Hikago/Sandman, part 2/4
The second chapter. Just because. ^____^
Chapter 2: The sky and the flowers, look how they're smiling
They walked on, and slowly the plains changed into a forest. The forest trees grew taller and taller, until they took the shape of skyscrapers. They were walking on the main street of a big city. Neon lights and advertisements flashed everywhere, but the city itself was empty, abandoned.
Hikaru shifted nervously. “This place has the feeling of a nightmare,” he whispered to Nuala. He kept on glancing over his shoulder, convinced that any moment something horrible would happen.
“It is a nightmare,” she admitted, “but not one we're looking for. But if it makes you uncomfortable, let's take a shortcut out of here. I doubt we'd find anything here, anyway.”
She turned on a side alley and opened a rusty door Hikaru almost didn't even notice. They went in and started walking down a dark staircase. After a while Hikaru saw dim light, and suddenly they were inside a normal house, walking down the stairs to the first floor. There were pictures hanging on the wall at the stairway, all of them depicting the same young man.
They came down to the living room where an old woman sat alone watching television. Here, too, were pictures of that man on the walls, and when Hikaru glanced at the television, he realized that the same man was there as well.
“Please excuse us, we're just passing through,” Nuala said to the woman, but she didn't even seem to notice them, staring intently at the television, where the man was just walking in a sunny park with a young woman who was wearing a flowery dress.
“That was weird,” Hikaru whispered as they stepped out of the house.
“What would you expect from dreams?”
“Well, yeah...” He glanced over his shoulder at the house, only to find it gone. “Was that her dream? Who was that man?”
“Who knows?” Nuala shrugged. “Maybe her son, or an old sweetheart. Possibly someone she's lost and can't forget.”
Hikaru thought of it a moment, of all the pictures and the almost obsessed stare on the woman's face, and decided he probably didn't want to know. “Are we going to somewhere particular?” he asked. Right now they had arrived to some formless place - if it now could be called a place - which only consisted of random colors and light. “Where are we, anyway?”
“Nowhere, really. Let's go... somewhere. As I said, I don't really know where to look for those things... but I think it'd be best to find some dreamers. I mean... the nightmares need the minds of the sleeping people to be able to, um, express themselves.”
“Express themselves, huh…” Hikaru muttered as he shuffled after Nuala.
Slowly the colors and lights around them were beginning to take form. Green went down, blue up, red and yellow still danced here and there, but somehow, Hikaru thought, the view was beginning to remind him of a child’s drawing of a landscape.
The thought had barely crossed his mind when the dream shifted and they were walking in a child’s drawing. The ground was green and the sky blazingly blue, but it was sloppily colored and there were streaks of white here and there. There was no horizon, just a white stripe between ground and sky. And the sun (hanging a bit too low, in the white part), as well as the flowers on the ground…
Hikaru grimaced. “Do they have to be grinning like that? It looks freaky.”
“It’s your dream,” Nuala said, shrugging. “If you don’t like it, change it.”
“Faces, away!” Hikaru yelled, and thought of a normal sun. It worked - although the drawing didn’t disappear, the sun and the flowers lost their smiley faces. “What a weirdo place,” he muttered as he looked around. Had he too drawn stuff like this when he was a child? Most likely. And his mother probably had those artworks safely stored somewhere…
He walked on, and on, and remembered his childhood, almost remembering some silly drawings he had made, and then he thought of the house where they’d lived when he had been small, a tinier place than their current one, and in the yard there had grown this old gnarled pine tree in which he’d loved to climb, no matter how often his mother told him not to, and then the pine was there, and he climbed up on its familiar branches.
As a small child again (his hair was still completely black and no one would have even listened to him if he had wanted to dye it), he sat on the highest branch he dared to climb to and watched the street that went by their home. There were some people walking on it, but even though they weren’t far away they seemed somehow misty and unreal - only the tree, and his home behind it, were truly there.
It was a beautiful day, blue sky and sun peeking from between the tree’s branches… and then, suddenly, all the people on the street stopped and turned to look at him, now completely sharp and focused.
“Faces, away!” they yelled, and they had no faces.
Hikaru screamed and fell of the tree. He rushed to the safety of his home, to his mother, who was cooking something in the kitchen. “Mom,” he cried, clutching to her apron, “There’s some people out there and they have no faces!”
“Have no faces?” his mother asked, gently. Slowly she started to turn to look down at him. “Did they look like…”
“Gotcha!” someone yelled, and the dream disappeared. Himself again, Hikaru blinked like an owl in bright daylight, again standing in the middle of the swirling colors. Nuala was holding something small and dark and hairy that struggled wildly to get free.
“Open the basket!” she yelled.
“What?” He was still not quite back on the cart.
“The basket! Quick!”
“Oh…” Hikaru opened the basket Nuala had been carrying, and she pushed the hairy thing in there.
“Great!” she said with a wide grin when she snapped the basket close. “We got one. You’re actually quite useful. Wouldn’t care to attract some more nightmares?”
“What, you’d use me as a bait?” Hikaru was still feeling a bit jumpy after the dream. “That was… freaky. What was that thing?”
“The monster under your bed.” When Hikaru gave her a blank stare, Nuala went on, “Childhood fears. Can you ever really leave them behind?”
“Oh… yeah,” Hikaru said thoughtfully. “My grandpa told me once this story about a noppera-bou*, and it was so frightening back then. I was… five or something. Mom was really angry with him and told him not to tell me any more scary stories.”
Nuala looked really happy when she held tightly to her basket. “Well, at least we have one. That’s one more than I was expecting to find.”
“You didn’t think you’d find any?”
“No, not really,” she admitted. “The Dreaming is such a big place. But I thought I’d have to at least try.”
They went on, once again, and finally walked out of the drawing to a normal sand road.
After a short while Hikaru was almost missing the brightly colored drawing. He was getting convinced that of all the possible and impossible places, this road had to be the most boring one. There was nothing around it, just, as far as the eye could see, even plains with sunburned grass. Not a single building, tree or a bush, or even a little mound, just the dead plains.
“Are you sure this isn't a nightmare?” he muttered to Nuala who simply smiled a little in reply. He was sure he would get crazy soon if there didn't come any variation.
He kicked the sand as he walked, once and twice, and to his surprise saw one stone bounce back as it flew off the road. He stopped and reached out with his hand, and sure enough, felt something solid right by the road. A wall, on which the sunburned plains were drawn. As soon as he realized this, the plains faded away and he was facing an old stone wall.
The wall followed the road, and a bit further down, he saw a gate in it. Curious, he ran to take a look, and the view almost made him lose his breath. He was watching a garden unlike he’d ever seen: the trees, the flowerbeds, little brooks and ponds with wooden bridges over them were perfect, as if they were the archetype of which things on earth were just dim echoes.
He stepped into the garden looking around in wonder. There were birds too, and the air was echoing with melodies he wouldn't have thought a bird could sing, and butterflies flew around like delicate flowers that had taken wing. A bit further away, underneath flowering cherry trees, a lonely figure was sitting on the ground, bent down as if examining something closely. There was something familiar in the figure, and Hikaru went a bit closer to get a better view.
“Touya!” he finally exclaimed. "That's Touya."
“Where are you going to?” Nuala asked when he headed toward his friend and rival.
“Figures,” he muttered when he saw what Touya was doing, without even hearing Nuala's question. “He really doesn't think of anything but go, day or night.”
Touya was so absorbed in the game he was playing that he didn't notice Hikaru arriving. He sat down at the other side of the go board, and took a look at the game. And frowned.
“What's this?”
Touya gave a great start and looked up, finally realizing he'd got company.
“Shindou! What are you doing here?”
“Never mind that,” Hikaru replied, still staring at the go board with a deepening frown. “The question is... what are you doing?”
The surprised look on Touya's face turned into a glare. “What does it look like? Replaying a game I played the other day.”
“You played that game? It's totally ridiculous!”
“I'd like to see you doing better on this board!”
“I'd do better blind! That doesn't even make any sense!”
Tight-lipped, Touya started to collect the stones away. “Why don't we play a game, then?”
“Sure! Go on and nigiri! If that's the way you're playing, I'll beat you with a nine stone handicap!”
“Hikaru?” Nuala said, watching them curiously with a tilted head. “What's that?”
Hikaru stared at her a moment before he remembered who she was. “Oh... it's a go board. It's... we... oh, bugger.” He looked at Touya who was holding a handful of white stones above the board, ready to nigiri. “I'm sorry, I don't have time to play now.”
“You don't?” Touya sounded genuinely surprised. “Why did you come here, then?”
Hikaru stood up, shot a hesitant look around. Such a beautiful garden. Maybe Sai would be here, too? He'd certainly like a place like this. “I'm looking for someone...” he said absentmindedly.
“Who?”
“Sai.”
“What?!” Touya sprung to his feet and the white stones fell from his hand. (When they fell on the ground they turned into cherry petals, though neither of the boys noticed this.) “Sai? So you do know Sai! Is he here?”
“If he were here, I wouldn't have to look for him, right?” Hikaru said, a bit annoyed at himself. He hadn't been meaning to tell Touya, but somehow, thinking about it had made him say it aloud.
“So you do know him. I knew it. Will you finally tell me about it? You did promise you would.”
“I said I might tell you. Some day. Might.” Hikaru stood up as well. “I don't have time for story-telling now. I need to find him. Oh, and...” He glanced at Nuala, who was still watching the go board as if enchanted. (It was a very beautiful go board, old and decorated.) “And... have you seen any nightmares? We're looking for those, too.”
“Nightmares?” Touya stared at him blankly. “You are looking for Sai and nightmares?”
“Well, some little ones that apparently escaped or something. I take it you haven't had any?”
“No...” Touya said slowly, still looking like he was considering if he should call the nice white-coated men to take care of his poor rival. “Though...” he glanced at the go board, “That board's enough to drive anyone nuts, a tiny nightmare in itself.”
Hikaru looked down at the board, confused. “What do you mean? It's a perfectly ordinary go board.”
“Looks like it, at least. Watch.” Touya sat down again and started replaying some old game. For a moment everything went fine, then Hikaru rubbed his eyes.
“Didn't you play a hane there, and not tsuke? And... what happened to the stone in that corner? There was a white stone on the star point, wasn’t there?”
“That's what I meant.” Touya stared at the board, highly annoyed. “I've been trying to replay this game for hours, but it always turns out totally messed up. It's like the go board ate some of the stones, or just moved them randomly around.”
“Hours? Then why do you keep on? There are other go boards, why do you have to play it on this one?”
Touya blinked. “I... don't know. It just didn't cross my mind that... I wouldn't have to.”
Nuala bent down across the go board as well. “I just wonder...” she muttered. Then she grasped the board and shook it. “Come now! Let me see what you really are!”
The board shimmered in her hands, trembled, and disappeared. In its stead she was holding to something transparent and slippery. “Aha!” she said triumphantly. “There! The basket!”
Hikaru opened the basket and she quickly showed whatever it was she had in her hands in there.
“What was that?” Touya asked, wide-eyed.
“A nightmare,” Nuala said, content. “One of those we were looking for. Not a very scary one, but so much the more annoying. It simply causes things to go wrong.”
“A nightmare... would that mean I'm sleeping?” Touya looked still quite confused. “Or... hey, wait, did you say something about Sai a while ago?”
“No.”
“Yes, you did!” Touya jumped up again. “If you're looking for Sai, then I want to... I want to...” He glanced around, looking troubled.
“What is it?” Hikaru asked.
“Damn,” Touya muttered. “I think... that's my alarm clock. I...” He was beginning to turn transparent. “I think I'm... but Shindou, you...” There was barely anything visible of him anymore, just some dark hair and eyes. “You must...” his voice, barely more than a whisper, faded away as well.
(In his room, Touya bolted up on his futon. “You must tell me everything some day!” he yelled. He sat there, clutching his blanket, breathing hard. A dream? About... Shindou? Who had been acting weird, as usual. And something about Sai. He shook his head and turned off the alarm clock with a great sigh.)
“Apparently it's already morning,” Hikaru said to Nuala, worried. “I don’t want to wake up yet... though knowing Touya, he probably gets up insanely early. I hope mom will let me sleep in...”
“We have two.” Nuala was, almost literally, beaming at her basket and didn't seem to have heard a word he'd said. “Two!”
“So… how many are there, anyway?” Hikaru asked with a small sigh.
“Oh, a few hundred.”
“A few…?” Hikaru spluttered, staring at her with wide eyes.
“315, to be exact.”
“And we’ve got two.” The statement was rather blank. “Is there any point in looking for them? Are you… are you planning to try to find them all?” Just how long would that take… “Certainly there can’t be room for that many in your basket!”
“Well, maybe not for all of them,” Nuala said, grasping the basket again and starting to walk out of the garden, “but there’s room for many more than you’d think. And, you know… it’s not that I really thought I could find any of them, but… it’s a matter of principle, you know. I just have to do what I can. You’re great, though.” She smiled brightly at Hikaru. “You’ve already helped me to find two of them. I didn’t notice this one at all, even though I was watching that board so closely.” She fell silent for a moment, then continued a bit hesitantly, “What is that game? Did you call it go?”
“Yeah. It’s the best game ever. I’m a professional go player, you know.”
“Really?” There was a curious shine in Nuala’s eyes. “How’s it played?”
And as the walked on, Hikaru started explaining to her the basics of go.
* You know the noppera-bou? A faceless ghost from the Japanese mythology. The most common version of the story goes something like this: A man is traveling alone when he comes to a crying woman. He asks her what's wrong, but when she turns to him, he sees she has no face. He runs away, and comes to the police station (or a bar or whatever) and starts telling his story, and whoever he's telling it to turns to him, asking "Did she look like this?" - and has no face, either.
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Chapter 2: The sky and the flowers, look how they're smiling
They walked on, and slowly the plains changed into a forest. The forest trees grew taller and taller, until they took the shape of skyscrapers. They were walking on the main street of a big city. Neon lights and advertisements flashed everywhere, but the city itself was empty, abandoned.
Hikaru shifted nervously. “This place has the feeling of a nightmare,” he whispered to Nuala. He kept on glancing over his shoulder, convinced that any moment something horrible would happen.
“It is a nightmare,” she admitted, “but not one we're looking for. But if it makes you uncomfortable, let's take a shortcut out of here. I doubt we'd find anything here, anyway.”
She turned on a side alley and opened a rusty door Hikaru almost didn't even notice. They went in and started walking down a dark staircase. After a while Hikaru saw dim light, and suddenly they were inside a normal house, walking down the stairs to the first floor. There were pictures hanging on the wall at the stairway, all of them depicting the same young man.
They came down to the living room where an old woman sat alone watching television. Here, too, were pictures of that man on the walls, and when Hikaru glanced at the television, he realized that the same man was there as well.
“Please excuse us, we're just passing through,” Nuala said to the woman, but she didn't even seem to notice them, staring intently at the television, where the man was just walking in a sunny park with a young woman who was wearing a flowery dress.
“That was weird,” Hikaru whispered as they stepped out of the house.
“What would you expect from dreams?”
“Well, yeah...” He glanced over his shoulder at the house, only to find it gone. “Was that her dream? Who was that man?”
“Who knows?” Nuala shrugged. “Maybe her son, or an old sweetheart. Possibly someone she's lost and can't forget.”
Hikaru thought of it a moment, of all the pictures and the almost obsessed stare on the woman's face, and decided he probably didn't want to know. “Are we going to somewhere particular?” he asked. Right now they had arrived to some formless place - if it now could be called a place - which only consisted of random colors and light. “Where are we, anyway?”
“Nowhere, really. Let's go... somewhere. As I said, I don't really know where to look for those things... but I think it'd be best to find some dreamers. I mean... the nightmares need the minds of the sleeping people to be able to, um, express themselves.”
“Express themselves, huh…” Hikaru muttered as he shuffled after Nuala.
Slowly the colors and lights around them were beginning to take form. Green went down, blue up, red and yellow still danced here and there, but somehow, Hikaru thought, the view was beginning to remind him of a child’s drawing of a landscape.
The thought had barely crossed his mind when the dream shifted and they were walking in a child’s drawing. The ground was green and the sky blazingly blue, but it was sloppily colored and there were streaks of white here and there. There was no horizon, just a white stripe between ground and sky. And the sun (hanging a bit too low, in the white part), as well as the flowers on the ground…
Hikaru grimaced. “Do they have to be grinning like that? It looks freaky.”
“It’s your dream,” Nuala said, shrugging. “If you don’t like it, change it.”
“Faces, away!” Hikaru yelled, and thought of a normal sun. It worked - although the drawing didn’t disappear, the sun and the flowers lost their smiley faces. “What a weirdo place,” he muttered as he looked around. Had he too drawn stuff like this when he was a child? Most likely. And his mother probably had those artworks safely stored somewhere…
He walked on, and on, and remembered his childhood, almost remembering some silly drawings he had made, and then he thought of the house where they’d lived when he had been small, a tinier place than their current one, and in the yard there had grown this old gnarled pine tree in which he’d loved to climb, no matter how often his mother told him not to, and then the pine was there, and he climbed up on its familiar branches.
As a small child again (his hair was still completely black and no one would have even listened to him if he had wanted to dye it), he sat on the highest branch he dared to climb to and watched the street that went by their home. There were some people walking on it, but even though they weren’t far away they seemed somehow misty and unreal - only the tree, and his home behind it, were truly there.
It was a beautiful day, blue sky and sun peeking from between the tree’s branches… and then, suddenly, all the people on the street stopped and turned to look at him, now completely sharp and focused.
“Faces, away!” they yelled, and they had no faces.
Hikaru screamed and fell of the tree. He rushed to the safety of his home, to his mother, who was cooking something in the kitchen. “Mom,” he cried, clutching to her apron, “There’s some people out there and they have no faces!”
“Have no faces?” his mother asked, gently. Slowly she started to turn to look down at him. “Did they look like…”
“Gotcha!” someone yelled, and the dream disappeared. Himself again, Hikaru blinked like an owl in bright daylight, again standing in the middle of the swirling colors. Nuala was holding something small and dark and hairy that struggled wildly to get free.
“Open the basket!” she yelled.
“What?” He was still not quite back on the cart.
“The basket! Quick!”
“Oh…” Hikaru opened the basket Nuala had been carrying, and she pushed the hairy thing in there.
“Great!” she said with a wide grin when she snapped the basket close. “We got one. You’re actually quite useful. Wouldn’t care to attract some more nightmares?”
“What, you’d use me as a bait?” Hikaru was still feeling a bit jumpy after the dream. “That was… freaky. What was that thing?”
“The monster under your bed.” When Hikaru gave her a blank stare, Nuala went on, “Childhood fears. Can you ever really leave them behind?”
“Oh… yeah,” Hikaru said thoughtfully. “My grandpa told me once this story about a noppera-bou*, and it was so frightening back then. I was… five or something. Mom was really angry with him and told him not to tell me any more scary stories.”
Nuala looked really happy when she held tightly to her basket. “Well, at least we have one. That’s one more than I was expecting to find.”
“You didn’t think you’d find any?”
“No, not really,” she admitted. “The Dreaming is such a big place. But I thought I’d have to at least try.”
They went on, once again, and finally walked out of the drawing to a normal sand road.
After a short while Hikaru was almost missing the brightly colored drawing. He was getting convinced that of all the possible and impossible places, this road had to be the most boring one. There was nothing around it, just, as far as the eye could see, even plains with sunburned grass. Not a single building, tree or a bush, or even a little mound, just the dead plains.
“Are you sure this isn't a nightmare?” he muttered to Nuala who simply smiled a little in reply. He was sure he would get crazy soon if there didn't come any variation.
He kicked the sand as he walked, once and twice, and to his surprise saw one stone bounce back as it flew off the road. He stopped and reached out with his hand, and sure enough, felt something solid right by the road. A wall, on which the sunburned plains were drawn. As soon as he realized this, the plains faded away and he was facing an old stone wall.
The wall followed the road, and a bit further down, he saw a gate in it. Curious, he ran to take a look, and the view almost made him lose his breath. He was watching a garden unlike he’d ever seen: the trees, the flowerbeds, little brooks and ponds with wooden bridges over them were perfect, as if they were the archetype of which things on earth were just dim echoes.
He stepped into the garden looking around in wonder. There were birds too, and the air was echoing with melodies he wouldn't have thought a bird could sing, and butterflies flew around like delicate flowers that had taken wing. A bit further away, underneath flowering cherry trees, a lonely figure was sitting on the ground, bent down as if examining something closely. There was something familiar in the figure, and Hikaru went a bit closer to get a better view.
“Touya!” he finally exclaimed. "That's Touya."
“Where are you going to?” Nuala asked when he headed toward his friend and rival.
“Figures,” he muttered when he saw what Touya was doing, without even hearing Nuala's question. “He really doesn't think of anything but go, day or night.”
Touya was so absorbed in the game he was playing that he didn't notice Hikaru arriving. He sat down at the other side of the go board, and took a look at the game. And frowned.
“What's this?”
Touya gave a great start and looked up, finally realizing he'd got company.
“Shindou! What are you doing here?”
“Never mind that,” Hikaru replied, still staring at the go board with a deepening frown. “The question is... what are you doing?”
The surprised look on Touya's face turned into a glare. “What does it look like? Replaying a game I played the other day.”
“You played that game? It's totally ridiculous!”
“I'd like to see you doing better on this board!”
“I'd do better blind! That doesn't even make any sense!”
Tight-lipped, Touya started to collect the stones away. “Why don't we play a game, then?”
“Sure! Go on and nigiri! If that's the way you're playing, I'll beat you with a nine stone handicap!”
“Hikaru?” Nuala said, watching them curiously with a tilted head. “What's that?”
Hikaru stared at her a moment before he remembered who she was. “Oh... it's a go board. It's... we... oh, bugger.” He looked at Touya who was holding a handful of white stones above the board, ready to nigiri. “I'm sorry, I don't have time to play now.”
“You don't?” Touya sounded genuinely surprised. “Why did you come here, then?”
Hikaru stood up, shot a hesitant look around. Such a beautiful garden. Maybe Sai would be here, too? He'd certainly like a place like this. “I'm looking for someone...” he said absentmindedly.
“Who?”
“Sai.”
“What?!” Touya sprung to his feet and the white stones fell from his hand. (When they fell on the ground they turned into cherry petals, though neither of the boys noticed this.) “Sai? So you do know Sai! Is he here?”
“If he were here, I wouldn't have to look for him, right?” Hikaru said, a bit annoyed at himself. He hadn't been meaning to tell Touya, but somehow, thinking about it had made him say it aloud.
“So you do know him. I knew it. Will you finally tell me about it? You did promise you would.”
“I said I might tell you. Some day. Might.” Hikaru stood up as well. “I don't have time for story-telling now. I need to find him. Oh, and...” He glanced at Nuala, who was still watching the go board as if enchanted. (It was a very beautiful go board, old and decorated.) “And... have you seen any nightmares? We're looking for those, too.”
“Nightmares?” Touya stared at him blankly. “You are looking for Sai and nightmares?”
“Well, some little ones that apparently escaped or something. I take it you haven't had any?”
“No...” Touya said slowly, still looking like he was considering if he should call the nice white-coated men to take care of his poor rival. “Though...” he glanced at the go board, “That board's enough to drive anyone nuts, a tiny nightmare in itself.”
Hikaru looked down at the board, confused. “What do you mean? It's a perfectly ordinary go board.”
“Looks like it, at least. Watch.” Touya sat down again and started replaying some old game. For a moment everything went fine, then Hikaru rubbed his eyes.
“Didn't you play a hane there, and not tsuke? And... what happened to the stone in that corner? There was a white stone on the star point, wasn’t there?”
“That's what I meant.” Touya stared at the board, highly annoyed. “I've been trying to replay this game for hours, but it always turns out totally messed up. It's like the go board ate some of the stones, or just moved them randomly around.”
“Hours? Then why do you keep on? There are other go boards, why do you have to play it on this one?”
Touya blinked. “I... don't know. It just didn't cross my mind that... I wouldn't have to.”
Nuala bent down across the go board as well. “I just wonder...” she muttered. Then she grasped the board and shook it. “Come now! Let me see what you really are!”
The board shimmered in her hands, trembled, and disappeared. In its stead she was holding to something transparent and slippery. “Aha!” she said triumphantly. “There! The basket!”
Hikaru opened the basket and she quickly showed whatever it was she had in her hands in there.
“What was that?” Touya asked, wide-eyed.
“A nightmare,” Nuala said, content. “One of those we were looking for. Not a very scary one, but so much the more annoying. It simply causes things to go wrong.”
“A nightmare... would that mean I'm sleeping?” Touya looked still quite confused. “Or... hey, wait, did you say something about Sai a while ago?”
“No.”
“Yes, you did!” Touya jumped up again. “If you're looking for Sai, then I want to... I want to...” He glanced around, looking troubled.
“What is it?” Hikaru asked.
“Damn,” Touya muttered. “I think... that's my alarm clock. I...” He was beginning to turn transparent. “I think I'm... but Shindou, you...” There was barely anything visible of him anymore, just some dark hair and eyes. “You must...” his voice, barely more than a whisper, faded away as well.
(In his room, Touya bolted up on his futon. “You must tell me everything some day!” he yelled. He sat there, clutching his blanket, breathing hard. A dream? About... Shindou? Who had been acting weird, as usual. And something about Sai. He shook his head and turned off the alarm clock with a great sigh.)
“Apparently it's already morning,” Hikaru said to Nuala, worried. “I don’t want to wake up yet... though knowing Touya, he probably gets up insanely early. I hope mom will let me sleep in...”
“We have two.” Nuala was, almost literally, beaming at her basket and didn't seem to have heard a word he'd said. “Two!”
“So… how many are there, anyway?” Hikaru asked with a small sigh.
“Oh, a few hundred.”
“A few…?” Hikaru spluttered, staring at her with wide eyes.
“315, to be exact.”
“And we’ve got two.” The statement was rather blank. “Is there any point in looking for them? Are you… are you planning to try to find them all?” Just how long would that take… “Certainly there can’t be room for that many in your basket!”
“Well, maybe not for all of them,” Nuala said, grasping the basket again and starting to walk out of the garden, “but there’s room for many more than you’d think. And, you know… it’s not that I really thought I could find any of them, but… it’s a matter of principle, you know. I just have to do what I can. You’re great, though.” She smiled brightly at Hikaru. “You’ve already helped me to find two of them. I didn’t notice this one at all, even though I was watching that board so closely.” She fell silent for a moment, then continued a bit hesitantly, “What is that game? Did you call it go?”
“Yeah. It’s the best game ever. I’m a professional go player, you know.”
“Really?” There was a curious shine in Nuala’s eyes. “How’s it played?”
And as the walked on, Hikaru started explaining to her the basics of go.
* You know the noppera-bou? A faceless ghost from the Japanese mythology. The most common version of the story goes something like this: A man is traveling alone when he comes to a crying woman. He asks her what's wrong, but when she turns to him, he sees she has no face. He runs away, and comes to the police station (or a bar or whatever) and starts telling his story, and whoever he's telling it to turns to him, asking "Did she look like this?" - and has no face, either.
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