Title: The Stone-Capturing Game (previously Stone Capture)
Series: Hikaru no Go
Disclaimer: Characters are the creations of Hotta and Obata
Type/notes: AU, supernatural. Warning for non-explicit character death. Written for Blind_Go challenge #3 on LJ. Compliments to Aishuu.
Summary: Sometimes, ghosts don't want to teach.

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Even after several months, they kept finding Go stones. It had become something of a morbid joke among the staff. White and black, the stones were noticeably old and worn, and looked out of place whenever they appeared: in a corner of a newly-made bed, between the boxes of latex gloves, and once, remarkably, in a bowl of M&Ms. Someone had placed a plastic cup at the nurses’ station to hold the ones that turned up, and not a week passed by without someone--a doctor, a janitor, or a nurse--dropping one in it, usually with a puzzled shake of the head or a superstitious shudder.

No one ever suggested actually throwing the stones away.

***

"Thank you for visiting, Touya-sensei." Kuwabara Yumiko straightened from her bow, and looked at him intently. There was only an enigmatic blandness in her eyes.

Touya said, "It's the least I can do, Kuwabara-san." He hoped that none of his discomfort showed on his face. "Please," he went on, as earnestly as he could, "do inform me the moment there is any change." As though unable to help himself, he glanced towards the middle of the hospital room, where Kuwabara Honinbou lay motionless.

"Of course, Touya-sensei," she said, still with that bland politeness.

Would she, really? Touya wondered. If there was indeed a change--for the worse--he would probably be the last to be informed. On impulse, he said, "I can't help feeling that I am responsible."

Her eyes widened in genuine surprise and not a little mortification, Touya saw, that he had struck at the heart of what she was undoubtedly thinking to herself. "Touya-sensei," she said quickly, "we would never blame you-"

"But it was during his game with me that he-" Touya interrupted before she could go on, and swallowed when he realized what he had been about to say. "That he had the attack," he finished.

"Please do not blame yourself," she said, recovering quickly. "Grandfather is old, and doctors have been warning him about his heart for a long time. I'm sure he'll get well soon." She bowed again. "We are very grateful for your concern for Grandfather."

With that, Touya found himself being subtly shown the door. "Please do not worry about Grandfather," she said. "I'm sure he will get better soon; the doctors here are the best in Japan, after all."

"Y-yes, they are," Touya said, aware of a tiny voice in the back of his mind that protested this assessment. He bowed, to cover his instinct to refute her. "I'm sorry about the intrusion, and I hope Kuwabara-sensei recovers soon. Please take care of yourself, too." He added the last, noting that she looked tired as well. She looked a little startled, but bowed in acknowledgement.

They exchanged only a few more words, as politeness dictated, before he was sent on his way, the door of the hospital room closing firmly behind him.

Once is accident, Touya thought as he walked down the hallways of the hospital. Two is coincidence. Three is...? He knew that there were a few superstitious pros who now gave him a wide berth, and rumours followed him whenever he appeared publicly.

With Sakata 8-dan, it had been a media circus. The headlines were dramatic and attention-grabbing: Pro Collapses in Final Meijin Match! That Sakata had been forced to forfeit the match, allowing Touya to retain the Meijin title for another year, was a source of public discussion as well. Sakata had turned down the offer for a rematch, saying that doctors had prescribed a lengthy convalescence from his near-death experience.

In Kitani Jyuudan's case, it took longer for most people to make the connection. After all, everyone knew that the man was a heart attack waiting to happen: he was overweight, and complained constantly of heart palpitations. It was just an unfortunate coincidence that he was playing with Touya Meijin when he died from heart failure.

Or was it? Since Kuwabara had been hospitalized, speculations that had been quickly hushed out of respect to the Kitani family re-surfaced. Some people reasoned that Kuwabara was old, and probably not as robust as he used to be, while others muttered that the Honinbou title holder was disgustingly hale and hearty, and it would take an act of God to kill him--or something worse; it all added up unavoidable awkwardness when the other pros met him now.

Touya had been just as horrified as the spectators when Kuwabara gave a pained gasp in the middle of their match, and fell to the tatami, but despite his shock, one of his first thoughts had been not again!

He walked on, and suddenly caught the whisper as he passed two nurses.

"... yes, that's him..."

"... while playing Go?"

Despite himself, his shoulders stiffened, and he quickened his steps, searching for the closest exit.

The hospital had extensive grounds. Touya remembered taking long walks here the year before, along the gently-winding paths, when things had seemed so bleak. He had not expected to find himself treading along them by himself again.

There had been some landscaping since then. Touya absently noted the addition of a rock garden and the small koi pond in a corner furthest away from the main building, with benches under shady trees for strollers to rest in. He started to walk towards one, and froze.

There was someone already there, a boy who was couching on the ground next to the artfully arranged rocks. No, not a boy, Touya decided. A young man in his mid-twenties--like Touya himself--who was playing with the pebbles taken from the rock garden. A patient?

He was wondering whether to intrude, or leave the young man to his pursuits, when he heard "Hikaru!"

The young man ignored the shout.

An older woman rushed up, her worried face dissolving into a smile of relief when she spotted the young man. "Hikaru, I've been looking everywhere for you," she said, approaching him.

'Hikaru' looked up. Touya stared at the fierce scowl on his face, with bloodshot eyes that seemed to be staring into the distance. Any comment he wanted to make died on his lips.

"Go away. I'm busy."

'Hikaru' spoke in a low growl, and made an impatient swipe in the air, before turning his attention to the pebbles.

The woman looked at the pebbles, and a look of resignation came over her face. "Not again," she muttered, and gave a start when she noticed Touya. "Oh, I'm sorry!" she said. "Was he bothering you-"

"Oh no," Touya reassured her immediately. "I was just passing by," he said.

He could tell, by her quick appraisal of his appearance, and the quick sympathy that entered her eyes, that she thought he had a gravely-ill relative in the hospital. That would have been true last year, he thought.

"I see," was all she said, and she turned her attention back to the young man again. "Hikaru, it's time to go for your check-up. Suzuki-sensei is waiting."

No response. She sighed, but did not seem upset. Instead, she went to one of the benches and sat down. "It'll take a while," she said to Touya, and took out a cellphone. "Suzuki-sensei," she said. "This is Shindou Mitsuko. Yes, I've found him. He's..." she glanced at 'Hikaru'. "Playing Go. Yes, at the rock garden. Do you think...? Yes, I'll get him to come back later, then. Thank you, sensei." She ended the call.

Touya gave a start at the words 'playing Go', and looked more carefully at what 'Hikaru' was doing. He had missed it at first glance, but now he realized that the ground was scattered with black and white pebbles, arranged in various formations. He could see lines that appeared to have been drawn on the sandy ground with a stick, and despite himself, he began to study the moves that had been placed. Though it looked messy, he began to see that there was order beneath the haphazard moves. After a moment he rocked back on his heels, confused. Black was obviously struggling to live, but White… White had a masterly grasp of strategy. White moved in a way that Touya sensed should be familiar, but he could not place the style.

The more he studied it, the more confused he became. He moved to where the woman was sitting. "He likes Go, then?" he asked, not knowing what else to say.

She looked up, as though surprised to find him still there. "I think so," she said, then shrugged. "I never know for sure. On his good days, he'll do anything to play it, even using pebbles or coins as stones. At other times, he screams and gets angry whenever he sees something Go-related..." she blinked at Touya's obvious befuddlement. "He's not too stable... he's my son, and he was supposed to come for a check-up at the clinic, you see," she said, nodding towards the smallest building.

"Oh." If his memory of the hospital layout was right, that was the building for treating mental health. Mental illness was something Touya had never come across before. He searched for something to say. "He's good at Go," he finally said, and felt embarrassed at its inadequacy.

The woman smiled, but her smile was strained. They remained silent for a while.

Touya watched the game--'Hikaru' seemed to be playing both Black and White, yet White was substantially stronger. He could not help feeling puzzled; White's Go reminded him of traditional styles of play, while Black's was modern, the sort of Go taught in Go classrooms around the country. Was it possible for one person to play two styles of Go, and at such different levels? He could not help it; he was opening his mouth to ask a question when the woman stood up.

She said, "Hikaru, no!"

But it was too late. Touya had noted that Black was losing, but he did not expect 'Hikaru' to give a shout of outrage, and start throwing pebbles around. One of them caught them on the calf.

The woman was already running towards her son, but instead of stopping him, she was furiously kicking away the pebbles on the ground, destroying the 'goban' altogether.

Touya ducked a few more pebbles, and ran to help her. Together, they kicked all the pebbles back into the rock garden, stamping firmly on the ground to remove the lines on the ground. Once the 'goban' was obliterated, 'Hikaru' abruptly became calm and docile again. He tugged at the woman's sleeve and made a soft, unhappy noise.

"I told you that you had a check-up," she said to him. "Shall we go back now?" She took his silence as assent, and turned to Touya. "I'm sorry, did he hurt you with those stones?"

Touya shook his head. "It's all right." He managed to stop the impulse to glance down at the reddening bruise on his leg.

"Thank you for your help!" she said.

"You're welcome," Touya said, and hesitated, curious her identity, but afraid to offend her by asking.

She solved his quandary. "I should have introduced myself," she said with a quick bow. Touya noticed that her grip on her son's arm remained firm. "I'm Shindou Mitsuko, and this is Hikaru." She patted his arm.

"I'm Touya Akira," Touya replied automatically, bowing. "Pleased to meet-" he stopped at the look of open astonishment on her face. "Shindou-san?"

She was staring at him so blatantly that her son growled. She recovered herself, and placed another hand over his, her gaze still on Touya. "You are his son, aren't you?"

His son. Touya did not realize how much those words struck him, and all of a sudden, his grief returned, and threatened to overwhelm him. "You knew my father?" Touya asked, his throat dry.

Shindou-san nodded. "We met Touya-sensei last year. Hikaru was..." she smiled painfully. "He was much more unstable then. He was actually a patient here. It was one of the times he sneaked out of his room, and somehow, he met Touya-sensei. When we found them, he was teaching Hikaru to play Go."

Touya wondered why his father had never mentioned that he had found a new student in hospital. "H-he never said anything about that to us," he said. The doctors had granted an exemption for his father to have a portable Go set in his room, and Touya recalled that on the times he had visited, the goban had looked used, but he had not thought much on it then.

Shindou-san was patting her son on the back. "Hikaru, look. This is Touya Akira," she said. "He's the son of Touya-sensei, whom you met last year. Remember?"

The young man finally raised his head. He looked very young, and Touya saw that underneath the disheveled look, his black hair was neatly trimmed, like a schoolboy. "Touya-sensei is dead," Shindou said, his voice soft.

Shindou-san nodded, though she gave Touya an apologetic look for her son's bluntness. "Yes, I know. And this is his son."

"I'm sorry!" Shindou said suddenly.

Both Touya and Shindou-san looked at him in astonishment. "Hikaru, what is it?" Shindou-san asked.

Shindou looked very upset, and rubbed a corner of his shirt between his fingers in agitation. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have let him play. It's my fault!"

"What?" Touya said before he could stop himself.

Shindou shrank back.

"I'm sorry," Touya said quickly.

"No, I'm sorry." To his shock, Shindou began bowing to him, and tears began to fall down his cheeks. "Sorry! Sorry!" he said over and over again.

"But wait-" Touya reached out to stop him, and found himself holding Shindou's arms. "It's all right, it's not your fault," he said, thinking only to reassure him. "It's all right," he repeated.

Shindou-san gave him a look of gratitude for his reassurance.

"I shouldn't have let him," Shindou said, sniffing. His eyes began to twitch, and he stared so fixedly at an empty spot next to Touya that the hairs on the back of Touya's neck rose. He fought the compulsion to look at his left.

"I won't let him hurt you," Shindou said, and began struggling against Touya, trying to get free.

"Hikaru!" Shindou-san exclaimed.

"Who-" Touya started to ask.

"Shut up, shut up!" Shindou shouted, ignoring the two of them.

Shindou-san looked troubled and awkward. "Touya-san," she finally said, "if you don't mind, can you help me bring him back to the clinic? He can calm down there."

"Of course not," Touya managed to put his arm around the young man, and with Shindou-san's help, he began to drag a shouting Shindou back towards the clump of hospital buildings.

After a few more minutes, however, Shindou had calmed down considerably. He clung to Touya, and mumbled to himself, but did not shout anymore. By the time they reached the outpatient clinic of the mental health wing, there were more nurses, and a doctor, and Touya was relieved of his burden, and asked to wait outside. He wondered if he should wait to find out what happened, but after an hour and no one came, he decided to go home.

***

He was dreaming of his father playing Go again, but it was not with him. A little surprised, Touya saw that his father was playing with Shindou Hikaru, the young man he had met earlier. They were in a hospital room. Father's hospital room, Touya's mind supplied. Shindou, if possible, looked even younger than Touya remembered, and was perched on other end of his father's bed, as though afraid to come any closer. The portable goban was placed between them.

The game was proceeding well--at least Touya had thought so, in the dream. Shindou was White and his father Black, and they were playing a brilliant game. Both exhibited high levels of play that caused interesting shapes to form on the goban. That was only to be expected from a player of his father's caliber, but from Shindou, it was amazing. It was as though he, too, was a pro, and an experienced one at that.

Then, Touya saw it.

Directly behind Shindou was a shadow, and as Touya watched, the shadow coalesced into a human shape. A face eventually emerged: a cold, pale-looking face, with blackened lips that were half-opened--from excitement, Touya realized--as it watched the game. Neither Shindou nor his father seemed to notice its presence.

Touya froze, his limbs immobilized by disbelief. What was going on? Shindou and his father kept playing--faster and faster, until the click of the stones sounded like the rattle of branches against the window in a stormy night. Then his father captured a stone.

Three things happened at once: his father suddenly clutched his chest, and Shindou shouted as he pushed away the goban--and the cold presence raised its head to stare directly at Touya.

Touya woke up.

He was sitting upright, and despite himself, he stood up to fumble for the light switch, unwillingly giving into a sound of relief when the harsh light showed him his room in all its normality. He sat down on the floor again, aware that his shirt was soaked with perspiration and that his forehead felt cold and clammy, but his thoughts were already racing as he tried to make sense of what he had dreamt. Shindou Hikaru's appearance in the dream... well, that could be explained by the meeting that afternoon, and learning about Shindou's relationship with his father.

It's the same game. There was a part of his mind that never really rested, but thought about Go all the time, and now it pointed out the one fact that Touya had been unwilling to acknowledge since he woke. Touya mopped his forehead with a corner of his blanket, trying to get his thoughts in order.

It was, in fact, the third time he had dreamt about that game. Once is accident. Two is coincidence. Three is... Touya shook his head, annoyed at the refrain that had popped up, turning his thoughts back to the dream. He had seen only his father the first two times; this was the first time he saw another person in that dream.

Even from the first time, Touya could not bring himself to believe that the game was a product of his subconscious. He knew his own playing style well, and he did not play like that--he could not; it was not in him to feint when he could attack, or to lure his opponent into making mistakes when he could triumph by superior strategy. It had to be a game that he had seen before.

He had assumed that he remembered the game so clearly because it was an old game of his father's. He had searched through his father's kifu after the first time he dreamt about it, but after a month, he had been forced to conclude that this was a game that he had never seen before: not his father's, or his own, or that of any pros he knew. After the second time, he started to study more kifu collections, sometimes deep into the night, for a hint or a clue of its origin. There was an old-fashioned cast to the shapes that tugged at him, suggesting that his father's opponent, whoever--or what--it was, learnt Go a long time ago.

Now he had seen the game for the third time.

Touya bit his lip, looking towards the middle of his room, where his goban had been set out. It was his father's goban. He had woke up one morning, months ago, and found it in his room. His mother had said nothing to him about it.

Slowly, deliberately, he got up and walked towards it, sitting down before it, tucking his feet under himself. He uncovered both go-ke and began to lay out the game, stone by stone. It started with a Shuusaku joseki, by White, and before long, Black started to take over the goban. His father's hands, as Black, met the challenges with the same steady confidence he had exhibited for as long as Touya had known him.

White captured a stone first--Touya remembered the diamond-shaped ponnuki that created in the left corner by that. The game accelerated after that, and Touya began placing the stones faster and faster, uncertain if he had the right order, but feeling the urgency to come to the end of that game pushing him on. The 'pachi' sounds grew in speed, blurring in his ears, but he continued, seeing the game as it was played out before him in its most recent incarnation, the one with Shindou Hikaru looking small and nervous, until the end, when his father had captured a white stone-

"Father?" he croaked.

For a moment he could have sworn, that out of the corner of his eye, he had caught a glimpse of someone very like his father, the way Touya remembered him, sitting on the tatami in his usual way. His heart had seemed to stop, and in the next instant, the mirage--if mirage it was--disappeared.

The sound of dropping Go stones made him blink, and Touya saw that without realizing it, he had pushed his goban away in reaction to his shock. It was too heavy to tip over, but some of the Go stones on it had spilled onto the tatami.

Just a figment of his imagination, Touya told himself, giving himself a mental command to calm down. He reached out and took a couple of stones to replace them in the go-ke.

There was a whisper at the back of his neck. Just the breeze, he told himself. The whisper came again, this time much softer, like a sigh. "Sai..."

Touya froze, then began to collect the Go stones laboriously, noting that some of them had skittered very far indeed. One by one, he replaced them in the two go-ke, not caring if he had put white stones with the black, or black stones with the white. It took a long time. His heart thudded madly. But he did not turn around.

By the time he finished, dawn was breaking. There was no one else--nothing else--in the room that he could sense, and relief made him weak. He crawled to his futon, exhausted, and collapsed in it.

***

When Touya woke up, it was noon. For a moment, he hoped that it was only a dream, but the disarranged game, still on his goban, did not allow him to think so. In the cold light of the day, though, his thoughts were calmer. Surely there was a rational explanation...

Drawing on the composure that he normally relied on for major matches, he put the futon back in order, took a shower, and returned to his room to dress. He avoided looking at his goban. He went and ate lunch with his mother, who remarked on the bags under his eyes, and chided him for spending so much time on Go.

"Your father's anniversary is next week," she said when they had finished eating.

"Yes."

"I'm not sure if I should engage a priest for the rites," she said. She had been wondering whether to have rites performed--for the first anniversary, at least, their relatives urged. "On the other hand, your father was never the superstitious sort," she went on, "I'm sure he would think it's all nonsense."

"Let's do it," Touya said, before he could stop himself.

"Akira-san?" she was looking at him in astonishment. "I didn't realize you felt that strongly about such things."

"I don't-" he said, then shook his head. "I mean, I wasn't here when Father died. I should be here for his first anniversary, for the proper rites."

His mother pursed her lips briefly at the mention that he had not been at his father's deathbed. "I wish you had been there, the night he died," she said. She had said that before, but for once the tone of her voice was not regretful, or even resentful.

Touya stared; she sounded frustrated, as though there was something about his father's death that she did not understand. He said, "Mother, I know Father's death was a shock-"

"Of course it was a shock!" she snapped, and looked horrified at herself.

Touya watched as her hand came up to cover her mouth. "Mother?" he said.

"Of course it was a shock," she repeated more softly, avoiding his eyes. "He was doing well. He was out of the intensive care unit, and I thought he would be discharged in a week or two. Then to get a phone call like that, and to get there to see all that, to find him dead-" She fell silent.

Touya leant forward and started to rub her shoulders. She had wanted to say something else, he sensed, but he did not want to press her about it. He had only returned to Japan two days after the funeral. Later he would wonder if he had been right to obey her urgings on the phone to remain in England for the European Cup Tournament, while she took care of the funeral arrangements herself. He had always known that his mother was strong, and that she understood the demands of being a Go player better than most, but at such a crucial time... He should have been on the next plane back, he told himself, not for the first time.

Her hand met his, on her shoulder, and squeezed it. "It's all right," she said, as though she had guessed his thoughts.

Touya said nothing, only wanting to savour this moment of connection between them. His mind flashed to the experiences of the night before, and he determined there and then that he would not say a single word to her about it.

After lunch, he went back to his room. Grimly, he sat down before the goban, and started to clear the stones off it, and to re-sort the stones into their right go-ke. Despite his determination to put all thought of the previous night out of his mind, however, the game kept reverberating in his mind.

He recognized his father's Go in that game, and suddenly, he realized where he had seen White's Go before. Shindou's White stones, yesterday afternoon, had displayed the same traditional style. But he did not know how to explain why had this style cropped up in a game between his father and the strange, cold presence.

He had assumed at first that the appearance of Shindou was incidental, a mere figment his mind conjured up because he had been at once filled with pity and curiosity about the strange young man who was so obviously ill, but seemed to have forged a genuine relationship with his father.

But perhaps there was more to it--that Shindou's presence in this third dream was not mere slippage, but held the key to unraveling the mystery behind the dreams, and the cold, ghostlike presence. He could see again, in his mind's eye, Shindou sitting there, while the goban filled up, accompanied by the clicking of the stones, before that... thing looked at him.

Without realizing he was doing it, Touya mentally reviewed the last moments of the dream again, and felt his jaw drop open at the conclusion that arose.

In the first two times, someone had been placing the stones for it.

***

Shindou-san was extremely apologetic when they met by accident outside the hospital. Touya had gone there to visit Kuwabara again, but he barely had time to greet her before she ushered him towards a little café nearby. "I'm very sorry about yesterday," she said after they had both ordered coffee. "I completely forgot that you were waiting outside. I was talking to Hikaru's doctor, you see, and it took much longer than I thought."

"That's all right." The coffee was served, and he stirred sugar into it slowly, wondering how to broach the topic. It was fortunate that he met Shindou-san when he did; he had been doubtful that the clinic would give out the phone number and address of its patients.

"You didn't wait very long, I hope?"

He shook his head. "Just an hour or so," he said.

She digested that, looking embarrassed. "I'm sorry," she bowed, nearly upsetting the cup of coffee placed before her. "Oh!"

Luckily, Touya steadied the cup before it had even finished wobbling, but a large black mark spread between them, staining the white tablecloth. They had to wait as the waiter replaced the cup, mopped at the stain, neither of them saying anything else.

"Hikaru was diagnosed with schizophrenia when he was thirteen," Shindou-san said as soon as the waiter had gone. "It affected him a lot... what am I saying," she said with a nervous giggle, "of course it affected him a lot. He kept saying that there were voices in his head. The drugs that worked to stop the voices either made him confused or depressed, and he couldn't go to school at all."

Her words made Touya uncomfortable. He was not sure what made Shindou-san start to tell him about Shindou's illness, and he felt nervous, having to sit there and hear the private details of someone he had barely met. He held himself stiffly, wanting to stop her but afraid of her reaction if he tried.

Shindou-san went on, "I thought a few times that he was possessed, and we brought him to the shrine, but whatever they did, it didn't help. He just got worse. He even tried to kill himself a couple of times-" her voice faltered at that, and when she continued, her voice was rough from remembered pain. "That was when he was warded at the hospital. It didn't really help; they just gave him more drugs, and he didn't try to kill himself any more, but he was turning into a stranger... he wasn't my son anymore... then he met Touya-sensei."

Touya straightened at that. He had a feeling that he knew where the conversation was finally heading.

"Touya-sensei helped him a lot," Shindou-san said. "He played Go with him. Hikaru has become more stable… he's been able to deal with the voices much better. He was discharged recently. I'll be forever grateful to Touya-sensei for helping Hikaru so much, but Touya-san, I have a further favour to ask you."

She ducked her head again in a bow, and Touya saw that her hands were clenched around a handkerchief. He thought, with a feeling much like relief, that he was about to get his wish.

"Please tell me, Shindou-san," he said. "I'll try my best to help."

"Will you come and see Hikaru?" she burst out. It felt as though she had been restraining herself from asking that the moment she saw him. She went on before he could reply. "Please? Since yesterday, he's been asking for Touya-sensei. I know it's a lot to ask, and you don't really know him at all, and he's... he's violent, sometimes, but I know my Hikaru is still inside and he would never hurt anyone-"

Touya could hear the fervency in her voice, and her worry seemed to surround them, creating a shield all around, as though she could pull him into her world by pure effort. He made an abortive motion out of instinct, and she flinched.

"No!" he tried to reassure her immediately. "I didn't mean--I mean, I would be glad to visit him. Today, if it's all right with you."

Her face cleared. "Really?" she said, her voice squeaking a little, like a woman much younger. "Oh, thank you, thank you! Hikaru will be so excited." She was smiling; relaxed, a far cry from her earlier agitation.

Touya felt obscurely guilty.

Her task accomplished, Shindou-san grew motherly, urging him to eat something, and recommended the café's signature roast beef sandwiches. The thought passed Touya's mind that she knew the menu so well because she had eaten there so often, alone. Adept at detecting what was not said, he did not ask about her husband.

They walked to the subway station after the coffee. On impulse, Touya asked, "Did my father spend a lot of time teaching Go to Shindou? When I saw the way he played yesterday, it looked like he already knew a lot."

She nodded. "The truth is, Hikaru already knew a little Go, when he was in his last year of elementary school. He was caught trying to steal one of his grandfather's antique gobans to sell…" she looked up with a helpless laugh. "He was a terrible brat when he was young. We spoilt him too much. When his grandfather said that as punishment, he had to learn to play Go, we discovered that he already knew some." She frowned. Her voice trailed off, and her expression grew even more troubled.

"What is it?"

She tried to laugh it off. "His grandfather said that Hikaru was good at Go. Too good, in fact." Her voice softened so much that Touya had to strain his ears to hear her. "Too good for an elementary school boy…"

His heartbeat quickened. "What do you mean?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. I've tried to learn more about Go, but it doesn't help! It didn't help me to understand what was happening to my son. Sometimes," she hesitated. "I wonder if it happened before that," she said, softly as though to herself.

"Before 'that'?"

She shook her head. "Maybe it's my overactive imagination, but later, I thought that Hikaru's behaviour had already started to change before that. He had been locking himself in his room all day, but I thought it was nothing."

"Shindou-san, before what?"

She rubbed the side of her head as though it was painful. "His grandfather's death. I thought that it was his grandfather's death that triggered Hikaru's illness--some doctors said that the death of someone close could be a factor..."

The words 'his grandfather's death' caught Touya's attention. Surely it could not mean what he thought it meant? He swallowed. "Shindou-san, I'm sorry to ask this, but how did Shindou's grandfather die?"

She blinked at him. "Heart attack. During a game between him and Hikaru."

***

After that, the rest of the journey to Shindou-san's home continued with only polite conversation. Touya told her a little about his work, but he could tell that Shindou was impatient to reach home and was not really listening to him. It suddenly occurred to him that she had made the trip to the hospital again, on the off-chance that he would be there, so she could make this request.

They lived in a small house in the suburbs. Shindou-san said a neighbour was helping to keep an eye on her son, but it was plain she was worried and immediately went upstairs to check on him. Touya was left exchanging more polite greetings with the neighbour, a housewife named Fujisaki.

Shindou-san was smiling when she came downstairs. She nodded at him. "He's awake," she said. "I told him you were here. Just go right up. I know he wants to see you alone."

Touya nodded uncertainly. Now that the moment was upon him, Touya found that he was nervous. For all his mother's assurances, Shindou was still a mental patient, and given what Touya wanted to ask him, it could end up being an upsetting visit, to say the least.

"It's all right. Go on!" Shindou said, ushering him forward. She did not seem at all troubled at the thought that her son was having a visitor all by himself.

Touya nodded, and took the stairs slowly, and caught Shindou-san saying, "Fujisaki-san, I hope Hikaru didn't give you any trouble-" as he reached the second floor.

The first door was ajar. Touya took a deep, fortifying breath, and entered. It was the room that faced the front, he realized, before he took in the rest of the room--not a padded room, a tiny part of his mind observed nervously--which was plain, except for a poster of Dragon Ball Z that looked old and faded. It was smaller than he expected, but it looked homely. Touya attributed that to the number of personal belongings scattered about, and the large, colourful bedspread on the bed. In the centre of the room, wrapped in a blanket, and sitting with his feet on a chair and his elbows on his knees, was the young man Touya had met yesterday.

"Hello, Touya-sensei," Shindou Hikaru said, without looking at him.

"Shindou-san," Touya said.

"Let's play Go," Shindou said, slipping off the chair to sit on the floor.

Touya saw that in lieu of an actual goban, there was a piece of paper on the floor, with lines drawn on it. 19 by 19, like a real goban; even the star points were marked. There were two mugs, filled with what looked like black and white Go stones.

"Touya-sensei!" Shindou said more insistently, as Touya hesitated. "We have to play. I'll place the stones."

Wonderingly, Touya went over and sat down opposite him. Of all the reasons he could think of for Shindou to ask for him, he had never expected a game with him.

"Let's start," Shindou said, and paused.

It was only because Touya was watching him so closely that he saw it. Just very slightly, Shindou tilted his head to the side. Touya felt his eyes narrow.

But Shindou only said, "You're Black. Touya-sensei, please start."

Wondering why he did not just rush out of the room to demand an explanation from Shindou-san, Touya reached towards the mug holding the black stones. Was it his imagination that his fingers were trembling?

He was unprepared for his hand to be slapped away by Shindou.

"No!" Shindou said, and reached for a black stone himself. He plunked it down on the star-point at Touya's upper right. Then he took a white stone and placed it on the star-point on his right.

The 'stones' were actually checker pieces, pebbles, and buttons, Touya noted, as Shindou then took out a black stone (a button in the shape of a flower) and placed it below the lower star-point. The next white stone was a pebble, white with pink streaks. It went on the remaining star-point.

Touya kept his hands to himself, but his confusion grew.

A struggle was beginning between Black and White. Despite himself, Touya felt mesmerized. Shindou was most likely replaying a game, he told himself. Going by the level of skill, Touya could tell that it was a game between two consummate players. White was a master strategist, it seemed, building up enough territory to ensure a victory, yet at the same time using that territory to lure Black in. Black avoided the trap without seeming to do so deliberately, instead finding the weaknesses in White's defenses and attacking boldly. Even though he was only a spectator, Touya found himself tensing as the game grew more vigorous. White's style of playing was fascinating, yet Black showed a balance between attacking and defending. Touya was starting to find that style familiar... Then Shindou placed another black stone, and in turn captured a white one.

Between one breath and another, Touya saw it. Black played like his father. A game, then, that his father had played? But the tense atmosphere that had sprung up between them made him reconsider. The speed of the game varied too, with irregular pauses between the hands, sometimes long and sometimes short.

With an inner jolt, Touya realized his initial assumption was wrong: Shindou was not just laying out the stones for a completed game. He was doing something else altogether. He watched Shindou's face from then on, instead of the game.

Shindou seemed to be in the grip of a fever. He still tilted his head to the side, as though to better listen to someone standing behind him, and after he did so, he placed a white stone. Then Touya realized that Shindou was doing it to him too: his head shifted a fraction of an inch towards Touya in turn, and after he did so, he placed a black stone.

A memory of the whisper across his neck the night before appeared in Touya's mind, superimposed over Shindou saying 'Touya-sensei' just now. Father? he dared to ask, in his mind, before he stopped, horrified.

Shindou was not re-playing a game. Shindou was playing a game--no, he was placing the stones for both Black and White. And if his father was Black...

Touya licked dry lips; his mouth felt as though someone had stuffed sawdust in it. "Shindou," he asked as softly as he could. "Who is White?"

Shindou did not seem to hear him. He kept placing the stones. Black, then pause. White. Another pause. Black. Another capture: the dull thud of a plastic checker piece. Shindou's left eye was starting to twitch, then his right, and perspiration ran down his forehead.

"Shindou Hikaru?" Touya tried again.

Shindou closed his eyes, and his face screwed tight, as though he was in the middle of a mental struggle. "His name is Sai," he whispered. He opened his eyes and began to place stones again. White first; Black took longer this time, but White succeeded in capturing a stone, too, five hands later. Shindou's hands started to shake. "No," he said, then louder: "No." He clenched his hand, his knuckles showing white, as though he was fighting against something. "I place the stones. Not you!" The 'you' came out in a snarl.

Touya started to protest, and rapidly realized that Shindou was not talking to him at all. He felt his hands come up, in a gesture of defense that was probably futile.

Then Shindou shouted "Stop!" and his hand shot out, slapping the stones aside. He began throwing them wildly. Pebbles, plastic pieces and buttons flew across the room. A few hit Touya on the face.

Touya scrambled back to avoid more stones, fear warring with concern.

Shindou was muttering incoherently now, and he continued to throw stones around, panting as though he had been running a marathon. "Get out," Shindou said through clenched teeth, but he was not looking at Touya.

Touya swallowed, not sure what to do. He half-expected Shindou-san to burst into the room and demand explanations for Shindou's outburst.

Minutes later, though, Shindou stopped throwing things, and let his arms flop to the side as though he was exhausted. "Sorry, Touya-sensei," he said, still panting.

"What?" Touya said.

"And I'm sorry too, Touya-san," Shindou said.

It took Touya only a split-second to realize that Shindou was actually apologizing to him as well, and not just to his father. "What?" he said in total bewilderment.

Shindou managed a weak grin, which grew decidedly stronger as the seconds ticked by.

Touya continued to stare at him, uncomprehending.

It only took five minutes of being loudly laughed at before Touya concluded that Shindou Hikaru, questionable psychosis (and possible possession) aside, had a sadistic sense of humour. Unfortunately, that was also when Shindou-san pushed opened the door to the room. Her eyes widened at the various objects spilled across the room.

Touya stood up awkwardly. "I'm sorry," he said. "I don't know what I did, but Shindou-san …"

"It's always like that night," she whispered, approaching Shindou, who had stopped laughing and was tearing up the piece of paper, and throwing the torn pieces around.

"That night?" Touya asked.

"When Touya-sensei died." She held her son's arms, stopping him from doing anymore throwing, and murmured to him softly, in an attempt to get him to calm down.

Touya felt his jaw drop. "When my father died? Shindou-san, what-"

But Shindou-san turned her head and gave him an apologetic look, still holding on to her son. "I'm sorry, Touya-san. Can you come back tomorrow? It's time for Hikaru to take his medicine."

Puzzled, but sensing that he could get no more out of her, Touya left.

***

At home, Touya sat and thought about the day's events in his room, but every glance at his goban made him uncomfortable. He left his room, and saw his mother seated at the sitting room table with a book.

She looked up as he entered. "You're back late," she said.

Touya did not mention that he had spent hours walking on the streets, trying to make sense of what he had learnt. "What happened the night my father died?" he asked, hearing his voice come out low with tension.

His mother frowned. "Has something happened?"

Touya asked instead, "There was something strange about Father's death, wasn't there?"

He watched his mother, as though hoping to surprise her, but her gaze on him was steady, with only a trace of condemnation visible from the narrowed corners of her eyes. "It's taken you a long time to ask that," she said.

Stung, Touya began, "Mother, I-"

"The hospital phoned in the middle of the night," she said before he could continue. "I wasn't expecting anything. He had been doing very well that day. He was playing Go--he said one of the patients there knew how--and you know I never worried when he was well enough to play."

Touya almost smiled. He noted her mention of one of the patients: was it Shindou?

His mother continued, "I rushed to the hospital. They had already declared him dead by then, but they didn't have time to do anything else about the room."

Something about the way her voice broke on the last word drew his attention. "The room? What about the room?"

She shook her head. "I don't know what happened. The room was a mess; it looked though someone had been throwing the furniture around: I could see signs of things smashed, and there were scratches on the wall... and Go stones everywhere."

"Go stones?"

She did not seem to hear him. "Not just scattered on the floor, or the bed. Everywhere: on the window-sill, high shelves, even on the chairs at the far end of the room. They found a few embedded in the walls, too."

Touya tried to imagine what could have happened to cause the scene his mother described. Even if his father's heart attack had started in the middle of a game, it could not have caused Go stones to fly about the room like that. Unless someone threw them.

"They later told me that the room was already like that when they went inside. No one had heard anything, until the emergency call button was pressed. They thought it was a burglar, at first, but they couldn't find any other clues, and there was no sign that your father died... from unnatural causes."

She closed her eyes at that, and Touya saw again how much his father's death had worn her down. He sat closer, and dared to touch her hand gently, before enfolding it in his.

She squeezed back, much like the way she had done so that afternoon.

Touya swallowed grief and cursed himself again for deciding to get on that plane. He had almost decided not to go, even though it was the third time the organizers had invited him. But he told himself that it was only a short trip, and he had to consider his career. And he had decided to go. The news of the death had been waiting for him at the airport when he landed in London.

Something occurred to him. "That patient who played with Father... do you know his name?" he asked as casually as he could.

His mother shook her head. "I never even saw him. It was a little strange, actually. But your father mentioned him by name once or twice in passing. I think his name was..." she frowned in memory.

"Shindou Hikaru?" Touya asked.

"No," his mother looked at him in surprise. "Sai."

***

To his relief, his sleep that night was uninterrupted, and he woke up rested, and determined to find out more. After a quick breakfast, Touya walked to the subway station, and ran into Kuwabara Yumiko at the entrance. "Touya-sensei," she said in surprise. "You haven't heard, then? About Grandfather?"

Touya wanted to retort that she was his only source of news about Kuwabara Honinbou. And if she had not contacted him... "It's good news, from your expression," he said.

She nodded. "Grandfather is getting better. The doctor says he will recover fully."

A huge weight seemed to roll off his shoulders. "I'm glad to hear that," he said, and bowed formally. "Please tell Kuwabara-sensei that I shall visit him later, if I may."

"Of c-course," she said, a small frown creasing her brow. "It's visiting hours now. Why not visit now? Grandfather said that I shouldn't have b-blamed you."

"It's all right-"

"No," she shook her head. "I'm sorry about that. It was unworthy of me. Will you come, then?"

Touya hesitated. "I-I have to do something first," he said. "I'll visit as soon as I can. Excuse me," he bowed again, and left, not veering from his intention of taking the train to Shindou's home. He was aware that Kuwabara Yumiko was staring behind him with open astonishment. No doubt she considered him an uncaring, callous man. But he had to talk to Shindou first.

Shindou-san greeted him with gratifying relief, and apologized for her dismissal the day before. She did not seem disturbed that Touya's first request was to see her son, but instead, walked him up halfway. Touya waited until she had left, and turned towards Shindou's room. The door was ajar, again.

"Can you see my father's ghost?" Touya asked the moment he walked into Shindou's room.

Shindou, now seated on his bed and resting his chin on his knees, showed no surprise at the question, or at its seeming suddenness. He nodded.

Touya hesitated at the ready answer. "Is-Is he here now?"

Shindou shook his head slowly, from left to right, and back again, like a robot. "He left soon after I spoilt the game yesterday. But he'll be back soon."

Touya could not help a shiver at that. "Really?"

Shindou hugged his knees. "He's a Go-playing ghost. Go-playing ghosts just want to continue playing Go," he said.

Something about the way he said that made Touya's heart chill. He opened his mouth, only to stutter, "H-how do you know that?"

"You're lucky," Shindou said, not answering his question. "He won't try to hurt you."

"He-what?"

"He won't try to hurt you. He won't try to force you to play his Go. He won't try to take over your heart so that he can place stones for himself. Other people, maybe."

It took a minute for Shindou's nonchalant words to penetrate. When they did, cold horror filled Touya. "What other people?" he asked, unable to believe what Shindou had implied. "Did he-did Father-" he could not find it in himself to continue.

Shindou nodded.

"Then Sakata-san and Kitani-san and Kuwabara-san..."

Shindou nodded again.

Touya did not find it strange that Shindou knew of the three opponents who had all suffered from heart attacks while playing with him. He recalled his mother's description of his father's hospital room, and more essentially, the name she had uttered. "Shindou," he asked, hoping that none of his horror showed on his face. "Did Sai kill my father?"

"There can be physical strain, if he tries to possess someone he was not attached to," Shindou said mechanically, as though he was reciting from a book.

Touya felt his knees growing weak, and he instinctively reached out for a form of support, and found the smooth, white wall behind him. He leant on it, and felt himself starting to slide down to the floor. "And you," he said, staring at Shindou and hearing his hoarse voice asking, as though from a long distance. "What has Sai been doing to you?"

There was a choked sound from Shindou.

"Shindou-" Touya said, startled, getting to his feet.

"I won't let him," Shindou snarled, and he started to knock his head against the bed rail.

"No!" Touya rushed over and grabbed hold of Shindou by his arms. He half-hoped that Shindou-san would come in; he did not know what else to do. "Don't hurt yourself."

"He'll leave if I die," Shindou said, struggling against him. "All of this will go away if I die."

"No." Touya held his shoulders firmly, and sat down beside him. Shindou's struggles were weakening, but that was because he was beginning to cry. "Please don't."

"I don't want to see him anymore. I don't want to keep fighting anymore. I caused Grandpa's death!"

"It wasn't you."

"And Touya-sensei was nice to me. But that just made him a target, like Grandpa."

Touya swallowed. "It still wasn't your fault," he said.

"But-"

"If it was, then what about me?" Touya asked him. "It means that I caused Kitani-san's death, and caused Sakata-san and Kuwabara-san to be hospitalized. And now I'm like you," he went on, realizing with a shock that this was true.

Shindou's jaw dropped as that belatedly occurred to him as well. "Oh."

Touya released him, but watched him warily. "C-can you tell me more about him?"

"At first, he just taught me Go," Shindou said immediately, before he fell silent.

Touya waited.

After several minutes, Shindou sniffed, and rubbed his eyes fiercely. "But it wasn't enough. He wanted to play, too. So I placed stones for him. He stood behind me, and he whispered to me when I played."

Touya thought about the cold, ghostly figure in his dream. That was Sai, he realized, and to have someone like that at his back... he repressed a shiver.

Shindou continued talking. "Then I wanted to play for myself, and he refused. I kept pushing him away, but he kept coming back. Then Grandpa wanted to play with me, and I-" his shoulders shook.

Touya took his hands quickly.

"I didn't realize he could do that!" Shindou said, half-heartedly trying to pull free. He sniffed more loudly. "I couldn't stop him. Grandpa was old. He couldn't-he didn't-" He fell silent. "I don't remember what happened after that. Mum said I started to get very sick."

Touya squeezed his hands. "But she said you became better after you met my father."

Shindou swallowed. "Touya-sensei realized after a while that Sai… wasn't me. And that I wasn't Sai. And the night he died-"

"You tried to stop Sai from possessing my father, didn't you?" The events of the dream came back to him.

Shindou's head slumped against Touya's shoulder. "Sometimes loud noises can distract him. Go stuff that doesn't look like Go stuff. He doesn't like that." That explained the strange-looking Go stones. "Or when someone disrupts the game. Or some sort of commotion. Otherwise he'll try to take over anyone who is playing. And then he kills them."

Touya swallowed.

"It was only after Touya-sensei's death that I learnt how to keep him out. Not all the time, but enough that he has to fight me."

Touya sat thinking. "Shindou," he said after a while.

"Why can't he just go away!" Shindou shouted.

"Shindou, I have an idea."

***

Shindou frowned, and looked uneasily around him, before his gaze focused on the item Touya had set up. "Are you sure?"

"Let's do it," Touya said, pushing down his inner doubts. "Sit down here," he said, indicating the floor.

"Um…"

Touya sat down on the floor of the hospital room first. It was the room that his father used to stay in, in fact. He had led the hospital authorities to think that he intended to hold the first year rites for the dead. It had taken a lot of arguments before the hospital agreed to this, even so.

He had been doing a lot of arguing in the past few days. By contrast, it was astonishing how quickly Shindou-san had agreed to his plan. But then, she was desperate too. Shindou's condition had improved, but it was still a far cry from recovery.

"It's all right," Touya said, watching him closely. "I'll be here, too."

With obvious reluctance, Shindou sat down. "I can see the bloodstains, you know," he said. "I'm the only one who can."

Touya looked at the goban, which had also taken a lot of arguments and a journey to Innoshima--the Shuusaku Museum was there--to obtain. On loan only, he was admonished--Touya had leant heavily on his status as a Go pro, and a title-holder, to push the request through. It looked like an ordinary antique goban to him, unstained, but he believed Shindou.

He was not surprised that Shindou's family had chosen to donate the goban, after the circumstances of its owner's death.

"Ready?" he asked Shindou.

Shindou stared as he brought out two containers of Go stones, not in the usual wooden go-ke, but in two plastic boxes used to hold bento. "What-"

"The nurses kept the stones you used after that night," Touya said. He did not mention that the staff had been finding Go stones for an entire year.

"Oh."

Touya took a deep breath, before he asked. "Is my father-"

Shindou glanced at him. No, behind him. "Yes."

"And him-" He meant Sai.

Another glance, this time to the side. "Yes."

Touya pushed the white stones towards Shindou. "Then let's start," he said.

Shindou held his gaze a second longer, his fingertips lingering at the edge of the bento box. "I'll play White," he said.

Sai always played white, it seemed. Touya nodded, and turned his attention to the goban, before lifting his hand to the bento box.

The stones were icy to the touch, and so cold that they seemed to burn his fingers. Touya picked one up between thumb and forefinger instead of his usual hold, and even so he felt awkward and clumsy, as though the stones had a life of their own and wanted to leap away from him.

Opposite him, Shindou seemed to be struggling too. He was holding the box of stones so tightly that Touya thought he heard the plastic bento box crack, and his eyes were squeezed shut.

"Shindou?"

Still with his eyes closed, Shindou nodded. "Please," he burst out, paused to take a loud, harsh breath, and went on more slowly, as though under duress. "Please give this one your guidance."

Touya found himself returning the words, "Please give this one your guidance."

The formal words, at first sounding out of place in a hospital, seemed to have the cadence of an opening ritual. In the same instant, there was a change in the room, as though the air itself had snapped. Everything became unnaturally still.

Shindou had stopped his struggles. He opened his eyes slowly, and when he did so, the expression in them was icily calm.

Touya placed the first stone.

The game had already started with the opening words. That was the essence of Go; it was a game of minds beyond the actual goban.

Shindou held a white stone with his thumb and finger as well, and placed the second stone, slow and precise. The 'pachi' sound was soft, as though it had been muffled.

They continued. Shindou was good, Touya soon found, but profoundly untutored: he had good instincts, he knew the strategies, and he read ahead with a quickness that would have been amazing in a mere amateur, but for someone of his skill, there was one glaring lack.

Shindou did not seem to feel the rhythm of the game.

There was a tempo to Go; experienced players knew that the best games occurred when both sides allowed the back-and-forth parrying of hands to envelop the game, to let a natural pace surface. It was a rhythm that ebbed and flowed without break. Attack and defense came readily as needed. Between two equally matched players, the one who could sense the rhythm best usually had the upper hand.

By now, they were entering mid-game; Shindou had the right edge, but Touya was beginning to consolidate his territories in the centre. The lower left was still sparsely occupied, and Touya knew that Shindou would need to make inroads into that to grow his territory. He could feel the call of the game; he attacked first.

Touya remembered that as a child, it had been his father who told him to 'feel' the game as they played. By listening to the rhythm of the game, one struck the balance between playing blindly on pure instinct and coolly calculating the odds of every hand. It made the game joyful

Shindou did not have that. He played strongly, but it was as mechanical as a cuckoo-clock.

Touya pitied him despite himself. He could feel the game in his heart, and knew what his next hands were. He surrounded the white stone on the lower left star point and captured it.

The air grew colder.

Shindou shuddered, and his hands jerked over the goban.

Touya said, hesitantly, "Shindou-"

A quick toss of the head in denial. "No, go on," Shindou said, though his knuckles were starting to turn white.

Of course, if Shindou had been trying not to hear Sai all these years, it was no wonder that he had never thought to search for the rhythm of the game.

No one had ever held Shindou by the hand and told him to listen while a game was being played, because he could only play by himself. The sheer loneliness he had faced made Touya's head spin. Go was a game played by two people. He could not imagine how difficult it must have been for Shindou, to keep the game in his mind, never able to engage fully with another opponent, because to do so would be to give up his own mind.

Doubt entered Touya's mind. Was this going to work?

Shindou was starting to fall behind; they were deep in mid-game now, and would be entering the end-game stage soon. He captured another white stone, and this time Shindou shook, violently, his shoulders hunching up as though to protect himself from an unseen blow.

Touya paused, and stared at him. "Shindou!" he said.

Shindou dropped the stone he was holding, slammed both palms to the floor and drew in breath with a high, keening sound that made the hair on Touya's neck stand up.

"No!" Shindou said.

Talking to Sai, Touya knew.

Shindou whispered, "It's my body. Y-you can't use it."

Touya watched as Shindou began to shake, from head to toe.

"No!" Shindou said, and suddenly there was blood on his lip, where he had apparently bitten on it.

"Shindou!" Touya exclaimed, horrified. His doubts, long quelled by his earlier drive, rose to the surface. "This is a bad idea, maybe we should stop-"

Shindou ignored him. "And you can't use his, either." A twisted smile was beginning to grow on his face. "He has Touya-sensei. And Touya-sensei won't let you."

At that, Touya felt a slow breath of wind brush his nape. Not wind, he realized, fighting the urge to rub the spot. Breath. But ghosts don't breathe...

"Play!" Shindou suddenly shouted. "Why don't you play now, huh?"

Don't taunt Sai, Touya wanted to say, but the back of his neck was growing numb from a coldness that was spreading down his back. Father?

"You're not playing?" Shindou asked, starting to grin, before he laughed. "Well, if you're not, then I will," he said. He reached forward, his hand shaking, and planted a stone on 10-8.

Touya stared, and he could have sworn that the cold presence behind him paused, too.

It was the worst possible hand Shindou could have played. White's defenses were weakened, its victories undone, and Black had an open invitation to march right in. Studying the newly placed stone and its implications, Touya started to feel horror spread through his body. What had Shindou done?

Touya could see large beads of perspiration roll down Shindou's cheeks, almost like tears. Then, as Shindou turned his head to the side, he realized they were tears.

Shindou was holding the box of Go stones to his chest now, and he spoke to the empty space beside him: "If you want to play, you'll have to hold the stones yourself."

There was no reaction, and Shindou turned back to Touya. "Play your next hand, Touya," he said. "Keep playing." There was no expression on his face.

Touya nodded. He could see the multiple weaknesses Shindou's previous move had revealed. It would be easy to take advantage of that, though it was likely that the game would end quickly. He started to place his next hand, but was stopped by a sudden feeling of vertigo, as though an earthquake had occurred. His hands fell to his side, and he closed his eyes, trying to damp down the feeling of nausea that had accompanied the vertigo.

Then he realized that the coldness at the back of his neck was gone, and his hands were still firmly clenched in his lap. Yet, he could hear loud 'pachi' sounds, one following the other with scarcely more than a few seconds' hesitation.

Who's moving the stones? Shindou? Shindou and...

He opened his eyes, and froze.

The goban was no longer right in front of him. It had somehow moved several inches to the right, and on either end were two ghosts. Touya swallowed at the sight of his father's ghost, looking almost the same as he did when he was alive.

Much paler, though, he thought with a touch of hysteria, before he turned his gaze reluctantly to the other ghost.

Ancient-looking Japanese clothes, with a black hat, and the impression of long, sleek hair. His face was nearly white, and his eyes were the same eyes that appeared in Touya's dream.

A soft, choked sound came from opposite him.

Touya could see Shindou curled up on the floor. "Shindou!" he exclaimed, "Are you all-"

Shindou was staring at the goban. Touya followed his gaze, and saw that the stones seemed to be moving on their own, floating over the surface, and falling with a 'pachi' sound.

Moving the stones themselves.

Touya swallowed. "Father?" he finally said.

No answer. Reluctantly, and very softly, with a quick glance at Shindou, he said, "Sai?"

No answer either. The 'pachi' sounds continued, with the tempo quickening, no doubt because Sai was trying to overcome the errors committed by Shindou's hand.

Out of the corner of his eye, Touya saw Shindou uncurl from his position, and sit up. He was deathly pale, and he looked much younger. It could have been a trick of his imagination, but Touya thought that Shindou looked better, in an undefinable way. It could be the lack of shadows in his eyes, or the relaxed set of his shoulders, as though he had finally put down a painfully heavy burden.

He waited, his attention wavering between Shindou and the ghosts, until Shindou pushed himself forward, close enough to touch.

"It's all right," Shindou whispered, and Touya could smell the blood from his bitten lip. "We can go now."

Touya glanced at the ghosts again. His father was still playing with Sai, and Touya's heart clenched as he realized that they were truly separated by the line between life and death. The game was proceeding smoothly, and there was a pace to the exchange of hands that sounded almost musical, and very far away.

Without knowing he had done it, his hand was on Shindou's arm, helping him to stand up. Shindou watched the two ghosts playing. Touya fancied that he could hear the rhythm of the game, too. He could see Shindou's lips shape the words: 'Goodbye, Sai.'

He and Shindou stared at the goban for a moment more, before he helped Shindou out of the room. They waited outside until morning, until the 'pachi' sounds had stopped.

***

"He's really gone?" Touya asked.

"You've been asking that for days," Shindou said. "Yes. And Touya-sensei too."

He and Touya had been thanking the hospital administration for their help, and Shindou-san had stopped to talk to Shindou's doctor again, while they took a walk.

Shindou's contented tones seemed to indicate that somehow, Sai and his father were probably playing Go together in the big goban in the sky, and Touya decided that he did not want to know anymore. He had his Go, and it was his to play, without fear of accidentally murdering someone. He sat contemplating the rock garden, Shindou beside him, and luxuriated in the relief of it all.

He would always feel guilty about the heart attacks, especially for Kitani, who had not survived, but then he already felt guilty after the attacks. Knowing that it was him, and his father's ghost... just made it official somehow. It would not happen again, he assured himself.

It was in the middle of that game in the hospital room, on Shuusaku's goban that he understood what Shindou said about Go-playing ghosts.

Touya still dreamt of the stones gliding along soundlessly along the lines of the goban, sometimes. "They didn't really know us at all, did they?" he asked.

"Ghosts are different from humans," Shindou said after a while. "They don’t understand what it’s like to be human. Or rather, without this flesh," he stretched out a hand and looked at it, "they have nothing to remind them. They just want to keep playing." He shivered, and wrapped his arms around himself.

"That’s why they stay," Touya said. "That was why my father stayed. So he could play with Sai--not because I was his son or because he cared for me, but because--I was an end to his means."

"I know. You're going to be very busy soon, aren't you?" Shindou asked.

"Yes." The tournament season was continuing, and Touya looked forward to his scheduled games.

"I'll be following you on the news, even though I'll be busy with school."

He had heard that Shindou was planning on going to night classes. "Really?"

Shindou was looking at him, amused. "I know a lot of Go, but I also dropped out of high school, and I missed out on, oh, learning about the real world."

Touya smiled. Shindou sounded eager about the latter. He supposed that for a person who had been trapped inside his own head--with only a Go-obsessed ghost for company--for years on end, the real world sounded like a whole new exciting planet. "Then I wish you good luck," he said, and concern made him add, "But are you comfortable being back in a class? It's noisy and distracting."

"I’m getting better, you know." Shindou smiled a little sadly. "I’ll probably be dependent on meds my whole life, though. I’ve been crazy for so long that it’s incurable now, even with-" he shrugged.

"I’m probably as crazy as you are," Touya said, referring to his father's ghost. "But I'll visit you whenever I have the time."

Shindou nodded. His gaze, fixed on the rock garden, suddenly seemed far away. Undeniably, his condition had improved out of recognition after that night. He was still prone to shouting fits when he was agitated, but they always ended very quickly, and he never complained about hearing voices anymore. He seemed to regard the future with simultaneous youthful enthusiasm and battle-wearied tenacity.

Touya was looking forward to getting to know this Shindou Hikaru. On impulse, he took Shindou's arm, feeling comforted by its solidness, reminded of the way he had helped Shindou out of the hospital room that night. After a moment, he pulled the other man upright. "Come on, let’s get you home."

-----------------The end---------------