “That girl said that she was the God of Go. Please tell me that it’s not true.”
Sai looked surprised. “But she is. Isn’t she adorable?” Touya Kouyou hummed in agreement, and Hikaru turned to Akira for support.
“She is rather…surprising,” he admitted. “But then again, you should know by now that many go players are a bit odd. If what my father said applies to her, then she must be a very old being who prefers to appear as a child.”
The ceremony ended quickly, without a single mention of the Hand of God, and conversation resumed.
“The best go players throughout history are gathered here,” Sai said.
“Does that include Shuusaku, by any chance?” Touya asked. “Or was he just…” He stopped to rephrase his question more delicately.
Sai immediately caught on to what Touya was asking, however, and he shook his head. “It is true that I played all of his official games for him,” he said. “Such was the generosity of his spirit. But he could not have borne it had he not been extraordinarily gifted in his own right. Torajirou is certainly participating in this competition.”
“Where is he, anyway?” Hikaru asked. “I would have thought he’d be around you, all things considered.”
“He is here, somewhere. But he decided it would be better if we could spend the evening with just the four of us. You will meet him tomorrow.”
“Okay. One more question then. Why are we here? Me and Touya. I don’t see anyone else like us. We’re…I don’t know…”
“Young?” Touya supplied, and Hikaru shot him a grateful look. He had been about to say, “not dead yet,” but ‘young” sounded infinitely better.
“You’re here by my request,” Sai explained. “It’s the tournament for the Hand of God, and we’re all traveling that path. Supposing you and Akira-san are to be the ones who reach the divine move one day, doesn’t it make all the more sense for you to be here?”
“Sai made his case to the committee. When they took too long deliberating, the God of Go stepped in to specially grant his request,” Touya Kouyou supplemented. “Now, the committee is ready to do just about anything Sai asks. They might even bestow him with the Hand of God itself, should he but ask for it.” Though he didn’t quite smile, his eyes conveyed warmth to accompany his fond jest.
Sai nodded happily. “There was something else too,” he said to Hikaru, chiding now. “I have been so looking forward to meeting Akira-kun properly, but I had a feeling you were never going to tell Akira the truth about me without a little help. You should keep your promises better, Hikaru. ”
“You would have to be nosy like that, wouldn’t you?” Hikaru grumbled, although he wore an awkward smile. It vanished instantly when Touya kicked his foot hard under the table and stammered out something to the effect that the pleasure of their acquaintance was entirely his.
“And I should like to play you while we’re here, Fujiwara-san,” Touya said.
“Please, just Sai is fine. And we shall certainly play each other, many times, I hope.”
“Sheesh, quit acting like a stuffed shirt, Touya,” Hikaru muttered to his rival, his ankle throbbing. “It’s just Sai.”
“Shut up. I’d like to see you call my father by his first name,” Touya hissed back.
“That’s completely different!”
Touya Kouyou cleared his throat politely, and self-conscious, Hikaru and Akira broke off into silent embarrassment.
“But do you really think the winner will attain the Hand of God?” Touya asked, looking at no one in particular.
“It’s what they promised,” Sai said. His eyes suddenly burned with his millennium-old agenda.
Touya Kouyou placed a hand on Sai’s arm, a gesture that was not lost on Hikaru. “The God of Go has a strange sense of humor,” he cautioned. “It may be that the Hand of God is something completely beyond our reach.”
Sai shook his head resolutely. “No, it can be reached. There’s no question of that. It definitely can be. If not by you and me, then certainly,” he declared, nodding towards Hikaru and Akira, “by them.”
“But Sai,” Hikaru said, Sai’s words raising a question, “why are you talking like the Hand of God can be reached by two people? A hand can only be played by one person. Don’t get me wrong, it’d be cool if all of us could reach the Hand of God. But before, you always made it sound like a personal goal.”
“That’s right.” Sai smiled contemplatively. “The Hand of God can only be reached by one. I spoke wishfully just now, I suppose.”
“But doesn’t it take the ultimate match to bring about the ultimate move?” Akira pointed out sensibly.
His father nodded approvingly. “If indeed the Hand of God can be attained here, it will be found during the final match.”
“Then I must play you in the finals,” Sai said to Touya Kouyou, and his gaze was that of one possessed.
“Naturally, my friend,” the other man assured him. “I would be disappointed if it were otherwise.”
Feeling somewhat put off, Hikaru saw that his rival shared his feelings. “Touya,” he said loudly, “I’ll play you in the finals.” He grinned and stuck his tongue out at Sai.
Sai’s eyes flashed at the challenge. “Hikaru, let’s play a game right now.”
Touya Kouyou chuckled. “Let me show you where you’ll be staying,” he told them, “And then you can play.” He turned to his son. “I’d like to see how far you’ve come as well.”
“Of course, Father.” Akira’s words couldn’t hide his anticipation.
~*~
Sai had a new fan. Hikaru hadn’t noticed it during their game, but afterwards, as Sai absently opened and closed it, it caught his attention.
“You’ve grown stronger, Hikaru. Much, much stronger.” Sai looked pleased, and then was unable to resist adding gleefully, “But I’ve grown stronger too.”
Hikaru laughed shortly. “Well, yeah, if you’re playing Touya-sensei every single day. No kidding you’ve grown stronger.” He looked again at the markedly different fan that Sai held. “That’s not the fan you gave me,” he commented. He held out his own fan, white, simple, and heavily nicked from nearly eight years of constant companionship.
Sai looked surprised, then embarrassed, as if noticing for the first time. “No, it’s not,” he admitted. His new fan was of heavy black paper, painted with red plum blossoms and two or three other kinds of light colored plants that Hikaru couldn’t identify. They stretched tastefully across three-quarters of the fan’s black surface.
“It matches your clothes,” Hikaru observed. “Where did you get it?”
“Oh.” Sai snapped his fan open and hid the lower half of his face behind it. “Kouyou,” he whispered.
“Huh.” Hikaru wouldn’t have thought that the older Touya would have gone for such an elaborate design. The possible implications didn’t hit him until a second later. “Wait, Touya-sensei gave you that? Like as a gift?”
Sai nodded, keeping an anxious watch on him. Hikaru snuck a look at the elder Touya, who was still in post game discussion with his son.
“I thought something might have been up with you two. You’re way too familiar with him.” Hikaru gave Sai an inquiring look. “It is like that, isn’t it?” He half expected Sai to deny it.
“Like…that?” Sai echoed faintly. “Yes, I think so. Are you…okay with it?” He was still hiding behind his fan, as if fearing Hikaru’s condemnation.
Touya’s dad and Sai. Touya’s dad. And Sai. Hikaru tried to wrap his mind around it and failed. But then he looked at Touya studying the board and realized that maybe he could understand after all. A little bit. He shrugged. “It’ll take some getting used to, but yeah, it’s fine. I kind of figured you were too pretty for your own good.”
“Good.” Sai showed a relieved smile. “But don’t tell Akira, please. Kouyou’s not sure how he would take it.” As Hikaru thought it over, Sai rushed to assure him, “Kouyou really loved Akiko-san, you understand. I don’t want to break apart those bonds any more than I already may have.”
Hikaru sighed and smiled supportively. All things considered, he knew he was completely unqualified to give Sai relationship advice. “You’re both adults,” he said. “Heck, you’re both already dead. I don’t know how the whole afterlife business works, but I’m sure Touya-sensei knows what he’s getting into.”
“Thank you,” Sai said. “It’s good to hear you say that.”
“Sure.” Hikaru shifted his attention to the fan again, eager to talk about anything else. “Isn’t that design kind of gaudy though?” Realizing how that sounded, he backtracked immediately. “I mean, it’s really pretty, and like I said, it suits you, but I never would have thought Touya-sensei would have chosen this type of design, is what I meant.”
“He didn’t choose it himself, exactly,” Sai admitted with a smile. “The God of Go suggested it, knowing that I had given my own fan to you several years ago. She picked it out, and he agreed with her choice.”
The whole God of Go business was weirding Hikaru out. “You guys go gift shopping with the God of Go?” He didn’t see how the God of Go could possibly be lonely like this.
~*~
The first match was difficult, but Hikaru pulled through. He found himself fighting as hard for every point as he had during the Kisei title matches. He was forced to settle for a neutral seki where he had been certain he could kill. Every intrusion he made was challenged aggressively, and his opponent’s advances were made no less boldly. But he was confident of his own readings, and he remembered with fierce joy the time Sai had simulated a sword fight with him, telling him to face his fears as Touya did and fight to the very brink of his abilities. He had advanced quickly from the second insei class to the first then. Now, driven by the same need to face Touya on the path to the Hand of God, he won his first round match by a small but well-earned margin. He felt as though he had gained months worth of experience.
His companions had each done well, and it was with a cheerful heart that Hikaru was introduced to Honinbo Shuusaku that evening. It was after dinner, and the Japanese style room that Hikaru and Touya shared, located in some part of the mysteriously expansive go salon, had become the default evening gathering place. At first, Hikaru had worried that while he was linked to Shuusaku by the common topic of Sai, Touya would be left out. As it turned out though, that wasn't the case at all. It was thanks in part to Shuusaku’s character. He was a courteous, mild tempered man, well-intentioned and thoughtful with an appreciable sense of humor. His efforts to be inclusive with Sai’s visitors were well received, and Hikaru couldn’t begrudge Sai for speaking so highly of him time and again.
“His advice was sound. But what then?” Shuusaku asked. “This doesn’t seem like it ended entirely to your satisfaction, Hikaru-san.” He sat on a cushion on the floor. Hikaru, Touya, and Sai were seated likewise in an open circle, while Touya Kouyou sat a little removed from their group, watching them with content interest.
“Yeah, it sucked. Right after he fed me all that stuff about facing my fears like Touya did, he sliced me in half without any warning, the jerk, and then had the gall to ask me for another game!” Hikaru grinned at his audience, his mirth broadening when he saw a repentant look on Sai’s face.
“Hikaru, it was only in your mind,” Sai protested. “You weren’t really sliced in half.”
“That’s a poor excuse for abusing such an eager student,” Shuusaku laughed. “Sai, that was truly unkind of you.”
“Torajirou, it wasn’t like that!”
“Akira-san, what do you make of it?” Shuusaku asked.
“I think Sai did the right thing,” Touya said. “Shindou was clearly in need of a beating to drive off his cowardice.”
“Touya, you’re missing the whole point!” Hikaru argued. “He sliced me in half with his sword! And then asked for another game like he hadn’t just killed me!”
“I always knew you were delusional,” Touya returned with vengeful pleasure. “Like Sai said, it was all in your mind.”
“Thank you, Akira. I always knew you were more sensible than Hikaru,” Sai said.
Hikaru looked in mock fury at them. “That does it. Touya, your alliance with Sai is so over.” He grabbed his cushion and proceeded to beat his rival with it. “Shuusaku-san, help me.”
“Ow, that hurts, Shindou!” Despite his protests, Touya couldn’t stop laughing and put up only a half-hearted defense. Once Touya had collapsed in a fit of giggles, Shuusaku watched in amusement as Hikaru moved on to his next target, Sai.
“Torajirou, Kouyou, help!” But Shuusaku only moved out of the way, and seeing this, Sai scrambled behind the senior Touya.
Hikaru stopped in his tracks and dropped the cushion with a tired huff. “That’s not fair, Sai. Touya-sensei’s not involved.”
Touya Kouyou looked back at Sai.
“It doesn’t matter," Sai said. "It was enough to stop you, Hikaru.” He opened his fan as though he had come up with a master strategy. “Tesuji,” he murmured playfully. Before Hikaru could make the connection, Sai snapped his fan shut and pointed it at him. He commanded, “Akira, Torajirou.”
His target protected by an impenetrable defense, Hikaru was ambushed from two sides, beset by his rival and betrayed by his disloyal supporter. “That’s sooo not fair, Sai,” he groaned from the floor, laughing helplessly. This was right. He wanted to create as many memories with Sai, and with those who had become a part of their odd family, if he could call it that, as possible.
“Hikaru.” Shuusaku offered him a hand up.
“Thanks,” Hikaru said, taking it gratefully. He didn’t immediately notice when the air around Honinbo heir changed, but the room quieted, and the older man looked thoughtful. He continued to hold Hikaru’s hand in a tighter-than-comfortable grip even after he had helped him up.
“I need to thank you,” Shuusaku stated, his eyes fixed intently on Hikaru’s.
“You do?”
Shuusaku continued, “I’ve heard it said that no ghost was ever seen by two pairs of eyes. Throughout my life, I was always afraid that once I died, I would be condemning Sai to an eternity of solitude. I believed that once I was gone, there would be no one left to see Sai. If there’s one thing I cannot be grateful for enough, it is you, Shindou Hikaru. Thank you for seeing Sai in my place, and for releasing him from his earthly bonds as I could not.” He bowed over Hikaru’s hand.
“Don’t do that. There’s no need for thanks.” Uncomfortable, Hikaru grinned sheepishly and looked over at Sai. “I was a pretty awful host, after all. And I’m sure the God of Go had it all planned out, one way or another.”
“All the same, I am grateful, and I needed you to know that. Sai is closer than family to me.” Shuusaku smiled. “Tomorrow I will face Sai, and the next day, you will. As it seems we will not meet in the tournament, I would be glad for the opportunity to play you after our matches tomorrow.”
“You’re talking like you’ve already lost,” Hikaru said.
Shuusaku realized his error and chuckled. “You’re right. I need to play to win, or else Sai won’t enjoy our match at all.”
~*~
The second round was no less difficult than the first, and Hikaru felt triumphantly exhausted as he pulled out another narrow victory. “How’d you do, Touya?” he asked, catching up with him outside the game room. His rival had finished before him, and a frown tugged on his mouth. “You played Kuwabara today, didn’t you?” he pressed.
“Yeah, but…” Touya shook his head. “I was going to lose. I don’t know if he purposely tossed the game or what, but he put his own group in atari! Granted, it only came out to six points, but what professional does that?”
“You’d be surprised. Waya showed me this video once where some 9-dan pro did that, only he lost an entire half of his board. It was pretty sad. The commentators were trying hard not to laugh.”
Touya still frowned. “Kuwabara went away laughing.”
“So? Good for him. It doesn’t bother him, so don’t’ let it bother you.” Hikaru shrugged, not seeing the point.
“But it doesn’t feel good to win like this!” Touya seethed. “I should have lost!” His outburst made Hikaru finally understand. It was exactly how he had felt after the game with Isumi during the pro exam.
“Look, it’d be great if go could only be won through brilliant moves,” Hikaru told him, “but sometimes your opponent might make a lousy move that forces you to win. Don’t let it bother you or you really will lose your next match. This isn’t the pro exam where you can throw a couple games and still recover.”
Touya looked at him suspiciously. “Since when did you become so wise?”
“I have experience,” Hikaru said sagely, feeling smugly superior. For good measure, he added, “Anyway, I bet the old geezer did that on purpose to throw you off for your next game.”
Touya smiled a little. “Ogata-san always did complain about his mind games.”
~*~
As it turned out, Hikaru and Touya were both knocked out in the third round, Hikaru by Sai, and Touya by his father.
“The God of Go planned it this way, didn’t she?” Hikaru grumbled that evening when everyone was gathered in his and Touya’s room. “I can tell this whole tournament is rigged to fall a certain way.”
“She does have a fondness for irony,” Shuusaku agreed. “And she certainly plays favorites without regard for the consequences.”
“Touya-sensei said Sai was her favorite, right? Why bother having a tournament at all then?”
“But Hikaru, it’s more fun like this,” Sai said. “And this way, you got to come visit us.” Touya Kouyou and his son sat opposite of each other from the goban, recreating their game, while Hikaru, Sai, and Shuusaku sat around them, bantering in between game analysis.
“I get it. So the God of Go arranged this whole tournament for your amusement?”
“No!” Sai denied vehemently.
“In spite of everything, Sai refuses to believe how beloved he is to her,” Touya Kouyou said, looking away from the game.
Sai colored. “Kouyou, don’t say that. If it were true, she wouldn’t have made me leave Hikaru in the first place.”
“Her love is a child’s selfish love,” Touya Kouyou said, disagreeing. “She would want to have you here. She’s still waiting for her own rival to appear one day, but if there’s been one person, in her view, who’s drawn the entire go world closer to the Hand of God, it’s you. And if go were to be embodied in a single spirit, that spirit would be yours.”
His voice had warmed as he’d spoken. Though a good five feet and a go board stood between the former sovereign of the modern go world and Sai, Hikaru had the sensation of intruding on a strangely intimate moment. He saw that Touya, staring at his father, felt it too.
“She knows I’m not fit to be her rival,” Sai murmured. “I’m yours. I’m your rival.”
“But who else has traversed a thousand years of go to connect the distant past to the far future?” Hikaru heard his own words from so long ago echoed in Touya Kouyou’s statement, and he wondered, fleetingly, how much time the deceased actually spent watching the living world. “There is no one who can even compare to you.”
Sai made no reply, for he noticed then that Akira’s eyes were fixed on his father as though trying to read deeply into a difficult situation. He directed everyone’s attention back to the board, saying, “Hikaru, what do you think if Akira had played a hane here instead of the oogeima?”
~*~
Later that night, when their visitors had left and they were preparing for bed, Akira said to Hikaru, “Do you think my father’s changed?”
“Sure. He looks like he’s dropped at least ten years, if not more.”
“It’s not just that.” Touya struggled to put his feelings into words. “He acts younger too, and he’s been more open these past few days than I can remember him ever being.”
“Well…” Hikaru stalled, hoping Touya wouldn’t ask what he was dreading, “he’s glad to see you again.”
“But don’t you think it has something to do with Sai?”
Hikaru spread his comforter over his futon, taking an extra moment to come up with the safest reply. “He found the rival he was always looking for. They’re both happier like this.”
“But is it just that?” Touya sounded doubtful. He laid his bedding out next to Hikaru’s. “I can’t help wondering if there’s something more.”
“Would it matter? If there was something more?” Hikaru probed cautiously. “Not that I’m saying there is, of course.”
Touya turned upon him in an instant. “Shindou, tell me,” he demanded.
Hikaru made a face. “Turn off the light, Touya. It’s nothing.” He wanted to kick himself in the head. Him and his big mouth.
The light blinked out, and they crawled into their respective futons. The tension remained. “Tell me,” Touya insisted again.
“It’s not my business, leave me out of it.” Hikaru sighed audibly, hoping Touya would get the hint. When Touya maintained a grim silence, Hikaru relented. Screw Touya. It wasn’t his problem if he couldn’t deal with it. “If you’re so curious, ask your dad.”
“I can’t do that!” Touya exclaimed, and he actually sounded so panicked that Hikaru reflexively turned toward him.
“Yeah? Then don’t.”
“You know, don’t you?” Touya accused. “About whatever is going on between them.”
Hikaru rolled his eyes. “Yes. You know you’re only out of the loop because we figured you’d go and be a drama queen about it. Kind of like how you’re acting now.”
Touya was silent for a long time. Hikaru had just about dropped off to sleep when he heard Touya say, “I can too handle it. Whatever it is.”
Stupid Touya. Hikaru was willing to bet the Hand of God that Touya already knew and was being purposely obtuse about it.
~*~
“Do you live in the go salon?”
Sai found Hikaru’s question vastly amusing. It was lunch break on the fourth day, and after watching the morning half of the matches, Shuusaku had stayed behind with Touya to discuss the games. Hikaru had excused himself with Sai and Touya Kouyou, looking for an opportunity to talk to Touya’s father without Touya around. But for some reason, he had asked that inane question instead, and now Sai was laughing at him.
“I’m serious!” Hikaru said. “There was nothing outside when I came here, and I just wanted to make sure that you were living and breathing something other than go once in a while.”
“You don’t need to worry, Hikaru,” Sai answered. “You couldn’t see anything outside of the go salon because you’re still alive. There are secrets which are hidden from those who do not yet belong here.”
“All right. I can take that.”
Sai mused. “But maybe we can make an exception. There’s somewhere I’ve been wanting to take you. Let me ask the God of Go.”
“Wait, you don’t have to! I was just curious.”
But Sai had fixated on the idea, and there was excitement in his eyes. “I’ll be right back,” he assured them, and ran off to the reception desk where the God of Go spent much of her time.
Now was probably a good time, Hikaru thought, thinking of his agenda. He looked nervously at Touya Kouyou. How awkward.
Touya’s father was perceptive. “Is there something you wanted to say, Shindou-kun?” he inquired not unkindly.
“Y-yes, actually.” He continued very quickly, “IthinkyoushouldtellTouya. AboutyouandSai.” Touya Kouyou appeared perplexed as he deciphered Hikaru’s speech, but there was no sign that he’d taken offense. Hikaru slowed down. “That is, I bet he’s figured it out already, and I think he can handle it. I know he can. But he deserves to hear it from you.” Hikaru didn’t add that Touya had been driving him up the wall the previous night and it was for his own peace of mind as much as it was for Touya’s.
The older man appraised him and then nodded. “Very well. If you think it’s necessary, then I will speak to him on this matter at an appropriate time.”
“Thanks.” Hikaru let go of the breath he had been holding. The sound of Sai wheedling with the God of Go reached them just then, and Hikaru grinned. “Sounds like Sai’s having fun.”
“Yes.” Touya Kouyou paused. “It must seem strange to you.”
“Huh? Oh, not at all!” Hikaru said, realizing that Touya Kouyou was referring back to the topic of him and Sai.
Touya Kouyou read curiosity in Hikaru’s denial. “It’s fine. I don’t mind sharing,” he said. “Sai would rather that you knew everything.” And so Hikaru listened.
“There was much I didn’t understand at first, after I played him over the Internet," Touya Kouyou said. "If he was my destined rival, why was I only granted that single game with him? I didn’t understand why he wouldn’t come forward to me, nor why we couldn’t travel the path together, challenging each other as you and Akira are so fortunate to do? Why didn’t he live to play me, as I did him?” Touya Kouyou couldn’t conceal his longing, and Hikaru didn’t know what to say. He tried to imagine not having Touya to play and couldn't.
Sai ghosted over to them then, his mission accomplished. He flashed Hikaru a thumbs-up sign, but otherwise waited silently, realizing that Kouyou was in the middle of his narrative.
The elder Touya cleared his throat and said with a wry smile, “But I have since come to understand that his was a much greater purpose than mine. If each of us is a rung on a ladder, then Sai is the joint that holds two great ladders together, so that we can reach that much higher. When I realized that, I was humbled by him for the second time. Not only was he the rival I had long sought, but he was the spirit of go itself.”
“Yeah, literally,” Hikaru had to add.
“Kouyou, don’t tell Hikaru I’m the spirit of go,” Sai said. “It’s not true. What will he think of me now?”
Hikaru rolled his eyes. “Yeah, because it’s so much worse being accused of being the spirit of go than being a plain old go-obsessed ghost, Sai.” He grinned and poked at Sai’s hat, but Sai hurriedly defended it, holding it firmly in place.
“Stop it or I won’t take you to the ramen shop for lunch,” Sai threatened. “The God of Go was kind enough to open the doorway there to you, but you have to behave.”
Hikaru immediately quit his assault on Sai’s hat. “Awesome! Let’s go! Can we make Touya come too?”
“I’ll call him and Shuusaku,” Touya Kouyou offered.
“You’re really lucky, Sai,” Hikaru reflected once the elder Touya had gone.
But Sai shook his head. “It’s not luck. It’s a fate of our own designing.” When Hikaru didn’t understand, he only said, “We will reach the Hand of God. Both of us.” Then he amended, “All of us. Someday.”
The world outside the go salon was as blank to Hikaru as before, but before long, as he and Touya followed behind Sai and the others, another doorway came into view. After two bowls of ramen, Hikaru was sorely tempted to find a quick, painless way to die in order to extend his stay indefinitely.
~*~
The final round took place in the not-quite-Yugen no Ma that Hikaru had found Sai and Touya Kouyou in on the first day. “How come you were playing in this room that first day?” he asked. “Do you play here casually too?”
“We play here on occasion, yes,” Sai answered. “But that doesn’t make it any less suitable for our match. If the Hand of God is to be found, this is where it should happen.”
The only spectator besides themselves was none other than the God of Go. Her hair was in braided pigtails today. “Good luck, Sai-san, Kouyou-san,” she told them as they took their seats. Sitting to her right, Hikaru noticed how her eyes lingered on Sai. Touya sat next to Hikaru, while Shuusaku went around to sit on the girl’s other side. If there were any cameras, he didn’t see them.
He thought back to Touya Kouyou’s words about how the God of Go was still waiting for her own rival to appear. From the way she appeared so intent on the game, leaning forward with her small hands clenched into fists, it certainly appeared that way. She was hoping that either Sai or Touya Kouyou would rise from this game as her rival, and Hikaru felt sorry for her. Even if one of them achieved the Hand of God in this game, they would never be her rival, anymore than he would ever be Touya Kouyou’s or Sai’s rival. It just didn’t work that way.
The players went through nigiri, and Sai took white, Kouyou black. Komi would be six-and-a-half moku. “Onegaishimasu,” they said, and the game began.
How many thousands of games had Sai and Touya Kouyou played together since their first even game over the Internet? Hikaru saw infinite possibilities in each of their moves, and he wondered if it was possible that they had read into all the possible scenarios to determine the other’s strategy before they played the next hand.
The metamorphosis of the former Meijin’s playing style that had begun after his online game with Sai was complete, and Hikaru saw the solid ferocity of a veteran tiger on the hunt combined with the youthful ingenuity inspired by Sai’s constant plays of daring genius.
It was a game that kept his attention riveted and his whole body tense, but if the Hand of God was to be forthcoming, he had seen no sign of it yet. He slid a glance at the little God of Go. She was still waiting.
The day ended, but the game did not. The lamps were lit and refreshments were brought, but neither Sai nor Touya Kouyou appeared to notice. Their focus remained unbroken, and they showed no fatigue or intention of stopping. Hikaru followed Touya out for a stretch break.
“What do you think?” he asked, twisting his torso and letting his arms swing freely.
“It’s close,” Touya said.
“What about the Hand of God?”
Touya took a long drink at the water fountain. “The God of Go is still expecting it. And the game’s only half over.”
“Yeah.” Hikaru took his turn at the water fountain. He splashed water on his face after drinking. “Suppose one of them finds the Hand of God. Do you think anything will change?”
“I doubt it. Eternal rivals are eternal for a reason.” Touya smiled hesitantly. “Thanks, by the way. My father talked to me yesterday…about that.” At Hikaru’s blank look, he said, “You know. That.”
“Oh.” Hikaru scrutinized his rival’s face, expecting to see something out of the ordinary. “So you’re okay with it?”
“More or less.” Touya nodded. “I mean, I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to the idea, but I’d guessed as much. They’re a good match, if you think about it. I just can’t say a word about it to my mother.” He grinned. “Wipe your face, Shindou. You’re dripping water. You look like a wet dog.” He started to walk away, but changed his mind midway.
“What?” Hikaru asked when Touya looked at him without a word.
“Nothing,” Touya said. He raised his hands to Hikaru’s face, and then very carefully, ran them from Hikaru’s forehead up through his dripping bangs, and then down past his temples and over his cheeks. “That’s better,” he said, and wiped his hands on Hikaru’s shirt. “You can dry the rest yourself.”
“Touya!”
“Let’s get back to the game.”
Hikaru followed him cheerfully back into the room, idiotic smile and all.
The intensity of the match had increased while they were gone. The God of Go shot them resentful glares as they took their places again. “It’s coming,” she hissed.
Hikaru studied the board. Only a few moves had been played while they’d been gone, but the balance of the game was poised on a precarious edge that teetered in Touya Kouyou’s favor. Sai would need a miraculous move to gain back the advantage.
The minutes ticked by uncounted as Hikaru searched for a move or a strategy overwhelming enough to be what Sai needed. He couldn’t find it. But he trusted that Sai could. He saw the God of Go focusing intently on the board and knew that the move was there. The Hand of God would be played.
After a long deliberation, Sai played his move. Hikaru studied its potential. It could be it, he allowed, but it depended on how the next moves were played out as well. Next to him, the God of Go smiled fiercely and wiped her eyes.
The next moves revealed a trap of genius that Sai had laid and lured his rival into. The game was decided, the God of Go’s smile declared. But the players themselves gave no indication that they had reached the same realization. Hikaru continued to study the board and read out the moves as they continued to be played.
The lamps burned low as the night passed. Morning light had filtered through the paper-matted window that led outside when the God of Go gave a tiny, “Oh!” Touya Kouyou had produced his own surprising move, working a damaging sacrificial exchange he had made earlier to his advantage and slipping narrowly out of Sai’s trap. Sai fingered his fan and considered his next move.
The rest of the game seemed to flow quickly after that, and half an hour later, Sai bowed his head. “I have lost.”
“Thank you for the game.”
“Thank you for the game.” The tension of the long hours quickly dispersed. Sai was hardly able to feel more than a little bit of disappointment for his loss. It had been an unparalleled game. “Which move do you think was the Hand of God?” he asked, smiling.
“If there was one, then there had to be several, I’m sure,” Touya Kouyou answered. “When you played here, for instance…”
“No, but you won, so it must have been your move here. I'm sure of it.”
The God of Go sniffled and escaped the room with a wail.
“Is she all right?” Touya’s father asked, looking after her in concern.
“I think your game surprised her,” Shuusaku guessed. “Particularly when Kouyou-san played the nobi on the top left formation.”
“I think you shocked her by rising above her, Kouyou,” Sai said, beaming with pride and exhilaration. “Maybe she’ll practice with us now sometimes.”
“Being the God of Go is lonely. With no rival to call her own, she may have let her skills deteriorate,” Kouyou reflected.
Hikaru didn’t want to talk about the little girl anymore. He scooted forward to the goban, Akira and Shuusaku following suit. “Sai, your sequence here starting at 5-13 was cool,” he exclaimed. “But you must have known that Touya-sensei would sneak into this area after that, right?”
~*~
They said their goodbyes. Hikaru gave Sai one last hug, shook hands with Touya’s dad and Shuusaku, and ruffled the God of Go’s hair, Kawai-san-style. She fumed and patted down her hair.
“I’ll always watch over you, Hikaru. And we’ll all be here when you come back,” Sai said fondly.
“I know,” Hikaru said. “I’ll miss you. Again.” He laughed ruefully. “Make sure that ramen shop stays in business until I come back.”
After Touya finished exchanging a few last words with his father, they stepped away from the doorway of the go salon. Hikaru watched everyone fade out like a distant memory shot for a movie. But he wouldn’t forget anything.
He found Touya’s fingers with his own. “Beat you to the Hand of God,” he challenged.
“I’d like to see you try.” There was the warm sensation of Touya’s hand brushing against his own before Touya, too, was taken a separate direction.
Hikaru stood just inside his house, travel bag slung over his shoulder. “I’m home,” he announced. He kicked off his shoes in the entryway and headed up to his room.
Greetings in the Name of God
Dear Mr. Shindou Hikaru,
Greetings in the name of God. In recognition of your achievements, you are cordially invited to participate in the Divine Cup taking place in the Great Go Salon in the Sky. The cup will run for one week beginning on the twenty-ninth day of April. We are pleased to announce that the winner of this tournament shall come away with the Hand of God.
If you choose to participate, transportation to the tournament site will be arranged for the evening of the twenty-eighth of April. Any and all material needs will be provided for, as well as a foolproof alibi for your absence from life.
Please fill out the attached form to reserve your spot in this once-in-a-millennium tournament and leave it in your mailbox by the twenty-seventh of April.
We hope to see you soon.
Sincerely,
Divine Cup Organizational Committee
~*~
“The Divine Cup? The Hand of God as the prize?” Touya snorted. “Shindou, surely you’re not taking this seriously.” His humor faded when Hikaru remained thoughtful. “Shindou, listen to me. This is clearly a tasteless joke. The Great Go Salon in the Sky? Come on! Even I could come up with something better.”
“Yeah, but-”
“And the Hand of God!” Touya rushed on. “You know it’s not a tournament prize to be given away! It’s the ultimate divine move!”
Touya's voice had risen, and Hikaru was glad that they had met up at Touya’s apartment instead of the go salon. Recently, Ichikawa-san had made clear that she had even less tolerance for their grade school arguments than before. Particularly because they were both title-holders now, she said, and it was high time they thought about the public image they were broadcasting. They were in Touya’s living room, seated across from each other at the goban out of habit. But papers, instead of stones, were strewn across the board.
“I know!” Hikaru answered defensively. “But if you read closely, it doesn’t say that they’re giving away the Hand of God as a prize. Just that the winner will get the Hand of God, somehow or other.”
“Big difference.”
“Look, Touya. This isn’t just any tournament. It’s the Divine Cup. Held only once every thousand years, according to this.” He jabbed at the invitation letter to prove his point. “Besides, even if we don’t reach the Hand of God there, there might be other things to see. I mean, if it really is the Great Go Salon in the Sky as they claim, and it means what I think it means, then maybe …” He trailed off and swallowed. “Anyway, I already filled out my response form. You’d better fill out yours too.”
“There are limits to stupidity, Shindou, and you’ve just exceeded them,” Touya said crossly. But somehow, he couldn’t snap at Hikaru when his rival got that haunted, hopeful look in his eyes. “Fine. I’ll answer this invitation. It’s not like they’re asking for my bank account number, anyway.”
While Touya filled out his reply form, Hikaru’s eyes fell upon the small family alter and incense bowl sitting on the shelf above the television on the opposite side of the room. Touya had grown up under the very roof of tradition, but the shelf decorations hadn’t appeared until his father had passed away a few years ago from a sudden heart attack.
If the Great Go Salon in the Sky really was the great go salon in the sky, then maybe Touya’s dad would be there too.
“He’s probably playing go now, wherever he is,” Hikaru had said after the former Meijin’s funeral. “With Sai,” he added quietly, because he’d felt that it had been the right thing to say. Touya had turned at the mention of that name, but Hikaru couldn’t bring himself to say any more, and Touya, too deep in grief, had let it slide.
“Hey, what did you fill out for ‘Preferred Excuse’?” Touya asked.
“Trip to Innoshima,” Hikaru answered, eyes still fixed on Touya’s family alter. “It’ll be Golden Week then, so no one should ask.”
“Of course.” Hikaru went there every May fifth, if he didn’t have a game scheduled, every May fifth since they’d become too old to qualify for the Hokuto Cup. “Do you mind if I put that too? You did promise to take me with you at some point, and you still haven’t.”
“Sure.”
Touya caught Hikaru staring at his memorial shelf again when he had completed the form. He wondered at it when a thought struck to him. “Hey, I’m done,” he said.
Hikaru came back to himself. “Good.” His brow wrinkled in confusion when Touya leaned forward across the goban.
“Shindou, this isn’t about the Hand of God at all, is it?” Touya asked seriously.
“Huh?” It took Hikaru a second to process, so startled was he by his rival’s proximity. “Well, it could be. I mean, of course it is. That’s what the tournament is for.”
“What I mean is, the Hand of God isn’t all you’re expecting to find there,” Touya clarified, sitting back and watching his rival closely. “It’s not the only reason you’re going out on a limb and taking this invitation so stupidly serious.”
“I am not!”
Touya raised an eyebrow, and Hikaru flushed. “Fine. I just thought it just sounds like fun, so I figured, why not? It’ll be Golden Week so I’ve got nothing scheduled for a change, and like you said, it’s not like they’re asking for your bank account information or anything. Might as well, right?” He topped his babbling off with a nervous chuckle, and Touya sat back, satisfied.
So it wasn’t about the Hand of God, not really. It didn’t matter if the first line of the invitation sounded like something lifted straight from a piece of solicitous spam mail. It was about the things that went unspoken and the things that had not yet been told. It was about the still-mysterious Sai, and it was about all the great players that had gone before them, including, he thought, finally daring to entertain his own feather-light wisps of hope, his father.
“Shindou, for your sake, you’re lucky you’re not this easy to read on the goban.” Touya sealed the envelope as Hikaru sputtered in indignation. “So I just leave this in my mailbox?”
“Oh, you’re done?”
“I told you that a whole minute ago.”
“Cool.” Hikaru grinned disarmingly, and Touya felt that their positions had reversed-he was the one unbalanced now. “Yeah, just leave it in your mailbox.”
~*~
On the night of April twenty-eighth, after wondering for hours if Touya had been right after all and he had been too gullible, Hikaru went to bed. As soon as he fell asleep, though, he was wide awake and on his feet, fully dressed in a loud yellow t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers. The world was a blank, unobtrusive white. There was no question of where he was. “So this is it, huh?” He couldn’t even tell if he was indoors or outdoors. The whiteness spread all around him, save for a single doorway that shone with light, beckoning to him. This was it. Hikaru breathed deeply, then entered the Great Go Salon in the Sky.
“Welcome, Hikaru-san,” a voice chirped promptly. The room seemed almost dim after the glaring expanse of white outside, and it took a second for his eyes to adjust. It smelled of freshly cut roses and lavender. To his immediate left was a reception counter, where a young girl with pigtails sat on a tall stool. He guessed her to be in elementary school.
“Er, hello,” he said, taking a moment to glance around. The room was very much like any reputable go salon-clean, well-lit, with a faithful clientele filling its seats. The only difference was the size of the room itself. It was big. Hugely big. There might have been a hundred individual tables, all comfortably spaced. It seemed as much a tournament hall as it was a go salon.
“If you’re interested, I can show you some of our more traditional rooms in the back, down the hall,” the girl said when Hikaru had stared too long without saying anything. She pointed to a far passage guarded by a pair of potted ferns. “There’s a game in progress that you’ll definitely be interested in.”
“Uh, sure. But who are you? How come you knew who I was?”
“I’m the God of Go,” the girl informed him proudly. He stared at her. “It’s true,” she insisted. “I’ll even show you around.”
She slid off the high stool and motioned for Hikaru to follow. He felt a bit overwhelmed-but this was the Great Go Salon in the Sky, after all-as he trailed behind her through the array of tables and down the passage. He searched for faces he could recognize as they passed, but none of them were familiar. “Hey, um…God? Do you know if Touya’s here yet? Touya Akira?”
“Kouyou-san’s son? Of course, I’d forgotten you two were eternal rivals. How very silly of me. He arrived about an hour ago, and happily for you, we’re heading to his location right now.” She turned another corner in the passageway, passing several rooms, and Hikaru hurried to keep up.
He was as nonplused about the girl’s casual reference to Touya’s father by his first name as he was by her matter-of-fact acceptance of his rivalry-not just rivalry, even, but his eternal rivalry-with Touya. But this was the Great Go Salon in the Sky, after all. And despite all appearances, maybe she was the God of Go. Though he sincerely hoped not. Some small part of him screamed that this had to be a nightmare. He’d always figured the God of Go, if there were one, to be an old man in Heian period robes. Or maybe, considering that Go originated in China, some old Chinese dude with a pointy beard and moustache. But not a know-it-all grade schooler.
He asked, “So you know Touya-sensei?”
But she hushed him with a wave of her hand and stopped outside a sliding door. “We’re here,” she whispered. “Please remain a silent observer until the end of the game. Can you do that?”
“Sure, why not?” Hikaru agreed, bemused. A split second before she slid the door open, it occurred to him why she might feel it necessary to make such a request of him.
Before him sat Sai, deep in a game with Touya Kouyou in the Yugen no Ma.
His mouth opened and closed soundlessly. The girl elbowed him and hissed, “Quiet.” He might have considered her actions cute if his brain hadn’t just gone into shock. She pointed him a little to the right, where Touya Akira sat watching the board, and Hikaru moved woodenly to sit down next to his rival. The door slid shut with hardly a sound, leaving just the two players and the two observers in the room. The clack of stone on wood brought Hikaru back to his senses.
He couldn’t take his eyes off of Sai. It had been eight years since he had disappeared. Sai looked as well as ever. His white outer jacket had been exchanged for a more elaborately patterned red one, and underneath, a formal black hitoe replaced his former burgundy one. His black eboshi hat, however, was a reassuring constant. The intensity he emanated resonated with some unnamable feeling deep within Hikaru, and he remembered, this was what he had felt during the NetGo game between Sai and Touya-sensei all those years ago. The intensity was much stronger now.
Next to him, Touya nodded at him but said nothing. Hikaru could imagine what he must have felt, seeing his father again. Did he know that the man his father was playing was Sai? He wanted to laugh. Touya, your father is playing Sai, he wanted to say. Sai is right there!
It took all of Hikaru’s self-control to sit quietly and study the board. The game was nearing its end, but the stones and patterns were a blur to him. After losing count twice as he tried to determine each side’s territory, Hikaru allowed his eyes to wander.
The room was not the Yugen no Ma as he had first thought, though such a comparison would bear up under much scrutiny. The floor was tatami, the architecture traditional Japanese, and even the décor on the opposite side of the room featured the same Zen-style stone garden. But where the Yugen no Ma had unobtrusive cameras hanging from the corners of the ceiling and a thermostat on the wall, giving clear hints of modernity, this room had none of that. It was a room brought straight from the castle games of Shuusaku’s time. Tall oil lamps stood in each corner of the room, and a shorter lamp sat closer at hand, lending a solemn light to the game.
His eyes came back to rest on the two players. Touya’s dad appeared healthy too; his concentration was no less than Sai’s. He had less grey in his hair than Hikaru remembered. The former title holder had died three years ago, soon after his son had first won the Meijin title. Had he been playing Sai ever since then? Hikaru fervently hoped so.
“I have lost.” Touya’s father bowed his head.
“Thank you for the game.” Sai bowed deeply in return, and then as though they had been aware all along, he and the elder Touya turned as one to their observers.
“Hikaru!” Sai exclaimed.
“Akira,” the former Meijin said warmly.
“Father. It’s good to see you again.” Touya’s voice broke, but Hikaru had no more time to be concerned as Sai nearly bowled him over with the exuberance of his hug.
“Sai!” Hikaru could say no more as he clutched at the Heian spirit’s red robes, tasting the salt of his tears. This was Sai again, his mind repeated over and over.
“Hikaru,” Sai cried, equally trapped by a similar wave of emotion. He succeeded in being just a bit more articulate: “I’m so glad you’re here.” For a long time, they couldn’t let go of each other. Hikaru marveled at the feeling of silk beneath his fingertips and the warmth from Sai’s hands where they gripped his back. Although he had been tangible to Hikaru as a ghost, Sai had never felt particularly warm or cold, and his clothes, though by all appearances silk, had never felt of the authenticity that they did now.
“You’re so much taller now, Hikaru,” Sai said at last, wiping his eyes.
“Maybe you’ve just gotten shorter,” Hikaru managed to joke lamely. But he saw that it was true-he was just as tall as Sai, if not a centimeter or two taller. It was strange.
“I missed you,” he said. “I wish you hadn’t had to leave.”
“I didn’t want to go either. But my time was over. I had guided you as far as I could, and it was time for your go to grow independently of me.”
Hikaru reached out and tugged at Sai’s sleeve, feeling like a twelve-year-old again. “I should have let you play more,” he apologized.
Sai shook his head gently. “No, you did what was right for you. I was far more selfish than I had any right to be. Besides, you did let me find my own true rival.” He looked toward the reunited Touya father and son, and with a pang, Hikaru realized that it had been a long time since he had seen Sai so happy. For Sai, the final months with Hikaru had been increasingly melancholy ones, filled with upset confusion and fear and sadness as he resisted his inevitable fate. Even allowing for the callowness of youth, Hikaru wondered how he could have been so insensitive of it at the time.
“Hikaru, don’t regret the past. You did nothing wrong.”
Hikaru nodded. “Have you been playing with Touya-sensei a lot?” he asked, changing the subject.
“Every day since he’s come here,” Sai answered sanguinely. “Before that, I…” He looked embarrassed, but continued at Hikaru’s curious stare. “I…moped around a little. Or a lot. I missed you, and for a long time, it just didn’t seem fair that I had to leave when I did.”
Hikaru smiled sadly, recalling clearly his own painful memories. “I did the same. I didn’t think I wanted to play go without you. I looked for you, you know. I kept hoping you’d come back.”
“I know,” Sai said, and it seemed to Hikaru that Sai really did know. They shared a silent moment as the pain of the past transformed into something closer to peace.
“Won’t you introduce me to Akira?” Sai asked.
“Sure.” Hikaru hesitated. “I haven’t told him the truth about you yet though.”
“What better time is there than now?”
Touya was waiting for them with his father, his eyes and nose faintly red. Hikaru was sure he didn’t look much better.
“Kouyou,” Sai said, “You remember Hikaru, of course?”
“Yes,” Touya’s father said. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Shindou-kun.”
Hikaru murmured a polite response, not quite at ease in the elder Touya’s aura of dignified authority.
“Akira.” Touya Kouyou began to introduce Sai, but Hikaru interrupted.
“Please, Touya-sensei, let me.” It seemed vitally important to Hikaru that he should be the one to introduce his once-companion. He saw in Touya’s eyes that he was already certain of Sai’s identity, but that didn’t lessen the significance of the moment. “Touya,” Hikaru said, “this is Sai. Fujiwara no Sai. He taught me how to play go.”
Touya’s eyes widened a fraction, but he nodded and held out a hand. “I’m glad to finally meet you,” he said.
“And I, you,” Sai answered.
There was so much to say, so much telling and explaining to do, that Hikaru hardly noticed when they moved from the Yugen no Ma lookalike room back into the main hall, where the tables had been rearranged for the opening ceremony and banquet. Hikaru had had dinner hours ago, but he felt hungry again. It seemed like the Great Go Salon ran in a different time zone.
“Shindou Kisei,” Sai said proudly as their food was served. “I was wondering which title you’d take first. But ‘Go Saint’ is fitting for you, I think.”
“That’s the honorary title they gave Shuusaku, so I figured, why not aim for that one?” Hikaru shrugged, embarrassed but pleased that Sai had kept up with his progress.
Next to him, Akira snorted. “Like you actually got to choose which title you wanted,” he said in an undertone with a cautious look at Sai. He believed Sai’s story-how could he not, having just watched Sai’s game with his father and seeing Sai with his own eyes?-but as much as it made sense, it still seemed somewhat unbelievable. In contrast, joking with Shindou was second nature.
“Well it is the most prestigious, now that you mention it,” Hikaru answered smugly. He was tempted to add, “Touya Meijin II” for good measure, but feeling the weight of Touya’s father’s gaze on him, good-humored though it was, he stopped himself. Instead, he said, “I did try for Honinbo this year too, but you know, Ogata-sensei spent so many years trying to beat the old geezer for it. Now that he finally has the title, he’s just as bad as Kuwabara was about giving it up.”
“Ogata-kun is still holding onto it, is he?” A wheezing chuckle from behind him, and Hikaru knew, without any sense of extraordinary surprise, that it was the very old man in question. At this point, everything surprising had become natural. The longtime Honinbo title holder had passed away only a few months before Touya Kouyou had. “If he doesn’t defend it until he dies, I have every mind to go back and haunt him.”
“Kuwabara-sensei,” Hikaru and Touya greeted.
“Don’t bother getting up,” the old man said when they made to do so. “I’m just passing through to say hello to you young ones. But I don’t want to disturb this lovely family dinner you’re having, ho ho ho!” He winked at Sai, who grew noticeably flustered.
“Kuwabara-sensei, please,” Touya Kouyou said, warning in his tone.
“Do as you like. I’ll see you youngsters tomorrow.” The old man nodded to them and hobbled away.
“He’s putting on a show for you,” Sai explained, color still in his cheeks. “He doesn’t usually act so old.”
“That reminds me, you look younger than I remember, Father,” Akira said.
His father agreed. “Here, we can be as young or old as we choose, so long as we are ourselves. That, of course, we cannot change.”
The opening ceremony began shortly afterwards. The little girl who had acted as receptionist and guide to Hikaru also acted as the master of ceremonies, welcoming the participants and explaining the rules. It was a straightforward elimination tournament, where a single loss would result in disqualification. There would be one round per day, with a total of six rounds. The sixth and final round would span two days.
“But don’t worry,” the self-proclaimed God of Go announced. “I arranged the pairings myself, so it should be fun and fair for everyone!”
So the matches weren’t even random, like any sensible, unbiased tournament would have them. Hikaru turned to Sai. “That girl said that she was the God of Go. Please tell me that it’s not true.”
Sai looked surprised. “But she is. Isn’t she adorable?” Touya Kouyou hummed in agreement, and Hikaru turned to Akira for support.
“She is rather…surprising,” he admitted. “But then again, you should know by now that many go players are a bit odd. If what my father said applies to her, then she must be a very old being who prefers to appear as a child.”
The ceremony ended quickly, without a single mention of the Hand of God, and conversation resumed.
“The best go players throughout history are gathered here,” Sai said.
“Does that include Shuusaku, by any chance?” Touya asked. “Or was he just…” He stopped to rephrase his question more delicately.
Sai immediately caught on to what Touya was asking, however, and he shook his head. “It is true that I played all of his official games for him,” he said. “Such was the generosity of his spirit. But he could not have borne it had he not been extraordinarily gifted in his own right. Torajirou is certainly participating in this competition.”
“Where is he, anyway?” Hikaru asked. “I would have thought he’d be around you, all things considered.”
“He is here, somewhere. But he decided it would be better if we could spend the evening with just the four of us. You will meet him tomorrow.”
“Okay. One more question then. Why are we here? Me and Touya. I don’t see anyone else like us. We’re…I don’t know…”
“Young?” Touya supplied, and Hikaru shot him a grateful look. He had been about to say, “not dead yet,” but ‘young” sounded infinitely better.
“You’re here by my request,” Sai explained. “It’s the tournament for the Hand of God, and we’re all traveling that path. Supposing you and Akira-san are to be the ones who reach the divine move one day, doesn’t it make all the more sense for you to be here?”
“Sai made his case to the committee. When they took too long deliberating, the God of Go stepped in to specially grant his request,” Touya Kouyou supplemented. “Now, the committee is ready to do just about anything Sai asks. They might even bestow him with the Hand of God itself, should he but ask for it.” Though he didn’t quite smile, his eyes conveyed warmth to accompany his fond jest.
Sai nodded happily. “There was something else too,” he said to Hikaru, chiding now. “I have been so looking forward to meeting Akira-kun properly, but I had a feeling you were never going to tell Akira the truth about me without a little help. You should keep your promises better, Hikaru. ”
“You would have to be nosy like that, wouldn’t you?” Hikaru grumbled, although he wore an awkward smile. It vanished instantly when Touya kicked his foot hard under the table and stammered out something to the effect that the pleasure of their acquaintance was entirely his.
“And I should like to play you while we’re here, Fujiwara-san,” Touya said.
“Please, just Sai is fine. And we shall certainly play each other, many times, I hope.”
“Sheesh, quit acting like a stuffed shirt, Touya,” Hikaru muttered to his rival, his ankle throbbing. “It’s just Sai.”
“Shut up. I’d like to see you call my father by his first name,” Touya hissed back.
“That’s completely different!”
Touya Kouyou cleared his throat politely, and self-conscious, Hikaru and Akira broke off into silent embarrassment.
“But do you really think the winner will attain the Hand of God?” Touya asked, looking at no one in particular.
“It’s what they promised,” Sai said. His eyes suddenly burned with his millennium-old agenda.
Touya Kouyou placed a hand on Sai’s arm, a gesture that was not lost on Hikaru. “The God of Go has a strange sense of humor,” he cautioned. “It may be that the Hand of God is something completely beyond our reach.”
Sai shook his head resolutely. “No, it can be reached. There’s no question of that. It definitely can be. If not by you and me, then certainly,” he declared, nodding towards Hikaru and Akira, “by them.”
“But Sai,” Hikaru said, Sai’s words raising a question, “why are you talking like the Hand of God can be reached by two people? A hand can only be played by one person. Don’t get me wrong, it’d be cool if all of us could reach the Hand of God. But before, you always made it sound like a personal goal.”
“That’s right.” Sai smiled contemplatively. “The Hand of God can only be reached by one. I spoke wishfully just now, I suppose.”
“But doesn’t it take the ultimate match to bring about the ultimate move?” Akira pointed out sensibly.
His father nodded approvingly. “If indeed the Hand of God can be attained here, it will be found during the final match.”
“Then I must play you in the finals,” Sai said to Touya Kouyou, and his gaze was that of one possessed.
“Naturally, my friend,” the other man assured him. “I would be disappointed if it were otherwise.”
Feeling somewhat put off, Hikaru saw that his rival shared his feelings. “Touya,” he said loudly, “I’ll play you in the finals.” He grinned and stuck his tongue out at Sai.
Sai’s eyes flashed at the challenge. “Hikaru, let’s play a game right now.”
Touya Kouyou chuckled. “Let me show you where you’ll be staying,” he told them, “And then you can play.” He turned to his son. “I’d like to see how far you’ve come as well.”
“Of course, Father.” Akira’s words couldn’t hide his anticipation.
~*~
Sai had a new fan. Hikaru hadn’t noticed it during their game, but afterwards, as Sai absently opened and closed it, it caught his attention.
“You’ve grown stronger, Hikaru. Much, much stronger.” Sai looked pleased, and then was unable to resist adding gleefully, “But I’ve grown stronger too.”
Hikaru laughed shortly. “Well, yeah, if you’re playing Touya-sensei every single day. No kidding you’ve grown stronger.” He looked again at the markedly different fan that Sai held. “That’s not the fan you gave me,” he commented. He held out his own fan, white, simple, and heavily nicked from nearly eight years of constant companionship.
Sai looked surprised, then embarrassed, as if noticing for the first time. “No, it’s not,” he admitted. His new fan was of heavy black paper, painted with red plum blossoms and two or three other kinds of light colored plants that Hikaru couldn’t identify. They stretched tastefully across three-quarters of the fan’s black surface.
“It matches your clothes,” Hikaru observed. “Where did you get it?”
“Oh.” Sai snapped his fan open and hid the lower half of his face behind it. “Kouyou,” he whispered.
“Huh.” Hikaru wouldn’t have thought that the older Touya would have gone for such an elaborate design. The possible implications didn’t hit him until a second later. “Wait, Touya-sensei gave you that? Like as a gift?”
Sai nodded, keeping an anxious watch on him. Hikaru snuck a look at the elder Touya, who was still in post game discussion with his son.
“I thought something might have been up with you two. You’re way too familiar with him.” Hikaru gave Sai an inquiring look. “It is like that, isn’t it?” He half expected Sai to deny it.
“Like…that?” Sai echoed faintly. “Yes, I think so. Are you…okay with it?” He was still hiding behind his fan, as if fearing Hikaru’s condemnation.
Touya’s dad and Sai. Touya’s dad. And Sai. Hikaru tried to wrap his mind around it and failed. But then he looked at Touya studying the board and realized that maybe he could understand after all. A little bit. He shrugged. “It’ll take some getting used to, but yeah, it’s fine. I kind of figured you were too pretty for your own good.”
“Good.” Sai showed a relieved smile. “But don’t tell Akira, please. Kouyou’s not sure how he would take it.” As Hikaru thought it over, Sai rushed to assure him, “Kouyou really loved Akiko-san, you understand. I don’t want to break apart those bonds any more than I already may have.”
Hikaru sighed and smiled supportively. All things considered, he knew he was completely unqualified to give Sai relationship advice. “You’re both adults,” he said. “Heck, you’re both already dead. I don’t know how the whole afterlife business works, but I’m sure Touya-sensei knows what he’s getting into.”
“Thank you,” Sai said. “It’s good to hear you say that.”
“Sure.” Hikaru shifted his attention to the fan again, eager to talk about anything else. “Isn’t that design kind of gaudy though?” Realizing how that sounded, he backtracked immediately. “I mean, it’s really pretty, and like I said, it suits you, but I never would have thought Touya-sensei would have chosen this type of design, is what I meant.”
“He didn’t choose it himself, exactly,” Sai admitted with a smile. “The God of Go suggested it, knowing that I had given my own fan to you several years ago. She picked it out, and he agreed with her choice.”
The whole God of Go business was weirding Hikaru out. “You guys go gift shopping with the God of Go?” He didn’t see how the God of Go could possibly be lonely like this.
~*~
The first match was difficult, but Hikaru pulled through. He found himself fighting as hard for every point as he had during the Kisei title matches. He was forced to settle for a neutral seki where he had been certain he could kill. Every intrusion he made was challenged aggressively, and his opponent’s advances were made no less boldly. But he was confident of his own readings, and he remembered with fierce joy the time Sai had simulated a sword fight with him, telling him to face his fears as Touya did and fight to the very brink of his abilities. He had advanced quickly from the second insei class to the first then. Now, driven by the same need to face Touya on the path to the Hand of God, he won his first round match by a small but well-earned margin. He felt as though he had gained months worth of experience.
His companions had each done well, and it was with a cheerful heart that Hikaru was introduced to Honinbo Shuusaku that evening. It was after dinner, and the Japanese style room that Hikaru and Touya shared, located in some part of the mysteriously expansive go salon, had become the default evening gathering place. At first, Hikaru had worried that while he was linked to Shuusaku by the common topic of Sai, Touya would be left out. As it turned out though, that wasn't the case at all. It was thanks in part to Shuusaku’s character. He was a courteous, mild tempered man, well-intentioned and thoughtful with an appreciable sense of humor. His efforts to be inclusive with Sai’s visitors were well received, and Hikaru couldn’t begrudge Sai for speaking so highly of him time and again.
“His advice was sound. But what then?” Shuusaku asked. “This doesn’t seem like it ended entirely to your satisfaction, Hikaru-san.” He sat on a cushion on the floor. Hikaru, Touya, and Sai were seated likewise in an open circle, while Touya Kouyou sat a little removed from their group, watching them with content interest.
“Yeah, it sucked. Right after he fed me all that stuff about facing my fears like Touya did, he sliced me in half without any warning, the jerk, and then had the gall to ask me for another game!” Hikaru grinned at his audience, his mirth broadening when he saw a repentant look on Sai’s face.
“Hikaru, it was only in your mind,” Sai protested. “You weren’t really sliced in half.”
“That’s a poor excuse for abusing such an eager student,” Shuusaku laughed. “Sai, that was truly unkind of you.”
“Torajirou, it wasn’t like that!”
“Akira-san, what do you make of it?” Shuusaku asked.
“I think Sai did the right thing,” Touya said. “Shindou was clearly in need of a beating to drive off his cowardice.”
“Touya, you’re missing the whole point!” Hikaru argued. “He sliced me in half with his sword! And then asked for another game like he hadn’t just killed me!”
“I always knew you were delusional,” Touya returned with vengeful pleasure. “Like Sai said, it was all in your mind.”
“Thank you, Akira. I always knew you were more sensible than Hikaru,” Sai said.
Hikaru looked in mock fury at them. “That does it. Touya, your alliance with Sai is so over.” He grabbed his cushion and proceeded to beat his rival with it. “Shuusaku-san, help me.”
“Ow, that hurts, Shindou!” Despite his protests, Touya couldn’t stop laughing and put up only a half-hearted defense. Once Touya had collapsed in a fit of giggles, Shuusaku watched in amusement as Hikaru moved on to his next target, Sai.
“Torajirou, Kouyou, help!” But Shuusaku only moved out of the way, and seeing this, Sai scrambled behind the senior Touya.
Hikaru stopped in his tracks and dropped the cushion with a tired huff. “That’s not fair, Sai. Touya-sensei’s not involved.”
Touya Kouyou looked back at Sai.
“It doesn’t matter," Sai said. "It was enough to stop you, Hikaru.” He opened his fan as though he had come up with a master strategy. “Tesuji,” he murmured playfully. Before Hikaru could make the connection, Sai snapped his fan shut and pointed it at him. He commanded, “Akira, Torajirou.”
His target protected by an impenetrable defense, Hikaru was ambushed from two sides, beset by his rival and betrayed by his disloyal supporter. “That’s sooo not fair, Sai,” he groaned from the floor, laughing helplessly. This was right. He wanted to create as many memories with Sai, and with those who had become a part of their odd family, if he could call it that, as possible.
“Hikaru.” Shuusaku offered him a hand up.
“Thanks,” Hikaru said, taking it gratefully. He didn’t immediately notice when the air around Honinbo heir changed, but the room quieted, and the older man looked thoughtful. He continued to hold Hikaru’s hand in a tighter-than-comfortable grip even after he had helped him up.
“I need to thank you,” Shuusaku stated, his eyes fixed intently on Hikaru’s.
“You do?”
Shuusaku continued, “I’ve heard it said that no ghost was ever seen by two pairs of eyes. Throughout my life, I was always afraid that once I died, I would be condemning Sai to an eternity of solitude. I believed that once I was gone, there would be no one left to see Sai. If there’s one thing I cannot be grateful for enough, it is you, Shindou Hikaru. Thank you for seeing Sai in my place, and for releasing him from his earthly bonds as I could not.” He bowed over Hikaru’s hand.
“Don’t do that. There’s no need for thanks.” Uncomfortable, Hikaru grinned sheepishly and looked over at Sai. “I was a pretty awful host, after all. And I’m sure the God of Go had it all planned out, one way or another.”
“All the same, I am grateful, and I needed you to know that. Sai is closer than family to me.” Shuusaku smiled. “Tomorrow I will face Sai, and the next day, you will. As it seems we will not meet in the tournament, I would be glad for the opportunity to play you after our matches tomorrow.”
“You’re talking like you’ve already lost,” Hikaru said.
Shuusaku realized his error and chuckled. “You’re right. I need to play to win, or else Sai won’t enjoy our match at all.”
~*~
The second round was no less difficult than the first, and Hikaru felt triumphantly exhausted as he pulled out another narrow victory. “How’d you do, Touya?” he asked, catching up with him outside the game room. His rival had finished before him, and a frown tugged on his mouth. “You played Kuwabara today, didn’t you?” he pressed.
“Yeah, but…” Touya shook his head. “I was going to lose. I don’t know if he purposely tossed the game or what, but he put his own group in atari! Granted, it only came out to six points, but what professional does that?”
“You’d be surprised. Waya showed me this video once where some 9-dan pro did that, only he lost an entire half of his board. It was pretty sad. The commentators were trying hard not to laugh.”
Touya still frowned. “Kuwabara went away laughing.”
“So? Good for him. It doesn’t bother him, so don’t’ let it bother you.” Hikaru shrugged, not seeing the point.
“But it doesn’t feel good to win like this!” Touya seethed. “I should have lost!” His outburst made Hikaru finally understand. It was exactly how he had felt after the game with Isumi during the pro exam.
“Look, it’d be great if go could only be won through brilliant moves,” Hikaru told him, “but sometimes your opponent might make a lousy move that forces you to win. Don’t let it bother you or you really will lose your next match. This isn’t the pro exam where you can throw a couple games and still recover.”
Touya looked at him suspiciously. “Since when did you become so wise?”
“I have experience,” Hikaru said sagely, feeling smugly superior. For good measure, he added, “Anyway, I bet the old geezer did that on purpose to throw you off for your next game.”
Touya smiled a little. “Ogata-san always did complain about his mind games.”
~*~
As it turned out, Hikaru and Touya were both knocked out in the third round, Hikaru by Sai, and Touya by his father.
“The God of Go planned it this way, didn’t she?” Hikaru grumbled that evening when everyone was gathered in his and Touya’s room. “I can tell this whole tournament is rigged to fall a certain way.”
“She does have a fondness for irony,” Shuusaku agreed. “And she certainly plays favorites without regard for the consequences.”
“Touya-sensei said Sai was her favorite, right? Why bother having a tournament at all then?”
“But Hikaru, it’s more fun like this,” Sai said. “And this way, you got to come visit us.” Touya Kouyou and his son sat opposite of each other from the goban, recreating their game, while Hikaru, Sai, and Shuusaku sat around them, bantering in between game analysis.
“I get it. So the God of Go arranged this whole tournament for your amusement?”
“No!” Sai denied vehemently.
“In spite of everything, Sai refuses to believe how beloved he is to her,” Touya Kouyou said, looking away from the game.
Sai colored. “Kouyou, don’t say that. If it were true, she wouldn’t have made me leave Hikaru in the first place.”
“Her love is a child’s selfish love,” Touya Kouyou said, disagreeing. “She would want to have you here. She’s still waiting for her own rival to appear one day, but if there’s been one person, in her view, who’s drawn the entire go world closer to the Hand of God, it’s you. And if go were to be embodied in a single spirit, that spirit would be yours.”
His voice had warmed as he’d spoken. Though a good five feet and a go board stood between the former sovereign of the modern go world and Sai, Hikaru had the sensation of intruding on a strangely intimate moment. He saw that Touya, staring at his father, felt it too.
“She knows I’m not fit to be her rival,” Sai murmured. “I’m yours. I’m your rival.”
“But who else has traversed a thousand years of go to connect the distant past to the far future?” Hikaru heard his own words from so long ago echoed in Touya Kouyou’s statement, and he wondered, fleetingly, how much time the deceased actually spent watching the living world. “There is no one who can even compare to you.”
Sai made no reply, for he noticed then that Akira’s eyes were fixed on his father as though trying to read deeply into a difficult situation. He directed everyone’s attention back to the board, saying, “Hikaru, what do you think if Akira had played a hane here instead of the oogeima?”
~*~
Later that night, when their visitors had left and they were preparing for bed, Akira said to Hikaru, “Do you think my father’s changed?”
“Sure. He looks like he’s dropped at least ten years, if not more.”
“It’s not just that.” Touya struggled to put his feelings into words. “He acts younger too, and he’s been more open these past few days than I can remember him ever being.”
“Well…” Hikaru stalled, hoping Touya wouldn’t ask what he was dreading, “he’s glad to see you again.”
“But don’t you think it has something to do with Sai?”
Hikaru spread his comforter over his futon, taking an extra moment to come up with the safest reply. “He found the rival he was always looking for. They’re both happier like this.”
“But is it just that?” Touya sounded doubtful. He laid his bedding out next to Hikaru’s. “I can’t help wondering if there’s something more.”
“Would it matter? If there was something more?” Hikaru probed cautiously. “Not that I’m saying there is, of course.”
Touya turned upon him in an instant. “Shindou, tell me,” he demanded.
Hikaru made a face. “Turn off the light, Touya. It’s nothing.” He wanted to kick himself in the head. Him and his big mouth.
The light blinked out, and they crawled into their respective futons. The tension remained. “Tell me,” Touya insisted again.
“It’s not my business, leave me out of it.” Hikaru sighed audibly, hoping Touya would get the hint. When Touya maintained a grim silence, Hikaru relented. Screw Touya. It wasn’t his problem if he couldn’t deal with it. “If you’re so curious, ask your dad.”
“I can’t do that!” Touya exclaimed, and he actually sounded so panicked that Hikaru reflexively turned toward him.
“Yeah? Then don’t.”
“You know, don’t you?” Touya accused. “About whatever is going on between them.”
Hikaru rolled his eyes. “Yes. You know you’re only out of the loop because we figured you’d go and be a drama queen about it. Kind of like how you’re acting now.”
Touya was silent for a long time. Hikaru had just about dropped off to sleep when he heard Touya say, “I can too handle it. Whatever it is.”
Stupid Touya. Hikaru was willing to bet the Hand of God that Touya already knew and was being purposely obtuse about it.
~*~
“Do you live in the go salon?”
Sai found Hikaru’s question vastly amusing. It was lunch break on the fourth day, and after watching the morning half of the matches, Shuusaku had stayed behind with Touya to discuss the games. Hikaru had excused himself with Sai and Touya Kouyou, looking for an opportunity to talk to Touya’s father without Touya around. But for some reason, he had asked that inane question instead, and now Sai was laughing at him.
“I’m serious!” Hikaru said. “There was nothing outside when I came here, and I just wanted to make sure that you were living and breathing something other than go once in a while.”
“You don’t need to worry, Hikaru,” Sai answered. “You couldn’t see anything outside of the go salon because you’re still alive. There are secrets which are hidden from those who do not yet belong here.”
“All right. I can take that.”
Sai mused. “But maybe we can make an exception. There’s somewhere I’ve been wanting to take you. Let me ask the God of Go.”
“Wait, you don’t have to! I was just curious.”
But Sai had fixated on the idea, and there was excitement in his eyes. “I’ll be right back,” he assured them, and ran off to the reception desk where the God of Go spent much of her time.
Now was probably a good time, Hikaru thought, thinking of his agenda. He looked nervously at Touya Kouyou. How awkward.
Touya’s father was perceptive. “Is there something you wanted to say, Shindou-kun?” he inquired not unkindly.
“Y-yes, actually.” He continued very quickly, “IthinkyoushouldtellTouya. AboutyouandSai.” Touya Kouyou appeared perplexed as he deciphered Hikaru’s speech, but there was no sign that he’d taken offense. Hikaru slowed down. “That is, I bet he’s figured it out already, and I think he can handle it. I know he can. But he deserves to hear it from you.” Hikaru didn’t add that Touya had been driving him up the wall the previous night and it was for his own peace of mind as much as it was for Touya’s.
The older man appraised him and then nodded. “Very well. If you think it’s necessary, then I will speak to him on this matter at an appropriate time.”
“Thanks.” Hikaru let go of the breath he had been holding. The sound of Sai wheedling with the God of Go reached them just then, and Hikaru grinned. “Sounds like Sai’s having fun.”
“Yes.” Touya Kouyou paused. “It must seem strange to you.”
“Huh? Oh, not at all!” Hikaru said, realizing that Touya Kouyou was referring back to the topic of him and Sai.
Touya Kouyou read curiosity in Hikaru’s denial. “It’s fine. I don’t mind sharing,” he said. “Sai would rather that you knew everything.” And so Hikaru listened.
“There was much I didn’t understand at first, after I played him over the Internet," Touya Kouyou said. "If he was my destined rival, why was I only granted that single game with him? I didn’t understand why he wouldn’t come forward to me, nor why we couldn’t travel the path together, challenging each other as you and Akira are so fortunate to do? Why didn’t he live to play me, as I did him?” Touya Kouyou couldn’t conceal his longing, and Hikaru didn’t know what to say. He tried to imagine not having Touya to play and couldn't.
Sai ghosted over to them then, his mission accomplished. He flashed Hikaru a thumbs-up sign, but otherwise waited silently, realizing that Kouyou was in the middle of his narrative.
The elder Touya cleared his throat and said with a wry smile, “But I have since come to understand that his was a much greater purpose than mine. If each of us is a rung on a ladder, then Sai is the joint that holds two great ladders together, so that we can reach that much higher. When I realized that, I was humbled by him for the second time. Not only was he the rival I had long sought, but he was the spirit of go itself.”
“Yeah, literally,” Hikaru had to add.
“Kouyou, don’t tell Hikaru I’m the spirit of go,” Sai said. “It’s not true. What will he think of me now?”
Hikaru rolled his eyes. “Yeah, because it’s so much worse being accused of being the spirit of go than being a plain old go-obsessed ghost, Sai.” He grinned and poked at Sai’s hat, but Sai hurriedly defended it, holding it firmly in place.
“Stop it or I won’t take you to the ramen shop for lunch,” Sai threatened. “The God of Go was kind enough to open the doorway there to you, but you have to behave.”
Hikaru immediately quit his assault on Sai’s hat. “Awesome! Let’s go! Can we make Touya come too?”
“I’ll call him and Shuusaku,” Touya Kouyou offered.
“You’re really lucky, Sai,” Hikaru reflected once the elder Touya had gone.
But Sai shook his head. “It’s not luck. It’s a fate of our own designing.” When Hikaru didn’t understand, he only said, “We will reach the Hand of God. Both of us.” Then he amended, “All of us. Someday.”
The world outside the go salon was as blank to Hikaru as before, but before long, as he and Touya followed behind Sai and the others, another doorway came into view. After two bowls of ramen, Hikaru was sorely tempted to find a quick, painless way to die in order to extend his stay indefinitely.
~*~
The final round took place in the not-quite-Yugen no Ma that Hikaru had found Sai and Touya Kouyou in on the first day. “How come you were playing in this room that first day?” he asked. “Do you play here casually too?”
“We play here on occasion, yes,” Sai answered. “But that doesn’t make it any less suitable for our match. If the Hand of God is to be found, this is where it should happen.”
The only spectator besides themselves was none other than the God of Go. Her hair was in braided pigtails today. “Good luck, Sai-san, Kouyou-san,” she told them as they took their seats. Sitting to her right, Hikaru noticed how her eyes lingered on Sai. Touya sat next to Hikaru, while Shuusaku went around to sit on the girl’s other side. If there were any cameras, he didn’t see them.
He thought back to Touya Kouyou’s words about how the God of Go was still waiting for her own rival to appear. From the way she appeared so intent on the game, leaning forward with her small hands clenched into fists, it certainly appeared that way. She was hoping that either Sai or Touya Kouyou would rise from this game as her rival, and Hikaru felt sorry for her. Even if one of them achieved the Hand of God in this game, they would never be her rival, anymore than he would ever be Touya Kouyou’s or Sai’s rival. It just didn’t work that way.
The players went through nigiri, and Sai took white, Kouyou black. Komi would be six-and-a-half moku. “Onegaishimasu,” they said, and the game began.
How many thousands of games had Sai and Touya Kouyou played together since their first even game over the Internet? Hikaru saw infinite possibilities in each of their moves, and he wondered if it was possible that they had read into all the possible scenarios to determine the other’s strategy before they played the next hand.
The metamorphosis of the former Meijin’s playing style that had begun after his online game with Sai was complete, and Hikaru saw the solid ferocity of a veteran tiger on the hunt combined with the youthful ingenuity inspired by Sai’s constant plays of daring genius.
It was a game that kept his attention riveted and his whole body tense, but if the Hand of God was to be forthcoming, he had seen no sign of it yet. He slid a glance at the little God of Go. She was still waiting.
The day ended, but the game did not. The lamps were lit and refreshments were brought, but neither Sai nor Touya Kouyou appeared to notice. Their focus remained unbroken, and they showed no fatigue or intention of stopping. Hikaru followed Touya out for a stretch break.
“What do you think?” he asked, twisting his torso and letting his arms swing freely.
“It’s close,” Touya said.
“What about the Hand of God?”
Touya took a long drink at the water fountain. “The God of Go is still expecting it. And the game’s only half over.”
“Yeah.” Hikaru took his turn at the water fountain. He splashed water on his face after drinking. “Suppose one of them finds the Hand of God. Do you think anything will change?”
“I doubt it. Eternal rivals are eternal for a reason.” Touya smiled hesitantly. “Thanks, by the way. My father talked to me yesterday…about that.” At Hikaru’s blank look, he said, “You know. That.”
“Oh.” Hikaru scrutinized his rival’s face, expecting to see something out of the ordinary. “So you’re okay with it?”
“More or less.” Touya nodded. “I mean, I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to the idea, but I’d guessed as much. They’re a good match, if you think about it. I just can’t say a word about it to my mother.” He grinned. “Wipe your face, Shindou. You’re dripping water. You look like a wet dog.” He started to walk away, but changed his mind midway.
“What?” Hikaru asked when Touya looked at him without a word.
“Nothing,” Touya said. He raised his hands to Hikaru’s face, and then very carefully, ran them from Hikaru’s forehead up through his dripping bangs, and then down past his temples and over his cheeks. “That’s better,” he said, and wiped his hands on Hikaru’s shirt. “You can dry the rest yourself.”
“Touya!”
“Let’s get back to the game.”
Hikaru followed him cheerfully back into the room, idiotic smile and all.
The intensity of the match had increased while they were gone. The God of Go shot them resentful glares as they took their places again. “It’s coming,” she hissed.
Hikaru studied the board. Only a few moves had been played while they’d been gone, but the balance of the game was poised on a precarious edge that teetered in Touya Kouyou’s favor. Sai would need a miraculous move to gain back the advantage.
The minutes ticked by uncounted as Hikaru searched for a move or a strategy overwhelming enough to be what Sai needed. He couldn’t find it. But he trusted that Sai could. He saw the God of Go focusing intently on the board and knew that the move was there. The Hand of God would be played.
After a long deliberation, Sai played his move. Hikaru studied its potential. It could be it, he allowed, but it depended on how the next moves were played out as well. Next to him, the God of Go smiled fiercely and wiped her eyes.
The next moves revealed a trap of genius that Sai had laid and lured his rival into. The game was decided, the God of Go’s smile declared. But the players themselves gave no indication that they had reached the same realization. Hikaru continued to study the board and read out the moves as they continued to be played.
The lamps burned low as the night passed. Morning light had filtered through the paper-matted window that led outside when the God of Go gave a tiny, “Oh!” Touya Kouyou had produced his own surprising move, working a damaging sacrificial exchange he had made earlier to his advantage and slipping narrowly out of Sai’s trap. Sai fingered his fan and considered his next move.
The rest of the game seemed to flow quickly after that, and half an hour later, Sai bowed his head. “I have lost.”
“Thank you for the game.”
“Thank you for the game.” The tension of the long hours quickly dispersed. Sai was hardly able to feel more than a little bit of disappointment for his loss. It had been an unparalleled game. “Which move do you think was the Hand of God?” he asked, smiling.
“If there was one, then there had to be several, I’m sure,” Touya Kouyou answered. “When you played here, for instance…”
“No, but you won, so it must have been your move here. I'm sure of it.”
The God of Go sniffled and escaped the room with a wail.
“Is she all right?” Touya’s father asked, looking after her in concern.
“I think your game surprised her,” Shuusaku guessed. “Particularly when Kouyou-san played the nobi on the top left formation.”
“I think you shocked her by rising above her, Kouyou,” Sai said, beaming with pride and exhilaration. “Maybe she’ll practice with us now sometimes.”
“Being the God of Go is lonely. With no rival to call her own, she may have let her skills deteriorate,” Kouyou reflected.
Hikaru didn’t want to talk about the little girl anymore. He scooted forward to the goban, Akira and Shuusaku following suit. “Sai, your sequence here starting at 5-13 was cool,” he exclaimed. “But you must have known that Touya-sensei would sneak into this area after that, right?”
~*~
They said their goodbyes. Hikaru gave Sai one last hug, shook hands with Touya’s dad and Shuusaku, and ruffled the God of Go’s hair, Kawai-san-style. She fumed and patted down her hair.
“I’ll always watch over you, Hikaru. And we’ll all be here when you come back,” Sai said fondly.
“I know,” Hikaru said. “I’ll miss you. Again.” He laughed ruefully. “Make sure that ramen shop stays in business until I come back.”
After Touya finished exchanging a few last words with his father, they stepped away from the doorway of the go salon. Hikaru watched everyone fade out like a distant memory shot for a movie. But he wouldn’t forget anything.
He found Touya’s fingers with his own. “Beat you to the Hand of God,” he challenged.
“I’d like to see you try.” There was the warm sensation of Touya’s hand brushing against his own before Touya, too, was taken a separate direction.
Hikaru stood just inside his house, travel bag slung over his shoulder. “I’m home,” he announced. He kicked off his shoes in the entryway and headed up to his room.