Fifthmus Fic: Always and Forever (for nighteevee, from qem_chibati)
TITLE: Always and Forever
AUTHOR: Qem, qem_chibati
RECIPIENT: nighteevee, requests
CHARACTERS: Akari + Hikaru, with many, many cameos.
SUMMARY:
Akari’s really known Hikaru for far too long.
OR;
It’s eight years after the epilogue of the series, so where are they now?
Well, Hikaru’s currently hiding behind Akari from Ogata.
Prologue:
Go players often face a crisis of sorts when it comes to comes to functions;
To bring a date, or not to bring a date, that is the question. Whether it is nobler in mind to spare an uninterested partner from Yamada-Gosei’s monologues, then it is to risk honorary Ogata-Meijin’s knowing smirks, particularly at the younger generation, isn’t really a question at all, but rather a risk assessment on which will be the most annoying to deal with.
Hikaru knows exactly where he stands on the issue, which is why he has a box of chocolates and is knocking at Akari’s door.
Chapter 1:
Akari opens the door and her first reaction is “Hikaru, this is a pleasant surprise!” her second, after seeing the box of chocolates is resignation. “Come in, you can tell me what you want over afternoon tea.”
Shindou’s changed in many ways over the years, from an immature soccer fanatic, to an immature Go fanatic, but chocolate as a form of bribery is not one of them.
Nor is the way that he tends to drag her into ways that get him into and out of trouble.
Nor really have the bleached bangs that he decided were cool, inspired by Yu-Gi-Oh when he was eight, changed. (Mercifully, she thinks, he didn’t extend to adding pink streaks as well, or bondage accessories, otherwise she fears his stalking problem over the years may have become greatly exasperated.)
“Please! I need your help to get Ogata to leave me alone!” Hikaru pleads across the table, with his very best puppy dog eyes. “The man is impossible to deal with.”
“Ogata, isn’t he the one that you think installed a key logger on your laptop?” Akari asks thoughtfully, the name awfully familiar.
“Well it had to have happened while I was at the Go institute, since Tsutsui had been looking at it the day before and that evening, so it was either him or Waya....”
“The one that corned you against the wall in a lift, last week?”, Akari says, as she cups her hands around a warm cup of tea.
“Yeah, thought I had dodged him, but he stuck his hand in and reopened it - so lucky Akira was there to get him to back off.”, Hikaru moans. “I don’t know anything about the Sai wanna-be on the internet - and I definitely don’t know… how to contact the real one.”
“The one, that pretends to get drunk and then invites you to his room to ‘play’?”
“I really don’t think he’s pretending.”
“Mou.” Akari sighs, “Why don’t you just ask Touya-san to rescue you if you look cornered?”
“He’s in Korea at the moment and won’t be coming back until next week. Waya isn’t invited, Ochi’s too stuck up, Isumi thinks that it’s funny the bastard, Kurata’s even more annoying, Fuku’s still annoyed at me from the Korean thing and Nase and Honda are too busy being lovey-dovey.”
“I see.”
“Please Akari! You’re the only one I can count on. With your amazing Teacher-Fu powers I just know you can scare him away!”
Akari pauses to think for a moment before she comes to her decision. “Oh okay. I’ll go. But only because we’ve been friends for so long, and you have to come to the reunion next week as Nakami-chan’s date.”
“What!?”
“And, you have to be nice to her! None of this ‘oh I didn’t recognise you from how much weight you put on’ idiocy that you did to Tomoe-chan.”
“But! Why me?”
“Nakami just had a bad break up with her boyfriend, and she already bought tickets and she doesn’t want to go alone.”
“…”
“Oh it’s not that bad” Akari responds to Hikaru’s glare, “she plays Go too - she was on the girls Go team back in high school and it’s the only way you’re going be able to attend and see all those familiar faces seeing as you didn’t graduate.”
“Familiar faces?” Hikaru’s tone is filled with disbelief.
“Mitani-kun, Kaneko-chan, your old soccer team, your old classmates; Kimihiro’s going to be there too!” Akari replies excitedly.
“Yeah but I see Tsutsui about as often as I see you!”
“Which is whenever you want something.” Akari responds wryly. “Anyway it serves you right for not being able to find your own girlfriend, and dragging your childhood friend to these things!”
“Hey I try! It’s just whenever I get to the ‘introduce your girlfriend to your friends’ stage; I suddenly don’t have a girlfriend anymore. And most girls are really boring, so it’s like why bother?”, complains Hikaru.
“Could the fact that you always get dumped, be because you completely utterly ignore them as you argue over whether or not white to c9 while black is in Atari, is stupid or not?”
“That was one time! And it was a completely ridiculous move to make in that situation - he protected one stone instead of the entire lower quarter, seriously was Ochi sick or something that day - it was definitely not up to his usual standards!”
“You’re utterly hopeless Hikaru. I should just leave you to be molested.”
“No! I’ll do it.”
“I’ll just give Kimihiro a call now, to let him know, since even in cases of ‘desperation’ you still leave it to the last minute to ask for my help.”
“It's a whole 24 hours notice!”
Akari watches Hikaru warily slurping his tea out of the corner of her eye, as she pulls out her mobile from her purse. So he should, they’ve been childhood friends since always and forever, (she has the baby pictures to prove it), and it will do him some good to sweat it out a little.
She feels happy as she feels the cool plastic come into her hand, and gazes at the white Motorola with a black Go stone dangling as she dials, knowing that elsewhere in Tokyo Tsutsui is right now pulling out his black Motorola with a matching white Go stone phone accessory.
Tsutsui is always so kind and attentive and the little details like this that he organises always make her smile. She’s glad that she returned his friendship and she feels incredibly fortunate that she was brave enough to make clear her feelings to him. Dealing with one oblivious boy in her life was enough and she can’t imagine what it would be like without Kimihiro now.
“Hi darling~ just calling to let you know that I’ll be home late tomorrow night, I will be going to a Go function to help protect Hikaru’s virtue.” Akari trills into the phone and resists the urge to laugh at Hikaru’s wince.
Tsutsui can instantly picture what happened on the other side of the line chuckles into his phone. “So he came crying to you for help again?”
“Yes again! Honestly, he’s been like a magnet for stalkers ever since we graduated elementary.”
“I’ve noticed. Sorry Akari but I need to get back to this code, but can you remind him that everyone is looking forward to hearing about the tournament games he’s playing this week?”
“Sure, I’ll let Hikaru know that he needs to bring his latest kifu to Happy Go Lucky, for you next weekend.”
“Thanks. I love you.”
“Love you too!~ See you tonight.”
Akari’s claps shut her phone and goes back to her conversation with Hikaru, “He says you have to bring-”
“Yeah, yeah” Hikaru says waving a hand lazily. “I was going to bring it already anyway. That’s nothing compared to being forced on a date...”
Akari deftly ignores Hikaru’s tone and brightly points out “Hey if things go well at the reunion next week, maybe you can start taking Ai-chan to these things in the future. I’m sure her bribery would be much easier to deal with, such as spending a day with her in Shibuya.”
At Hikaru’s traumatised look, she can’t resist giggling.
Chapter 2:
Akari feels like a celebrity, as they arrive on Hikaru time - about forty-five minutes after the fashionable point - with the way so many people stare at her and Hikaru as they make their way to the main part of the function. The feeling only gets stronger as when she enters the room with a camera flashing capturing her own and Hikaru’s entrance.
“Yo!” one of Hikaru’s friends Waya-kun says a huge grin lighting his face up above the offending camera hanging from his neck. His face is slightly flushed - she wonders if he has been drinking.
“What are you doing here Waya!?” Hikaru accuses, “I thought you didn’t win your qualifying match for the Honinbo tournament?”
“Oh I’m here as Isumi’s date tonight.” He says with a cheeky grin, thumping the spluttering said Isumi on the back.
“Just kidding” Waya says and his grin becomes even wider. “Lighten up Isumi, it was only a joke! J-o-k-e.”
He then turns with a winks at Akari and explains “I’m here for work; I’m doing an article for Igo Monthly on the tournament and I’m also planning on using this for my Go column in Tokyo Daily.”
He then turns to Hikaru and voice becomes less jovial. “We can’t all be fabulous Go prodigies you know - some of us actually have to work for a living. Speaking of which, what are your thoughts on going up against Fuji-7-dan next week? The ones that I can actually put in my article, that is.”
“Um, well-”
“Stop! On second thoughts, email me tomorrow and pretend you said it tonight!” Waya says. “Today’s been a good day! And I would like to live until tomorrow.”
“Live?” Akari says with amusement.
“You really can’t underestimate this guy’s ability to tick people off. Really, he got into a screaming fit with the Koreans from the Lion’s tournament last month and I’m pretty sure they couldn’t speak Japanese and I know he can’t speak Korean - but some how he managed to…”
As Waya continues his rant, she can see behind his back Hikaru making a chugging gesture indicating Waya, and Isumi responding by shaking his head.
She decides that it might be best to help calm Waya down - and she’ll use the best way she knows how, by agreeing completely.
“Oh absolutely, I know completely where you are coming from - back in high school he managed to start a vendetta with the baseball team, and this was after he had left the school. It was completely unbelievable - let’s go find somewhere more comfortable and I will tell you all about it.”
Hikaru looks embarrassed, but Waya appears less hyperactive, despite the way he furiously keeps writing on his pad, surrounded by the “new wave” players who find it a lot more comfortable hanging out in the back than mingling with the older more established Go players.
Akari enjoys watching them from her corner - the world of Go is rather alien and somewhat scary - but also fascinating to watch. The way Ochi looked at her and then at Hikaru in disbelief was quite flattering, but added a comment on the Go conversation she saw how his eyes narrowed - an expression that reminds her of Touya-san in a scary way and she’s glad she’s on the other side of the group.
“Thanks for helping to calm Waya down” Isumi says as he settles down beside her. “It’s been an interesting day and had just gotten a bit worked up over something Ochi had said when he ran into you.”
Akari smiles, “Ah it was nothing really. It’s Isumi-san right? We met at Happy-Go-Lucky.”
“Ah yes!” Isumi’s face brightens with recognition. “The Go parlour Mitani-san runs, the one that has the pachinko machines at the ground level and a bar just beneath?”
“Yes that’s the one - it’s an interesting place to visit, especially since it started attracting such a large cliental of profession players who come in on regular basis to hang out.”
“Hmm” Isumi says, “yes I would imagine so. The free beer to title holders assisted with that I think…”
“I guess Mitani-kun can thank Hikaru for that, though I’m sure he won’t.”
“I didn’t think Hikaru had a title at the time?”
“He didn’t, but I do believe that Ogata did.”
“I see.” Isumi says and though the wording is neutral she can see the deep amusement etched into his face.
Hikaru was right, Akari decides, Isumi does find the whole situation quite amusing.
The conversation fades to silence for a little while, both Akari and Isumi watching the Go players mingle, before Isumi tentatively tries to start the conversation again.
“I’m sorry if you told me before, but what is it that you do for a living?”
“Oh I’m a school teacher, I teach geography and history at Yamabuki Middle School.”
“Oh? That sounds interesting, what made you decide to teach?”
“Ah well when I was growing up, I sometimes saw how certain student fell behind even when they were obviously quite bright in other ways, so I always wanted to be able to reach out and help… As for what I decided to teach - with Hikaru always getting lost I felt I needed to know not only where I am and where I want to go - but everywhere else I might end up.” She laughs. “History pretty interesting and it seemed to fit in well.”
“You and Hikaru seem pretty close.” Isumi observes.
“Childhood best friends always and forever”, Akari smiles, and doesn’t tell him about how after mid school, she didn’t think she would ever speak to Hikaru again, as anything more than an acquaintance, until when Kimihiro organised a reunion of all the former Haze school club’s Go players to celebrate Mitani’s opening of Happy-Go-Lucky and had managed to convince Hikaru to give regular lessons to help attract people to the new Go parlour.
As the night goes on, Waya and Isumi are the first to head off, Waya needs to get started on his article and as they live in the same apartment Isumi prefers to catch the same train. Nase and Honda are second; Akari’s glad she got a chance to invite Nase to Happy-Go-Lucky, Wednesdays are Lady’s night, and Nase is the one of the most promising up coming female Go players in the world. Akari finds it a little inspiring, especially since most of the girls she met back at mid and high school either stopped playing, or only play in the women’s tournaments and Nase always tries for every tournament that she can.
Akari slips off to the bathroom, leaving Hikaru to whinge at/with Ochi over the quality of today’s insei and how exactly Hikaru compared to them when he was his age.
Ochi’s opinion appears to be that a mass of Shindou clones have infiltrated the institute, with Hikaru struggling to find ways of stating that he is absolutely 100% not like them or how his circumstances were different - without going into why exactly they were different.
As she walks down the corridors, she ponders the matter. She was there when Hikaru started to learn Go and made the choice to become an insei and she still doesn’t know why exactly. Touya-san had something to do with it yes, but he and Hikaru met when Hikaru was playing so that came after the very beginning.
The beginning she can only pin point as being shortly after Hikaru fainted on top of the go board - but how that’s related she doesn’t really understand. Perhaps he met someone in the hospital that played? Possibly Sai? The one that keeps coming up, particularly amongst the pro’s and the internet Go fanatics. But why keep it a secret?
She knows it’s a secret and not just Hikaru being a dork and just not bothering to tell her, because Hikaru’s friends always when given the opportunity ask her, and Kimihiro’s complained about being asked and Mitani’s complained about being asked, and even one of the ex-girlfriends of Hikaru’s that she met complained about the matter so she can’t even begin to imagine how many people Hikaru’s avoided the issue with.
She’s pretty sure that even Touya-san doesn’t know from what a side comment he made one night, though he seems to think Hikaru will tell him one day.
It’s a little hurtful that the boy who used to tell her everything would keep something that obviously changed her life from her. But she can understand a little, since apparently the reason for Ogata’s special interest in HIkaru is trying to find this Sai.
They’d also had already started growing apart when all of this happened with Hikaru being a dumb boy, later becoming obsessed with Go and Akari becoming interested in growing up to be seen as adult and mature - such an exciting world lay ahead, she remembers being sure of at the time.
Well meeting up with crazy Go players counts as exciting, Akari guesses. And her students give Hikaru a run for his money in the being interesting stakes.
When Akari returns, she finds her chance to demonstrate her amazing Teacher-Fu powers.
Ogata, now that the protective crowd Hikaru cultivated has thinned out, is urging Hikaru to drink more and just spend the night at the hotel.
Hikaru is struggling against the challenge in Ogata’s tone - once he got involved he could never resist a challenge, so Akari steps into her role as Hikaru’s bodyguard, by in her very best and firmest teachers tone, explaining how they need to leave now to make sure they can catch the right train to get to their respective homes in time.
Hikaru gratefully hugs Akari from behind and agrees resolutely, “yes, yes the trains. Need to make sure Akari gets home on time.”
The fact that Akari drove Hikaru here and is dropping him off at the station before she heads home, is none of Ogata’s business, really.
Epilogue:
“That was fun.”, Akari smiles as drops Hikaru off at the local train station. “Don’t forget to email Waya with your thoughts on the Honinbo tournament.”
“Yeah, yeah will do.” Hikaru says with a mock salute. “Thanks for this.”
“You’re welcome. We’re friends right?”
“Always and forever!”
AUTHOR: Qem, qem_chibati
RECIPIENT: nighteevee, requests
CHARACTERS: Akari + Hikaru, with many, many cameos.
SUMMARY:
Akari’s really known Hikaru for far too long.
OR;
It’s eight years after the epilogue of the series, so where are they now?
Well, Hikaru’s currently hiding behind Akari from Ogata.
Prologue:
Go players often face a crisis of sorts when it comes to comes to functions;
To bring a date, or not to bring a date, that is the question. Whether it is nobler in mind to spare an uninterested partner from Yamada-Gosei’s monologues, then it is to risk honorary Ogata-Meijin’s knowing smirks, particularly at the younger generation, isn’t really a question at all, but rather a risk assessment on which will be the most annoying to deal with.
Hikaru knows exactly where he stands on the issue, which is why he has a box of chocolates and is knocking at Akari’s door.
Chapter 1:
Akari opens the door and her first reaction is “Hikaru, this is a pleasant surprise!” her second, after seeing the box of chocolates is resignation. “Come in, you can tell me what you want over afternoon tea.”
Shindou’s changed in many ways over the years, from an immature soccer fanatic, to an immature Go fanatic, but chocolate as a form of bribery is not one of them.
Nor is the way that he tends to drag her into ways that get him into and out of trouble.
Nor really have the bleached bangs that he decided were cool, inspired by Yu-Gi-Oh when he was eight, changed. (Mercifully, she thinks, he didn’t extend to adding pink streaks as well, or bondage accessories, otherwise she fears his stalking problem over the years may have become greatly exasperated.)
“Please! I need your help to get Ogata to leave me alone!” Hikaru pleads across the table, with his very best puppy dog eyes. “The man is impossible to deal with.”
“Ogata, isn’t he the one that you think installed a key logger on your laptop?” Akari asks thoughtfully, the name awfully familiar.
“Well it had to have happened while I was at the Go institute, since Tsutsui had been looking at it the day before and that evening, so it was either him or Waya....”
“The one that corned you against the wall in a lift, last week?”, Akari says, as she cups her hands around a warm cup of tea.
“Yeah, thought I had dodged him, but he stuck his hand in and reopened it - so lucky Akira was there to get him to back off.”, Hikaru moans. “I don’t know anything about the Sai wanna-be on the internet - and I definitely don’t know… how to contact the real one.”
“The one, that pretends to get drunk and then invites you to his room to ‘play’?”
“I really don’t think he’s pretending.”
“Mou.” Akari sighs, “Why don’t you just ask Touya-san to rescue you if you look cornered?”
“He’s in Korea at the moment and won’t be coming back until next week. Waya isn’t invited, Ochi’s too stuck up, Isumi thinks that it’s funny the bastard, Kurata’s even more annoying, Fuku’s still annoyed at me from the Korean thing and Nase and Honda are too busy being lovey-dovey.”
“I see.”
“Please Akari! You’re the only one I can count on. With your amazing Teacher-Fu powers I just know you can scare him away!”
Akari pauses to think for a moment before she comes to her decision. “Oh okay. I’ll go. But only because we’ve been friends for so long, and you have to come to the reunion next week as Nakami-chan’s date.”
“What!?”
“And, you have to be nice to her! None of this ‘oh I didn’t recognise you from how much weight you put on’ idiocy that you did to Tomoe-chan.”
“But! Why me?”
“Nakami just had a bad break up with her boyfriend, and she already bought tickets and she doesn’t want to go alone.”
“…”
“Oh it’s not that bad” Akari responds to Hikaru’s glare, “she plays Go too - she was on the girls Go team back in high school and it’s the only way you’re going be able to attend and see all those familiar faces seeing as you didn’t graduate.”
“Familiar faces?” Hikaru’s tone is filled with disbelief.
“Mitani-kun, Kaneko-chan, your old soccer team, your old classmates; Kimihiro’s going to be there too!” Akari replies excitedly.
“Yeah but I see Tsutsui about as often as I see you!”
“Which is whenever you want something.” Akari responds wryly. “Anyway it serves you right for not being able to find your own girlfriend, and dragging your childhood friend to these things!”
“Hey I try! It’s just whenever I get to the ‘introduce your girlfriend to your friends’ stage; I suddenly don’t have a girlfriend anymore. And most girls are really boring, so it’s like why bother?”, complains Hikaru.
“Could the fact that you always get dumped, be because you completely utterly ignore them as you argue over whether or not white to c9 while black is in Atari, is stupid or not?”
“That was one time! And it was a completely ridiculous move to make in that situation - he protected one stone instead of the entire lower quarter, seriously was Ochi sick or something that day - it was definitely not up to his usual standards!”
“You’re utterly hopeless Hikaru. I should just leave you to be molested.”
“No! I’ll do it.”
“I’ll just give Kimihiro a call now, to let him know, since even in cases of ‘desperation’ you still leave it to the last minute to ask for my help.”
“It's a whole 24 hours notice!”
Akari watches Hikaru warily slurping his tea out of the corner of her eye, as she pulls out her mobile from her purse. So he should, they’ve been childhood friends since always and forever, (she has the baby pictures to prove it), and it will do him some good to sweat it out a little.
She feels happy as she feels the cool plastic come into her hand, and gazes at the white Motorola with a black Go stone dangling as she dials, knowing that elsewhere in Tokyo Tsutsui is right now pulling out his black Motorola with a matching white Go stone phone accessory.
Tsutsui is always so kind and attentive and the little details like this that he organises always make her smile. She’s glad that she returned his friendship and she feels incredibly fortunate that she was brave enough to make clear her feelings to him. Dealing with one oblivious boy in her life was enough and she can’t imagine what it would be like without Kimihiro now.
“Hi darling~ just calling to let you know that I’ll be home late tomorrow night, I will be going to a Go function to help protect Hikaru’s virtue.” Akari trills into the phone and resists the urge to laugh at Hikaru’s wince.
Tsutsui can instantly picture what happened on the other side of the line chuckles into his phone. “So he came crying to you for help again?”
“Yes again! Honestly, he’s been like a magnet for stalkers ever since we graduated elementary.”
“I’ve noticed. Sorry Akari but I need to get back to this code, but can you remind him that everyone is looking forward to hearing about the tournament games he’s playing this week?”
“Sure, I’ll let Hikaru know that he needs to bring his latest kifu to Happy Go Lucky, for you next weekend.”
“Thanks. I love you.”
“Love you too!~ See you tonight.”
Akari’s claps shut her phone and goes back to her conversation with Hikaru, “He says you have to bring-”
“Yeah, yeah” Hikaru says waving a hand lazily. “I was going to bring it already anyway. That’s nothing compared to being forced on a date...”
Akari deftly ignores Hikaru’s tone and brightly points out “Hey if things go well at the reunion next week, maybe you can start taking Ai-chan to these things in the future. I’m sure her bribery would be much easier to deal with, such as spending a day with her in Shibuya.”
At Hikaru’s traumatised look, she can’t resist giggling.
Chapter 2:
Akari feels like a celebrity, as they arrive on Hikaru time - about forty-five minutes after the fashionable point - with the way so many people stare at her and Hikaru as they make their way to the main part of the function. The feeling only gets stronger as when she enters the room with a camera flashing capturing her own and Hikaru’s entrance.
“Yo!” one of Hikaru’s friends Waya-kun says a huge grin lighting his face up above the offending camera hanging from his neck. His face is slightly flushed - she wonders if he has been drinking.
“What are you doing here Waya!?” Hikaru accuses, “I thought you didn’t win your qualifying match for the Honinbo tournament?”
“Oh I’m here as Isumi’s date tonight.” He says with a cheeky grin, thumping the spluttering said Isumi on the back.
“Just kidding” Waya says and his grin becomes even wider. “Lighten up Isumi, it was only a joke! J-o-k-e.”
He then turns with a winks at Akari and explains “I’m here for work; I’m doing an article for Igo Monthly on the tournament and I’m also planning on using this for my Go column in Tokyo Daily.”
He then turns to Hikaru and voice becomes less jovial. “We can’t all be fabulous Go prodigies you know - some of us actually have to work for a living. Speaking of which, what are your thoughts on going up against Fuji-7-dan next week? The ones that I can actually put in my article, that is.”
“Um, well-”
“Stop! On second thoughts, email me tomorrow and pretend you said it tonight!” Waya says. “Today’s been a good day! And I would like to live until tomorrow.”
“Live?” Akari says with amusement.
“You really can’t underestimate this guy’s ability to tick people off. Really, he got into a screaming fit with the Koreans from the Lion’s tournament last month and I’m pretty sure they couldn’t speak Japanese and I know he can’t speak Korean - but some how he managed to…”
As Waya continues his rant, she can see behind his back Hikaru making a chugging gesture indicating Waya, and Isumi responding by shaking his head.
She decides that it might be best to help calm Waya down - and she’ll use the best way she knows how, by agreeing completely.
“Oh absolutely, I know completely where you are coming from - back in high school he managed to start a vendetta with the baseball team, and this was after he had left the school. It was completely unbelievable - let’s go find somewhere more comfortable and I will tell you all about it.”
Hikaru looks embarrassed, but Waya appears less hyperactive, despite the way he furiously keeps writing on his pad, surrounded by the “new wave” players who find it a lot more comfortable hanging out in the back than mingling with the older more established Go players.
Akari enjoys watching them from her corner - the world of Go is rather alien and somewhat scary - but also fascinating to watch. The way Ochi looked at her and then at Hikaru in disbelief was quite flattering, but added a comment on the Go conversation she saw how his eyes narrowed - an expression that reminds her of Touya-san in a scary way and she’s glad she’s on the other side of the group.
“Thanks for helping to calm Waya down” Isumi says as he settles down beside her. “It’s been an interesting day and had just gotten a bit worked up over something Ochi had said when he ran into you.”
Akari smiles, “Ah it was nothing really. It’s Isumi-san right? We met at Happy-Go-Lucky.”
“Ah yes!” Isumi’s face brightens with recognition. “The Go parlour Mitani-san runs, the one that has the pachinko machines at the ground level and a bar just beneath?”
“Yes that’s the one - it’s an interesting place to visit, especially since it started attracting such a large cliental of profession players who come in on regular basis to hang out.”
“Hmm” Isumi says, “yes I would imagine so. The free beer to title holders assisted with that I think…”
“I guess Mitani-kun can thank Hikaru for that, though I’m sure he won’t.”
“I didn’t think Hikaru had a title at the time?”
“He didn’t, but I do believe that Ogata did.”
“I see.” Isumi says and though the wording is neutral she can see the deep amusement etched into his face.
Hikaru was right, Akari decides, Isumi does find the whole situation quite amusing.
The conversation fades to silence for a little while, both Akari and Isumi watching the Go players mingle, before Isumi tentatively tries to start the conversation again.
“I’m sorry if you told me before, but what is it that you do for a living?”
“Oh I’m a school teacher, I teach geography and history at Yamabuki Middle School.”
“Oh? That sounds interesting, what made you decide to teach?”
“Ah well when I was growing up, I sometimes saw how certain student fell behind even when they were obviously quite bright in other ways, so I always wanted to be able to reach out and help… As for what I decided to teach - with Hikaru always getting lost I felt I needed to know not only where I am and where I want to go - but everywhere else I might end up.” She laughs. “History pretty interesting and it seemed to fit in well.”
“You and Hikaru seem pretty close.” Isumi observes.
“Childhood best friends always and forever”, Akari smiles, and doesn’t tell him about how after mid school, she didn’t think she would ever speak to Hikaru again, as anything more than an acquaintance, until when Kimihiro organised a reunion of all the former Haze school club’s Go players to celebrate Mitani’s opening of Happy-Go-Lucky and had managed to convince Hikaru to give regular lessons to help attract people to the new Go parlour.
As the night goes on, Waya and Isumi are the first to head off, Waya needs to get started on his article and as they live in the same apartment Isumi prefers to catch the same train. Nase and Honda are second; Akari’s glad she got a chance to invite Nase to Happy-Go-Lucky, Wednesdays are Lady’s night, and Nase is the one of the most promising up coming female Go players in the world. Akari finds it a little inspiring, especially since most of the girls she met back at mid and high school either stopped playing, or only play in the women’s tournaments and Nase always tries for every tournament that she can.
Akari slips off to the bathroom, leaving Hikaru to whinge at/with Ochi over the quality of today’s insei and how exactly Hikaru compared to them when he was his age.
Ochi’s opinion appears to be that a mass of Shindou clones have infiltrated the institute, with Hikaru struggling to find ways of stating that he is absolutely 100% not like them or how his circumstances were different - without going into why exactly they were different.
As she walks down the corridors, she ponders the matter. She was there when Hikaru started to learn Go and made the choice to become an insei and she still doesn’t know why exactly. Touya-san had something to do with it yes, but he and Hikaru met when Hikaru was playing so that came after the very beginning.
The beginning she can only pin point as being shortly after Hikaru fainted on top of the go board - but how that’s related she doesn’t really understand. Perhaps he met someone in the hospital that played? Possibly Sai? The one that keeps coming up, particularly amongst the pro’s and the internet Go fanatics. But why keep it a secret?
She knows it’s a secret and not just Hikaru being a dork and just not bothering to tell her, because Hikaru’s friends always when given the opportunity ask her, and Kimihiro’s complained about being asked and Mitani’s complained about being asked, and even one of the ex-girlfriends of Hikaru’s that she met complained about the matter so she can’t even begin to imagine how many people Hikaru’s avoided the issue with.
She’s pretty sure that even Touya-san doesn’t know from what a side comment he made one night, though he seems to think Hikaru will tell him one day.
It’s a little hurtful that the boy who used to tell her everything would keep something that obviously changed her life from her. But she can understand a little, since apparently the reason for Ogata’s special interest in HIkaru is trying to find this Sai.
They’d also had already started growing apart when all of this happened with Hikaru being a dumb boy, later becoming obsessed with Go and Akari becoming interested in growing up to be seen as adult and mature - such an exciting world lay ahead, she remembers being sure of at the time.
Well meeting up with crazy Go players counts as exciting, Akari guesses. And her students give Hikaru a run for his money in the being interesting stakes.
When Akari returns, she finds her chance to demonstrate her amazing Teacher-Fu powers.
Ogata, now that the protective crowd Hikaru cultivated has thinned out, is urging Hikaru to drink more and just spend the night at the hotel.
Hikaru is struggling against the challenge in Ogata’s tone - once he got involved he could never resist a challenge, so Akari steps into her role as Hikaru’s bodyguard, by in her very best and firmest teachers tone, explaining how they need to leave now to make sure they can catch the right train to get to their respective homes in time.
Hikaru gratefully hugs Akari from behind and agrees resolutely, “yes, yes the trains. Need to make sure Akari gets home on time.”
The fact that Akari drove Hikaru here and is dropping him off at the station before she heads home, is none of Ogata’s business, really.
Epilogue:
“That was fun.”, Akari smiles as drops Hikaru off at the local train station. “Don’t forget to email Waya with your thoughts on the Honinbo tournament.”
“Yeah, yeah will do.” Hikaru says with a mock salute. “Thanks for this.”
“You’re welcome. We’re friends right?”
“Always and forever!”