notes: chapter 5 is now complete. I ended up cutting it short because it was already about 2.6k when I started working on what was originally going to be the next part of this chapter and made the beginning of chapter 6 instead. So it looks like 'Fuseki' will be three parts. I hope that's alright.

Oct 19: fixed honorifics.

Chapter 5: 布石 Fuseki Part 2

After getting an earful from Ashiwara on the drive home, Touya was accosted by his frantic mother upon entering, and for several minutes it seemed like he wouldn't hear the end of it as she made him eat a sizeable lunch (since she believed he missed breakfast) and gave him a talking to at the same time. Finally, after he'd eaten, Touya agreed to go rest and seemed he would be free when he was ambushed by his own father, who took him into his study and gave him a calm, but stern lecture that also seemed to last forever, maybe at least half an hour.

When at last Touya was finally dismissed, he went straight to his room and slid the door shut behind him, tossed his futon out on the floor and collapsed on it from exhaustion. "Whyyyy?" he moaned into the pillow.

Hikaru could not help but smile at the scene. He had never seen Touya act so much like a normal kid their own age. Minus the neat and tidy somewhat traditional room with what seemed to be only a neat shelf of books (no manga of course), it could almost be a scene out of his own life.

Of course, his parents! In fact, he was already starting to miss them. He wondered what they were doing now, but realized given these circumstances it was probably best not to go look, or even think about it at all. His eyes watered at the thought.

"Wow," said Hikaru, hoping to distract himself from thinking of his own family, "That Ashiwara is like a third parent to you."

"Between Ashiwara-san and Ogata-san especially, I have at least four. And Ichikawa-san is like an older sister, too. And then there's the fact that every adult in the Go world seems to believe I'm their precious nephew or grandson. It can be overwhelming sometimes, as you can see. "

"It might help if you tried to talk to me with your mind more," said Hikaru ("Us! Us!" Sai insisted), "It would avoid drawing attention to yourself."

"Yes," said Touya, "I keep forgetting I can do that."

Touya sighed and stared at the ceiling. "No matches for a whole week! What will I do?"

"Here's a suggestion, you can play that game against me?"

Touya buried his face in his pillow and groaned continuously for several seconds as his answer.

"No no no, I didn't mean today!" That was a lie—he did mean today, at least at first but that groan made him change his mind. "Maybe tomorrow? Assuming your day doesn't get messed up somehow?"

"You know, Hikaru," said Sai, "You always got mad at me for badgering you for games, and here you are doing the same thing to Akira!"

Hikaru grimaced. He couldn't even argue with that. He hadn't realized it until now, but it was exactly what he was doing.

"Sai?" he said in a soft voice, smiling at his companion.

"Yes, Hikaru?"

"Shut up."

"Ohayou, Touya/Akira!" Akira's moment of waking was hailed by Shindou and Sai in unison. That's right, he remembered, spirits don't get tired, and they were probably waiting the entire time for him to finish sleeping. He was going to have to get used to this new loud presence in his normally quiet home.

"Ohayou," he replied, although given the dim sky outside it wasn't quite ohayou. Or maybe it was early morning after all? Given his weird sleep habits these past few days, he wasn't sure anymore.

He checked his watch to find it was early morning, which was still attached to his wrist because in his exhaustion he'd never bothered to take off his clothes, which he really needed to stop doing before it became a habit. As he unbuttoned and shrugged off his waistcoat, he contemplated how in the world he was going to get his matches back. It sure would be a huge problem if rumours started going about the Go pro community that he had fallen ill and cancelled several matches due to mourning for Shindou. In comparison to his actual friend Waya being present for matches, it would seem rather—

"TOUUUUYAAAA!" Shindou yelled at the top of his lungs, scaring Akira out of his wits.

"Shindou, you don't have to yell! What even is the matter?"

"Can you at least warn before you start stripping before my very eyes?" Shindou snarled, shielding himself from the sight.

Oh no, Akira sighed, not this again. He'd only just started unbuttoning his shirt. "I'm just changing clothes, for the love of god. You're acting really childish about this, you know. Haven't you even been in a boy's locker room before?"

"Of course I have, but this is like, up close and personal! I can't help but freak out."

"Look, Shindou," said Akira as he buttoned his shirt back up, blushing somewhat, "It's clear that you cannot leave my side for the foreseeable future, but I still need to dress and bathe even if I cannot leave your presence. It might be better for the both of us in the long run if we just tried to get used to that fact now."

"I guess that makes sense," said Shindou, still looking away. He sat crosslegged on the ground with his fists in his lap, looking quite tense. Then he looked up at Akira again. "But Touya, doesn't it bother you? Don't you need privacy?"

Akira laughed. "My family is stalked by paparazzi and everyone who cares about go has a need to know what's going on in my personal life. I didn't get much privacy to begin with. And I guess now that you and Sai are here I don't get to have it at all, not that it's your fault of course. So I guess I'm just used to not having a whole lot of privacy? So it's really not a big deal to me."

If anything, Akira thought to himself, what really bothered him at all was Shindou reacting with fear and revulsion to something as benign as the idea of him taking off his clothes. He honestly felt a little bit hurt.

He sat down at Shindou's goban and grabbed a fistful of white stones. "Let's nigiri," he said.

"Huh?"

"I'm changing the subject, since it makes you uncomfortable, so we're having the game you wanted. Just say odd or even."

"Oh!" said Shindou, brightening up and crawling toward the other side of the goban, "Even, then."

Akira counted out the stones. "Odd," he said, "I take black." He placed his first stone, a 3-4 point.

"The 3-4 point right there," said Shindou, pointing to said point with his finger, and Akira placed the white stone. "Wow, it feels weird to be on the other side of this. I wish I had Sai's fan for this, that would make me feel a lot cooler. Sai, can I have your fan? Is it even possible?"

"Absolutely not!" said Sai at Shindou's side, clutching the fan, "Knowing you, you'd accidentally make a tear in it." Shindou stuck out his tongue at him childishly.

"Can we please focus on the game here?" Akira softly interjected, having already placed his corner claim.

"Oh, sorry! Keima here."

"An approach already? I sense confidence in you, Shindou." He sent off a sequence of joseki that gave Shindou the corner and left himself with more influence on the center.

Once basic territory claims were made, the game began in earnest. Though Akira led the game, Shindou's moves were also quite solid, and Akira felt under pressure to keep up his lead. Occasionally, Shindou made a brilliant hand, emanating straight from a divine insight just out of his reach—the style of Sai. Sai had been teaching him, and it showed beautifully. This Shindou was not the helpless novice he crushed at the middle school tournament, nor was he the secret Sai who crushed him before—this was truly, uniquely Shindou's go, coming into its own.

Happiness bloomed within Akira. This was it—the game that he had been waiting for, the game he needed. Thanks to god this game could take place, that the chance to play Shindou's go hadn't been lost forever.

He realized his tears were falling, and wiped them from his face. Had Shindou seen that? He looked up at him. He was so deep in concentration that he saw nothing.

Ah! Shindou had sente, and he was leading him around the board! Akira had allowed his attention to lapse, and now Shindou was already starting to eat through his lead in points. He had to find some way to push him back, and quick—

The door slid open, so suddenly that Akira and Shindou jolted. Ah, it was only his father.

"Akira," otou-san said, "I was checking in to make sure you were alright." He invited himself in and had a look at the game. "This is the goban which Fujisaki-san brought, isn't it? What kind of game are you replaying?"

Akira tried to invent a plausible answer to that question but could come up with nothing. "Shindou," he directed a thought to him, "Any ideas?"

Shindou shrugged.

Otou-san knelt beside the board and pondered. Sai, who happened to be sitting in the same place, got very uncomfortable, huffed and crossed to the opposite side.

"Hmm," said his father, raising his eyebrows. "The style of white has an unmistakeable influence from Sai. The player is certainly not Sai, and certainly not as strong as Sai either; there are many years of experience behind Sai's moves which this player does not have. All of this gives rise to the strong impression that white is a young pro who is a student of Sai. And, of course, the strength of black can only be yours."

"Wow!" Hikaru exclaimed, "He got all that just from looking at the board?"

"His deductions are so close to the truth," said Sai, holding the end of his fan to the base of his lip.

His father noticed the remnants of tears on his son's face and gently wiped them away. He held his large hand on his shoulder for a moment, giving a slight, but heavy smile. Then he nodded, said, "If you feel up to it, you can join us for breakfast," got up and quietly left.

"What was that all about?" asked Shindou. "And wow, were you really crying during our game?"

Akira blushed and wiped at his cheeks. "Uh, never mind about that. Anyway, Otou-san appears to be under the impression that I am mourning by replaying a game with you. Since he doesn't know you're back, it's a reasonable assumption to make."

"So, shall we continue? It was your move."

Instead of playing his move, Akira simply gathered the stones and started to put them away. "I'm sorry, Shindou, but if someone walked in here again things might get even more complicated. Already, it's obvious to otou-san that white was you, and it's also improbable that I would even be able to replay a game against you seeing as we had no official matches against each other and we honestly didn't really interact."

Shindou grunted. "Yeah, you're right. It's best to keep a low profile about this, especially when your dad thinks you're sick and any babble about seeing ghosts would probably send you straight to a hospital."

"Ok, so let's head down to breakfast!"

Breakfast with his parents was silent and awkward. Normally, they would have asked him about goings-on at school or the institute, but since he wasn't going to either for the time being there was nothing to ask about. Meanwhile, Shindou gazed lustfully at the omelets, miso and natto of the household's traditional breakfast, that sadly he could never take part in eating. And Sai stared off out a window, his mind preoccupied by something. Sai had been rather quiet actually, Akira had realized. It made him a little worried.

He thought of something to say that broke the silence. "Otou-san, okaa-san, I was thinking. Do you remember when you played go online in the hospital?"

"Yes, I remember it," said otou-san, "What about it?"

"I was thinking I would play a little casual online go for the time being when I can't go to matches; I think it would make me feel a little better."

"Playing go online is only a mere shadow of playing go in person, in which you can actually know that person's identity and feel the stones. I will allow it, but warn that you should not allow yourself to become wrapped up in it, as what happens to some young insei and pros."

"Yes, otou-san," said Akira, groaning mentally. His father had to turn everything into some kind of teaching moment, especially when he did not need the lesson. "Anyway, it's not really for me, but for them," he added in his mind, directing his thoughts to Shindou and Sai.

"Really?" Shindou and Sai grinned with delight. Aside from Akira and each other, they hadn't been able to play anyone at all since their return to him. Akira was glad to see that it made Sai happy.

"Akira, thank you so much!" Sai squealed, hugging him, "You are so much nicer to me than mean Hikaru." Being hugged by a ghost did not feel like anything, nor had any momentum that pushed him around, as if the ghost was hugging a statue.

"Hey, don't be rude! The only reason why I stopped was because people all over the world became too curious about you, you know! I didn't want any complications." Shindou grumbled.

Unaware of the ghostly banter, his father asked, "Akira, do you feel ready to play against me in the mornings again? If you do not, please do not feel as if you should."

Akira nodded. Normally the two played a quiet game every morning when they got a chance, but the day after his father delivered the news, Akira found himself making a major self-atari and even being led into a ladder, losing the advantage of his handicap, and when he noticed, instead of playing his next stone he simply held it in the air, trembling until it slipped out of his fingers, and broke down into a quiet sob. His father cleared away the game and comforted him, and decided it would be best not to make him play morning games until he had time to heal.

It was his performance in this game that convinced Akira not to go to his match the day he met Akari-san, which was probably for the best, as performing badly in a game would probably draw more unwelcome attention from the go world than simply not showing up at all.

"Yes, otou-san," said Akira, "I feel ready." His father gave a warm smile, and after breakfast they departed to the study to play a game.

Akira found that he was playing as he usually did, with that time of emptiness behind him now that Shindou was back. After the game, Akira retreated to the household desktop computer to play online go.

Logging in alternately as 'sai' and 'hikaru', Akira allowed his companions to play game after game online, the two frequently fighting over who would get to play next. He recalled his own match against 'sai' online, and smiled at how far he had come since then, to finally understand who 'sai' was. During this time he even logged in as 'akira' and played a few games for himself.

After several hours of playing, Akira returned to his room and settled into a peaceful nap.