ineluctable:

Not to be avoided, evaded, or escaped; inevitable.

10. #10

It was really a horrible indignity, Hikaru thought. He was going undercover here, but he didn't even get a cool code name. He'd asked to be #5, like for go, right? But instead he'd ended up as #10 and some pretty boy wimp had gotten his number. Hikaru still couldn't make himself be entirely civil to the guy when he saw that big five on his chest. The undercover go player definitely should have gotten the 'go' jersey.

Hikaru had to be the only guy in the entire camp who actually liked the food. Having returned from China recently, he was so grateful for actual Japanese food that even the regurgitated gruel they fed the teenagers at camp was heavenly to him. Some of the underclassmen in their little cabins still pointed at him as he walked by. The story about the six bowls of lamb-flavored ramen must have spread that far. Hikaru, thankfully, did not consider this as compromising his position as a secret agent, though, so felt himself free to continue happily eating himself into oblivion, much to all of his new friends' disgust.

Hikaru, his #10 jersey still kind of stained from the morning's quite energizing curry, ran out onto the field with his cabin team for 11:00 scrimmages. A cloud had blissfully chosen to hover over their particular end of the woods, so the hearty Okinawa sun was for once not doing its best to burn them alive. The cool breeze and the spicy taste in his mouth sent extra exuberant power into the kick Hikaru launched the game with, and as he dove forward into the enemy defenders as heedlessly as he always did, he knew he'd made the right choice in taking a week here before the fifth-round Ouza matches.

Some big guy stole the ball, and Hikaru hauled his ass back to midfield, shouting at his own defenders. The ball shot back up in a few seconds, and Hikaru began to dribble back down the field. Heh, he thought. Hane, inverted hane, see you next week, big guy...

Hikaru collapsed onto the bench, gasping for breath. One of his friends tossed him his thermos, looking at him skeptically, and he chugged down the Gatorade for dear life. He really wasn't in shape for soccer anymoreIt was still fun, though, otherwise he wouldn't be going to sleep away camp for it. It was also fun because none of these guys knew he was a go pro. That skeptical teammate, who snickered at him and shoved him in the ribs, currently calling him a pussy, wasn't afraid of him at all.

Hi, Sai, Hikaru thought. It's a beautiful day. You would have loved it. I don't think you would have liked soccer much, though. It's kind of too rough for you.

Hikaru squinted at the tsumego book he was tearing through. He didn't really agree with their answer. He saw a way in the long run which could set up black for more territory than their solution. Not many people would have been able to see it, though. Sai would have, so would most upper dans, and Touya. Hikaru contemplated sending them a letter.

"Come on, Hikaru-kun, we're gonna go light fireworks!" Jounichi called from outside the log walls, and Hikaru jumped to his feet, stuffing the incriminating evidence of go in the pockets of his huge shorts. "I bet if we get them high enough, some girls from the camp across the river will come and see!"

Hikaru ran out, taking some in his hands. The actual feel of them made him nervous, though. "What if we burn something down?" he asked, and promptly had his ass kicked for being a wimp. Laughing, Hikaru followed them, in agreement with their philosophy of "to hell with that."

I wonder if Touya's wondering where I am, Hikaru thought. We normally run into each other around the go institute a lot the week before matches. I wonder if he's thinking about me. I wonder what he would think about this place, and about soccer, and about my friends. I wonder if I could ever get him to play soccer with me, or sit here with me like this, watching the colors explode.

Hikaru gasped at a sudden boom that caught him off guard, and as the green tendrils faded into smoke, he felt an irrational sense of horrible loneliness. I'll tell Touya about Sai someday, Hikaru told himself, for no reason in particular, and hugged his legs to his chest. He wondered if he could buy a copy of the new Weekly Go anywhere near here, because Touya was having some round of Meijin preliminaries that Hikaru hadn't gotten into.

I love this place, Hikaru realized. It's just that Touya's not here. If he was here, this would be perfect. Hikaru promised himself that he would take Touya to a festival like this sometime. They'd play a heated competitive game, it would slowly get dark to the accompaniment of the carefree cries of running children, and then, under the streaming summer fireworks, Hikaru would whisper his secret into Touya's ear.

14. radio-cassette player

A childish voice spoke fuzzily through the speakers, not stumbling over theadult worlds. The strips rolling inside the years-old tape still played the recorded mumblings faithfully, as years older, Touya Akira listened to himself again.

"I shouldn't have played atari there. Honestly, what was wrong with me?"

Tape after tape Akira had filled with his observations on games he'd played or seen. He'd started talking to the record button in 4th year grammar school to organize his thoughts. It had been a while since he'd listened to tapes this old. With the childish conviction that everyone devilishly wanted to spy on his thoughts, he'd hidden them away in some obscure place, and only recently found them by mistake. As old as the thoughts were, they brought the games clearly back into focus.

"I think he thought he was actually winning before we did seiichi. Maybe that explains the cocky way he played during the end-game. I'll pay attention to these things."

"I need to start being more willing to sacrifice pieces. In some situations, reluctance could cost me the game."

Akira laid out the old games to the instructions his high, clear voice had laid out on the radio-cassette player. He debated between two possible spots for the thirty-second move, then decided even if he'd been nine, he couldn't really have been stupid enough to play in the lower one. Satisfied, he took the better move, and let black's game deteriorate from there. So mediocre. Mediocrity was the worst insult Akira knew to give.

Ashiwara tried to get him to buy a CD player, because that was what was popular with people these days. All the kids his age certainly used them instead of the old-fashioned technology Akira was crouched over. But, Akira simply had replied, all his classical music was on tapes, and it would cost too much to replace them with CD recordings of the same things anyway.

Ashiwara replied that he wouldn't be buying a CD player to listen to classical music, and honestly, he'd said teasingly, sometimes it was hard to believe Akira was a kid. Even crusty Ogata had a CD player. He'd seen Shindou listening to his walkman, too. The fact, however, that Shindou had a walkman made Akira quite determined not to get one for himself.

Akira put in the prelude to Bach's third suite, a cello piece he liked. His father had been known to call Bach a robotic monkey after two or three cups of sake, but he'd written some things that Akira quite liked. The mechanical, mathematical nature of the compositions he'd put out pleased Akira very much. If his father was interested in passion, he should dig out some of mother's old torch songs or go to a theater to see a tragedy. Passion had no place in a go player's world, except in the context of the unshakable drive to win.

Akira remembered old games from grammar school and inwardly winced at them, bothered by the mistakes he'd made. He also cringed at the memory of the old him, that awkward, too-smart child who hadn't really internalized that he wasn't normal yet. Bach, however, declared all such embarrassing memories transient. Akira hummed along, despite the fact that he'd never really liked his voice, a common complaint in the Touya males, and waved his fingers in time to the cadence. Akira preferred to think cadence instead of beat because it put him in mind of a conductor.

Akira looked at a list of English vocabulary words and wrote a person each word reminded him of. He surveyed the word ineluctable, and, with annoyed reluctance, wrote down the characters Shindou Hikaru. Bach's cello made a bold statement that was rather violin-like in its pronounced quality, and Akira buzzed his lips together as he sighed, stretching out across his bed. I don't see any need for myself to change, Akira thought irritably, blowing hair out of his eyes.

Akira listened again to the tapes of his childhood and wondered where he would be five years distant again from that smug, shaky voice. Shindou, he thought, would be there. Was "ineluctability" a word? He rather doubted it.

Akira tapped out Bach's vigorous cadence on his soft comforter and wished he had learned to play the cello.

27. overflow

Hikaru and Touya were both 13, and while Hikaru waited at the bottom of the stairwell with Sai, Touya walked down slowly from the top, alone. Hikaru listened to his rival's slow descending footsteps, waiting for him to come closer. Touya couldn't have known that Hikaru was there staring up at him, since he was staring down at his own shoes so fixedly. It was as if he expected the steps to never end.

Touya didn't look happy, the harshness to his tread, almost like a stomp, attested to that, as did the unusually marked stiffness about his shoulders. He must not feel good about how he'd done in his first dan match, Hikaru decided. Hikaru wouldn't have liked losing to Zama-Ouza, either. The old man wasn't that good, was kind of slimy, was too cocky, and Hikaru knew Touya was better than him. Hikaru knew how Touya hated losing at all. Well, so did Hikaru.

Touya was sniffling. Hikaru realized Touya must kind of have a cold, but for a weird second, he thought his rival was actually crying. Hikaru felt all his excitement and anxiety inflate even further. Touya looked up and saw Hikaru when they only had a few steps remaining between them, which made the boy stop in place. He didn't seem to want to get any closer.

"What are you doing here, Shindou?" Touya asked, eyes hostile. The other boy intimidated him, but Hikaru took a step up towards Touya anyway. His hand trailed along the metal railing, only a foot away from where Touya's rested uncertainly.

"I saw your game," Hikaru said, and stopped on the step right below, which left Touya still taller than him. Hikaru looked up and his eagerness overrode his fear. Touya seemed weary and irritated and the smallest bit frightened.

"I-" Hikaru considered what to say. He didn't want to say something that would offend Touya again, but- "Touya, that was awesome!"

Touya blinked, and his hand shook. "Shindou?"

Hikaru looked up, then impulsively stepped up quickly and hugged Touya hard. "I'm really inspired now! I think you're incredible, Touya! You deserved to win, you know."

Touya stiffened in Shindou's arms, shocked beyond action. The way Hikaru hugged him was a head-on-shoulder type of thing, with bleached hair shoving itself snugly against Touya's neck. Hikaru met Touya's stunned eyes and smiled at him tentatively, letting him go but pulling him down the few remaining stairs. Sai was smiling in the corner, the bottom of his face behind his fan lit up by the bluish-green exit sign.

Touya seemed not to know what to say. "The snow is beautiful," Hikaru said softly. "Right?"

He looked at Touya, who, with his lips slightly parted and breath turning to frost in the air, looked for once like a child.

"You-" Touya said, words insufficient for something he wanted to say.

Hikaru, of course, didn't understand how much he'd hurt Touya before, how confused and stirred-up he made Touya, and how inconceivable Touya found this moment. He just spun around in the falling snowflakes as he ran out, laughing with sheer pleasure, and grinned at the other boy. Touya's cheeks were red in the chill. Hikaru gave Touya his umbrella.

"Take it," Hikaru said.

Touya stared down at it, looked up at Hikaru with both anger and amazement. Finally he just walked off down the street, neon lights framing his retreating figure. Hikaru watched, then looked up at a quiet Sai.

"Well," Sai said, smiling a little despite himself, "I'm not going to feel sorry for you if you get a cold, Hikaru!"

Hikaru just shook his head happily, staring off where Touya had gone.The street, lit by both streetlights and moonlight, was like the gateway to a whole new world, all his to explore and claim. Hikaru imagined Touya holding Hikaru's old black umbrella over his head as he waited for a taxi, thoughts contemplative as he shivered from the cold, and he hugged himself.

"Sai," Hikaru said, turning to his friend, "Isn't it just so beautiful?"

30. kiss

Shindou tried to run. Akira didn't even think before he was running after him. Students in the library turned to stare, Shindou's face full of mindless panic, Akira's with equally mindless determination. Hushed voices turned to shrieks and Akira pushed people out of the way to get to Shindou, who accidentally tripped a first year; Akira almost stepped on him before the kid could get back up.

"Come back here, Shindou!" Akira yelled, panting as he strained his legs, making them go faster. "What are you scared of?'

"Leave me alone!" Shindou yelled. "I don't want to play go anymore!"

Akira would have in other circumstances been aghast at the spectacle they were making of themselves, but he didn't mind anything if it helped him catch Shindou. Shindou shoved the door of a nearby stairwell open with his body, but it was an up staircase, and they were on the second floor- everyone else was going the other way, pushing him back. Akira shot forward and grabbed Shindou from behind, clamping his hand on Shindou's scrawny wrist so hard it was like he intended to weld them together. Shindou yelled something incoherent, and Akira dragged him down against the tide.

"Hey, Touya-"

Akira pushed Shindou into the chemistry room that doubled as headquarters for the go club. The beakers and dull surroundings which he'd spent so much time in were like an accusation to Shindou. Akira shoved him in, blocking the door with his body. The window they had talked through a year ago, the only other possible exit, was locked shut.

"Play a game with me," Akira demanded, feeling kind of panicked himself. Shindou had to!

"No!" Shindou yelled back. Neither of them saw that the members of the current go club had started to arrive. Akari looked as though she was the one being yelled at.

"Don't be such a coward!" Touya shouted back, face red with anger and frustration. Most people would have hardly recognized him. The only sounds were the wind and nearby happy voices.

Shindou closed his eyes, then- "Shut up!" His voice raised manically, and the pain in it could have sliced a person in two. "You have no idea what I've been through! You don't know anything about what I've lost!"

Mitani's mouth had fallen open. His hand were clenched into fists just like Akira's. It was hard to believe neither of the boys had seen them. The tension that hung in the air was like a bullet had just gone off.

Akira stared at Shindou, rendered speechless for seconds. He really didn't know anything about Shindou. He knew that. But he was here because he wanted to. He always had, and he still did.

"That doesn't matter," Akira said. "To win at something, you always have to lose something else." Shindou's mouth fell open, lips parting. Akira stepped forward. "Play a game with me," he demanded, and put his delicate hands on Shindou's trembling shoulders. The other boy looked scalded by the touch, as though Akira's eyes locking on his once again pierced right through his heart.

Akira kissed Shindou. He'd fantasized about it enough to know exactly how he wanted to do it. They were about the same height- Akira put one hand in Shindou's hair to steady him, and he wasn't frightened, spurred on the softness of the bleached strands between his fingers. He put his face up to Shindou's and pushed their lips together. At first he missed, and his lower lip locked on the very corner of Shindou's mouth, then he felt with his lips experimentally and found where he was going.

Shindou's lips were small and thin and soft and disbelieving and much warmer than he'd imagined. It felt good, really good, so he moved a little, shifting, and pushed his tongue against the entrance to Shindou's mouth, and sucked, hard. Shindou was frozen. Akira felt like he'd just won a hundred thousand games. His mouth opened against Shindou's, and he felt the sharp scraping of his teeth brushing Shindou's inner lip, soft and inviting, like an electric shock, so he pulled himself back as if pulling himself back to reality. He looked Shindou in the eye. Shindou's lips were slightly swollen and wet, a hot red.

"You-" Shindou breathed.

"Yeah," Akira said, voice taking on unfamiliar confidence. "I'm gay. But I'm also a lot better at go than you. While you loaf around feeling sorry for yourself, I'll be getting either further ahead of you. I'm not going to lose a single match from now on."

Shindou's face was shocked, the epitome of uncertainty. "I expect you to be at our next game," Akira said, and brushed past Shindou's pole-axed friends in a most spectacular exit. He looked down at the sleeves of his uniform to adjust them against his pale skin, trying to let out the heat that rose red under its awkward confines. He waited.

Shindou won his next game by a ridiculously staggering margin. Akira read the record of this and reached up to touch his lips.

25. fence

Hikaru wasn't too sure about the 20 oz worth of ice tea he'd bought. He didn't have tea much, didn't even really like it, but it had been the only thing besides water that hadn't been sold out in the school machine. He didn't really feel that great about actually drinking it. There was clearly some unidentifiable black stuff at the bottom of the bottle. When he tried to wipe it off, nothing changed, so it turned out the black stuff was actually inside the bottle. What was it, tea leaves or grinds or something? Toxic sludge?

Hikaru needed to see Touya, and so he went to Kaiou, which unlike his own school didn't have a professional day. Hikaru wasn't quite sure how he intended to find Touya, so he was lucky that Touya had gym and was outside. Hikaru, approaching the imposing academy from the back, had seen Touya in a group of blue and black-clad boys on the tennis courts.

A tall old man was barking directions at them. Hikaru crept up, grateful that it wasn't a sports practice. Then people might have thought he was a spy for another school, like in anime. He walked up to the green fence and grabbed it in his hands as he leaned forward against it, watching.

Hikaru shut the J-rock playing on his walkman off to concentrate on what was going on. They were having singles matches. Everyone was getting their opponents and starting. Touya ended up with some random boy, not looking happy or sad or anything in particular about what they were doing. Hikaru watched, biting his lip. He might end up having a game against Touya soon, he didn't know. They'd talk again then. No one noticed Hikaru.

Touya, to Hikaru's surprise, turned out to be strikingly dismal at tennis. His serve was weak, he couldn't aim or hit many different kinds of shots, he wasn't fast enough, and his coordination was embarrassingly hideous. Hikaru would have been laughing if Touya hadn't seemed completely unconcerned about all this. His opponent, winning in straight points, looked more upset than Touya did, who so clearly didn't care. Some girls ran by chasing a soccer ball, and Hikaru turned for a second to look for the origin of the noise, but quickly turned back Touya, not wanting to miss something potentially important.

If it wasn't for him, Hikaru thought, staring at the haughtily apathetic boy, I wouldn't be a go players. I'd be just like his opponent. But still- I mean, I'm just standing here outside the courts. I'm looking at him through a freaking fence. I wonder why he kissed me. I think Sai was gay, too. He looked like a girl, sort of.

The gym class ended, and the gym teacher called all the boys back, talked at them, then dismissed them. Some guys walked out in groups of friends; Touya, of course, didn't. Hikaru remembered the normal frustrated feeling he got when his gym teacher called them to end class- he wanted to play more, after all- and knew for Touya, it must be the exact opposite. Even though he didn't want Touya to notice he was there, he sort of did, too.

Touya pulled a kifu out from his bag and studied it as he walked back to his classroom. Hikaru had to suppress his urge to read it over Touya's shoulder. He felt like there was a force pulling his towards Touya, some kind of gravity. He tightened his hands on the wires of the fence as he watched Touya's back. Sai, Hikaru thought, I want to talk to you. What would you have said to me, right now?

Hikaru's iced tea didn't look remotely cold anymore. The black crud, however, was still floating at the bottom of the amber liquid. Advertisements in bright colors adorned the wrapper. Hikaru drank it, and winced. Well, if he drank enough iced tea, he'd get used to it eventually.