Disclaimer: Hikaru no Go was written by Yumi Hotta and illustrated by Takeshi Obata. I do not, in any way, profit from this story.
Go, Soccer Player, Go!
Chapter 20: Haze Go Club V.
...
A chair scraped sharply across the floor before tumbling down onto the cheap tile. Another aluminum folding chair was abruptly pushed back immediately after, the table between them jostling as someone's hip collided painfully against the hard plastic edge. The goban and go stones shook upon the table then but remained upon the table's surface as the commotion unfolded above.
"WAH! Touya!"
"Unhand me, Shindo!"
"Not if you're gonna go beat up a guy!"
"They're not just disrespecting go, they're sullying it!" Akira shouted, eyes snapping towards Hikaru so fast that Hikaru nearly lost his grip on Touya's arm just from the shock of seeing the expression there.
Akira's eyes were hardened and fierce, sharp with the heat of indignation and anger. They were the eyes of a tiger enraged enough to attack.
However, though Hikaru visibly flinched at the eyes Touya was showing him, he kept his vice-like grip on the other boy's elbow. Even if Hikaru didn't understand why betting money on a game would cause Touya to react this way, he would bodily hold him in place. Hikaru might be standing on the other side—a table in between them—but he was still physically stronger than Touya.
"Hikaru!" Sai interrupted sharply from beside Hikaru.
"They're not just betting on a game," Sai accused, pointing his closed fan directly towards the board. "They're cheating in this game. Both of them."
Hikaru's eyes immediately flickered over the board. Now that Sai had mentioned it, some of the stones didn't seem right. He had been watching this game even before Sai and Touya, and had had more time to notice the shapes the stones were making and predict the flow of the game.
But he didn't remember the board looking quite…like that. It was as if he had been watching a mass of ants, had looked away for a second, and turned back to find that some of the ants had...moved.
"Little kids who don't understand should sit down and stay quiet." The older, middle-aged man playing black grinned in Hikaru's and Akira's direction. "I'm trying to teach a valuable lesson."
"Che," The younger player scoffed at him. "You're just throwing it in my face."
"I wouldn't be doing this right if I wasn't." The older man laughed boisterously, throwing his head back in amusement. It was as if Hikaru's and Akira's presence there, and their knowing what was happening, didn't matter to him at all.
This time, even Hikaru was looking closely enough to see it. Once his head was thrown back, the boy playing white slipped an extra stone into his captures.
Hikaru immediately abandoned paying attention to the crooked game and instead turned to focus on Sai. However, Sai wasn't affected by these events in the way Hikaru thought he would be. Even though this situation should bring back all of those bad memories of his past, the very memories which had led to his death...
Sai just looked sad.
And Hikaru didn't know this because they shared that bond with one another that allowed them to feel the other's feelings. This time, Hikaru understood because he could see it.
Sai was looking down only at the boy who was cheating. And Hikaru understood the profound sorrow in Sai's expression then. Even Sai, a ghost no one else could see or hear or touch or communicate with in any way, someone who had lived a thousand years ago and nobody other than Hikaru would ever even know he existed, felt pity for the boy before him. Pitied him for not knowing what he was losing in living this way.
"How could you?" Hikaru whispered.
Akira looked back at Hikaru in shock, enough to forget his own violent reaction to this game.
Hikaru kept his grip on Akira's elbow, but his hold slackened as he stared down at the goban in play. He wasn't looking at the players, neither the older man nor the boy their age. But Hikaru's question to them hung in the air, haunting everyone in the room.
It was completely silent for a moment. The old man behind the counter turned away. Everyone else in the go club did as well. Even if they weren't playing that game, the guilt in just knowing about it wasn't lessened. They had allowed the cheating to happen without consequence, had participated in the corruption of a child in this way.
"Why shouldn't I?"
The other boy stared up at them, not angry, not ashamed, no emotion whatsoever. His pose in his chair was slack and casual, his attention still half on the game he had been playing.
Akira focused on the white stone in this boy's hand, white hot rage flooding his entire being at such an insolent question.
But Mitani Yuki only smirked at Akira's indignation, seeing the other boy's clenched fists as amusing.
"It's just a game." Mitani told them, idly twirling the stone across his fluid, capable fingers.
"It doesn't mean anything to you, or to him," Mitani nodded his head towards Hikaru. "Or to anyone else watching, not even really to me and him."
He glanced over at his opponent, who was now uncharacteristically just observing this entire conversation in complete silence.
Dismissing this, Mitani turned his gaze back to the two kids his age standing in front of him.
"Me and him play this game together, and we know what we're getting into. And if the two of us playing know, then what does it matter to anyone else?" He asked the two interrupting his game.
"Why are you doing this?" Akira demanded. He wasn't just about to let this go, not when the integrity of go was being put into question.
"Why not?" Mitani replied immediately. "It's just a game played for fun. And it's more fun for me and him if we bet on the game and cheat while playing."
Hikaru couldn't believe the words coming out of this kid's mouth. He bristled at the thought of even understanding the twisted logic of what this kid was saying.
Games were fun. Hikaru had always believed that everyone played games because they were fun. But he had never bet on a game before. Sure, he may have said big words and may have suggested an innocent bet like more games of soccer or something...but never money! Never ever money on anything ever!
Hikaru couldn't even comprehend cheating (or losing money) as being fun at all. But, in a way, what this kid was saying was also right. They weren't hurting anyone, and both of them knew what was going on.
As confusing and as wrong as it felt, Hikaru didn't think he had anything to say against this kid's reasons.
Still, Hikaru opened his mouth to say something because he just had to dispute what this other kid was saying. Despite his newfound doubt, he was still sure that cheating was wrong, even if only because it had been one of the reasons for Sai killing himself. But his conviction was lost while he was doing it, and all he managed to do was close his mouth in silence.
However, Touya Akira hadn't been moved at all by Mitani Yuki's words.
"So that's how you want to always live your life?"
Akira's fists were still tightly clenched at his sides, his fingernails digging painfully into his palm. But he didn't care about that right now. Right now, this was even more important than him. This was even more important than go.
"You don't have to think of go like I do," Akira told Mitani. "Because this isn't about go at all. You're just telling me that you're disappointing yourself."
"I'm not—" shouted Mitani.
"You were." Akira interrupted him immediately. "Betting on and cheating your go like this doesn't make go more fun. It just shows me that you've given up on yourself."
At this point, Akira wrenched his arm free from Hikaru. And Hikaru didn't even make a move to restrain Touya again. Despite the harsh words Touya was saying to this kid, he didn't have to worry about Touya beating this kid up the old-fashioned way.
"Whatever made you cheat in the first place—desperation, anger, even spur of the moment whim—it was the first instance in which you disappointed yourself. You didn't believe in your ability to get stronger or to improve honestly. You stopped trying, and you gave up."
"And actually, what you're doing isn't fun at all. But you already know that, don't you? It's just that it's easier this way. It's become easier for you to give up than to make an effort. And you continue to do it because you already think lowly of yourself."
Touya looked straight into Mitani's hard gaze then, not in anger, but in warning this time.
"If you continue on this path, that's how you'll always live your life."
"WHAT DO YOU KNOW!?" Mitani shouted, slamming his fist into the table.
The stones upon the goban rattled and scattered, disrupting the game and rendering it unplayable. But no one really cared then. All anyone cared about then was that Mitani looked angry enough to kill.
"You don't know anything!" Mitani shouted at Touya. "You don't know anything about me. You don't know anything about my life. You're just some stupid kid who thinks he knows everything, barging in here when you don't belong, talking about things you don't even understand!"
Akira didn't say anything at all in response to this. He just looked at Mitani for a long time, as if he were trying to figure something out, like Mitani were a tricky pattern of stones his opponent had laid down.
"Let's make a bet."
"What?!" Hikaru exclaimed, looking at Akira like he had gone insane.
"We'll play a game." Akira announced, looking straight at Mitani. "You can cheat as much as you want. And if you feel good about yourself after our game, then I'll admit that I was wrong about you."
Mitani eyed Touya carefully then, he looked seriously angry but also seriously surprised by Touya's suggestion.
"That's not a real bet." Mitani pointed out shrewdly.
Akira calmly picked up his fallen chair and set it back upright, not giving any hint to his thoughts or emotions.
"Then we'll bet ¥10,000 like your last game." Touya declared, taking his seat in front of the goban.
It took a moment, but Mitani Yuki accepted the challenge.
...
Author's Notes:
The setup to it took longer than I thought it would, but I wanted to make the first go game I write super exciting!